/>
betrayal, or stabs him in the back to avoid it.



The outlaw chief had slipped into the room so silently that the first

inkling they had of his presence was that gentle, insulting voice. Now,

as he lounged easily before them, leg thrown over the back of a chair

and thumbs sagging from his trouser pockets, they looked the picture of

schoolboys caught by their master in a conspiracy. How long had he been

there? How much had he heard? Full of suspicion and bad whisky as they

were, his confident contempt still cowed the very men who were planning

his destruction. A minute before they had been full of loud threats and

boastings; now they could only search each other's faces sullenly for a

cue.



"Celebrating Chaves' return from manana land, I reckon. That's the

proper ticket. I wonder if we couldn't afford to kill another of



Collins' fatted calves."



Mr. Hardman, not enjoying the derisive raillery, took a hand in the

game. "I expect the boys hadn't better touch the sheriff's calves, now

you and him are so thick."



"We're thick, are we?" Leroy's indolent eyes narrowed slightly as they

rested on him.



"Ain't you? It sure seemed that way to me when I looked out of that

mesquit wash just above Eldorado Springs and seen you and him eating

together like brothers and laughing to beat the band. You was so clost

to him I couldn't draw a bead on him without risking its hitting you."



"Spying, eh?"



"If that's the word you want to use, cap. And you were enjoying

yourselves proper."



"Laughing, were we? That must have been when he told me how funny you

looked in the 'altogether' shedding false teeth and information about

hidden treasure."



"Told you that, did he?" Mr. Hardman incontinently dropped repartee as a

weapon too subtle, and fell back on profanity.



"That's right pat to the minute, cap, what you say about the information

he leaks," put in Neil. "How about that information? I'll be plumb

tickled to death to know you're carrying it in you vest pocket."



"And if I'm not?"



"Then ye are a bigger fool than I had expected sorr, to come back here

at all," said the Irishman truculently.



"I begin to think so myself, Mr. Reilly. Why keep faith with a set of

swine like you?"



"Are you giving it to us that you haven't got those papers?"



Leroy nodded, watching them with steady, alert eyes. He knew he stood on

the edge of a volcano that might explode at any moment.



"What did I tell yez?" Reilly turned savagely to the other disaffected

members of the gang. "Didn't I tell yez he was selling us out?"



Somehow Leroy's revolver seemed to jump to his hand without a motion on

his part. It lay loosely in his limp fingers, unaimed and undirected.



"SAY THAT AGAIN, PLEASE."



Beneath the velvet of Leroy's voice ran a note more deadly than any

threat could have been. It rang a bell for a silence in which the clock

of death seemed to tick. But as the seconds fled Reilly's courage oozed

away. He dared not accept the invitation to reach for his weapon and try

conclusions with this debonair young daredevil. He mumbled a retraction,

and flung, with a curse, out of the room.



Leroy slipped the revolver back in his holster and quoted, with a laugh:



"To every coward safety, And afterward his evil hour."



"What's that?" demanded Neil. "I ain't no coward, even if Jay is. I

don't knuckle under to any man. You got a right to ante up with some

information. I want to know why you ain't got them papers you promised

to bring back with you."



"And I, too, senor. I desire to know what it means," added Chaves, his

eyes glittering.



"That's the way to chirp, gentlemen. I haven't got them because Forbes

blundered on us, and I had to take a pasear awful sudden. But I made an

appointment to meet Collins to-morrow."



"And you think he'll keep it?" scoffed Neil.



"I know he will."



"You seem to know a heap about him," was the significant retort.



"Take care, York."



"I'm not Hardman, cap. I say what I think.



"And you think?" suggested Leroy gently.



"I don't know what to think yet. You're either a fool or a traitor. I

ain't quite made up my mind. When I find out you'll ce'tainly hear from

me straight. Come on, boys." And Neil vanished through the door.



An hour later there came a knock at Leroy's door. Neil answered his

permission to enter, followed by the other trio of flushed beauties. To

the outlaw chief it was at once apparent with what Dutch courage they

had been fortifying themselves to some resolve. It was characteristic

of him, though he knew on how precarious a thread his life was hanging,

that disgust at the foul breaths with which they were polluting the

atmosphere was his first dominant emotion.



"I wish, Lieutenant Chaves, next time you emigrate you'd bring another

brand of poison out to the boys. I can't go this stuff. Just remember

that, will you?"



The outlaw chief's hard eye ran over the rebels and read them like

a primer They had come to depose him certainly, to kill him perhaps.

Though this last he doubted. It wouldn't be like Neil to plan his

murder, and it wouldn't be like the others to give him warning and

meet him in the open. Warily he stood behind the table, watching their

awkward embarrassment with easy assurance. Carefully he placed face

downward on the table the Villon he had been reading, but he did it

without lifting his eyes from them.



"You have business with me, I presume."



"That's what we have," cried Reilly valiantly, from the rear.



"Then suppose we come to it and get the room aired as soon as possible,"

Leroy said tartly.



"You're such a slap-up dude you'd ought to be a hotel clerk, cap. You're

sure wasted out here. So we boys got together and held a little

election. Consequence is, we--fact is, we--"



Neil stuck, but Reilly came to his rescue.



"We elected York captain of this outfit."



"To fill the vacancy created by my resignation. Poor York! You're the

sacrifice, are you? On the whole, I think you fellows have made a wise

choice. York's game, and he won't squeal on you, which is more than I

could say of Reilly, or the play actor, or the gentlemen from Chihuahua.

But you want to watch out for a knife in the dark, York. 'Uneasy lies

the head that wears a crown,' you know."



"We didn't come here to listen to a speech, cap, but to notify you we

was dissatisfied, and wouldn't have you run the outfit any longer,"

explained Neil.



"In that event, having heard the report of the committee, if there's no

further new business, I declare this meeting adjourned sine die. Kindly

remove the perfume tubs, Captain Neil, at your earliest convenience."



The quartette retreated ignominiously. They had come prepared to gloat

over Leroy's discomfiture, and he had mocked them with that insolent

ease of his that set their teeth in helpless rage.



But the deposed chief knew they had not struck their last blow.

Throughout the night he could hear the low-voiced murmur of their

plottings, and he knew that if the liquor held out long enough there

would be sudden death at Hidden Valley before twenty-four hours were

up. He looked carefully to his rifle and his revolvers, testing several

shells to make sure they had not been tampered with in his absence.

After he had made all necessary preparations, he drew the blinds of

his window and moved his easy-chair from its customary place beside the

fire. Also he was careful not to sit where an shadow would betray his

position. Then back he went to his Villon, a revolver lying on the table

within reach.



But the night passed without mishap, and with morning he ventured forth

to his meeting with the sheriff. He might have slipped out from the back

door of his cabin and gained the canyon, by circling unobserved, up the

draw and over the hogback, but he would not show by these precautions

any fear of the cutthroats with whom he had to deal. As was his

scrupulous custom, he shaved and took his morning bath before appearing

outdoors. In all Arizona no trimmer, more graceful figure of jaunty

recklessness could be seen than this one stepping lightly forth to knock

at the bunk-house door behind which he suspected were at least two men

determined on his death by treachery.



Neil came to the door in answer to his knock and within he could see the

villainous faces at bloodshot eyes of two of the others peering at him.



"Good mo'ning, Captain Neil. I'm on my way to keep that appointment I

mentioned last night I'd ce'tainly be glad to have you go along. Nothing

like being on the spot to prevent double-crossing."



"I'm with you in the fling of a cow's tail. Come on, boys."



"I think not. You and I will go alone."



"Just as you say. Reilly, I guess you better saddle Two-step and the

Lazy B roan."



"I ain't saddling ponies for Mr. Leroy," returned Reilly, with thick

defiance.



Neil was across the room in two strides. "When I tell you to do a thing,

jump! Get a move on and saddle those broncs."



"I don't know as--"



"Vamos!"



Reilly sullenly slouched out.



"I see you made them jump," commented the former captain audibly,

seating himself comfortably on a rock. "It's the only way you'll get

along with them. See that they come to time or pump lead into them.

You'll find there's no middle way."



Neil and Leroy had hardly passed beyond the rock-slide before the

others, suspicion awake in their sodden brains, dodged after them on

foot. For three miles they followed the broncos as the latter picked

their way up the steep trail that led to the Dalriada Mine.



"If Mr. Collins is here, he's lying almighty low," exclaimed Neil, as he

swung from his pony at the foot of the bluff from the brow of which the

gray dump of the mine straggled down like a Titan's beard.



"Right you are, Mr. Neil."



York whirled, revolver in hand, but the man who had risen from behind

the big boulder beside the trail was resting both hands on the rock

before him.



"You're alone, are you?" demanded York.



"I am."



Neil's revolver slid back into its holster. "Mornin', Val. What's new

down at Tucson?" he said amiably.



"I understood I was to meet you alone, Mr. Leroy," said the sheriff

quickly, his blue-gray eyes on the former chief.



"That was the agreement, Mr. Collins, but it seems the boys are on the

anxious seat about these little socials of ours. They've embraced the

notion that I'm selling them. I hated to have them harassed with doubts,

so I invited the new majordomo of the ranch to come with me. Of cou'se,

if you object--"



"I don't object in the least, but I want him to understand the

agreement. I've got a posse waiting at Eldorado Springs, and as soon as

I get back there we take the trail after you. Bucky O'Connor is at the

head of the posse."



York grinned. "We'll be in Sonora then, Val. Think I'm going to wait and

let you shoot off my other fingers?"



Collins fished from his vest pocket the papers he had taken from

Scott hat and from Webster. "I think I'll be jogging along back to the

springs. I reckon these are what you want."



Leroy took them from him and handed them to Neil. "Don't let us detain

you any longer, Mr. Collins. I know you're awful busy these days."



The sheriff nodded a good day, cut down the hill on the slant, and

disappeared in a mesquit thicket, from the other side of which he

presently emerged astride a bay horse.



The two outlaws retraced their way to the foot of the hill and remounted

their broncos.



"I want to say, cap, that I'm eating humble-pie in big chunks right this

minute," said Neil shamefacedly, scratching his curly poll and looking

apologetically at his former chief. "I might 'a' knowed you was straight

as a string, all I've seen of you these last two years. If those coyotes

say another word, cap--"



An exploding echo seemed to shake the mountain, and then another. Leroy

swayed in the saddle, clutching at his side. He pitched forward, his

arms round the horse's neck, and slid slowly to the ground.



Neil was off his horse in an instant, kneeling beside him. He lifted him

in his arms and carried him behind a great outcropping boulder.



"It's that hound Collins," he muttered, as he propped the wounded man's

head on his arm. "By God, I didn't think it of Val."



Leroy opened his eyes and smiled faintly. "Guess again, York."



"You don't mean--"



He nodded. "Right this time--Hardman and Chaves and Reilly. They shot

to get us both. With us out of the way they could divide the treasure

between them."



Neil choked. "You ain't bad hurt, old man. Say you ain't bad hurt,

Phil."



"More than I can carry, York; shot through and through. I've been

doubtful of Reilly for a long time."



"By the Lord, if I don't get the rattlesnake for this!" swore Neil

between his teeth. "Ain't there nothin' I can do for you, old pardner?"



In sharp succession four shots rang out. Neil grasped his rifle, leaning

forward and crouching for cover. He turned a puzzled face toward Leroy.

"I don't savvy. They ain't shooting at us."



"The sheriff," explained Leroy. "They forgot him, and he doubled back on

them."



"I'll bet Val got one of them," cried Neil, his face lighting.



"He's got one--or he's quit living. That's a sure thing. Why don't you

circle up on them from behind, York?"



"I hate to leave you, cap--and you so bad. Can't I do a thing for you?"



Leroy smiled faintly. "Not a thing. I'll be right here when you get

back, York."



The curly-headed young puncher took Leroy's hand in his, gulping down

a boyish sob. "I ain't been square with you, cap. I reckon after

this--when you git well--I'll not be such a coyote any more."



The dying man's eyes were lit with a beautiful tenderness. "There's one

thing you can do for me, York.... I'm out of the game, but I want you

to make a new start.... I got you into this life, boy. Quit it, and live

straight. There's nothing to it, York."



The cowboy-bandit choked. "Don't you worry about me, cap. I'm all right.

I'd just as lief quit this deviltry, anyhow."



"I want you to promise, boy." A whimsical, half-cynical smile touched

Leroy's eyes. "You see, after living like a devil for thirty years, I

want to die like a Christian. Now, go, York."



After Neil had left him, Leroy's eyes closed. Faintly he heard two more

shots echoing down the valley, but the meaning of them was already lost

to his wandering mind.



Neil dodged rapidly round the foot of the mountain with intent to cut

off the bandits as they retreated. He found the sheriff crouching behind

a rock scarce two hundred yards from the scene of the murder. At the

same moment another shot echoed from well over to the left.



"Who can that be?" Neil asked, very much puzzled.



"That's what's worrying me, York," the sheriff returned.



Together they zigzagged up the side of the mountain. Twice from above

there came sounds of rifle shots. Neil was the first to strike the trail

to the mine. None too soon for as he stepped upon it, breathing heavily

from his climb, Reilly swung round a curve and whipped his weapon to his

shoulder. The man fired before York could interfere and stood watching

tensely the result of his shot. He was silhouetted against the skyline,

a beautiful mark, but Neil did not cover him. Instead, he spoke quietly

to the other.



"Was it you that killed Phil, Reilly?"



The man whirled and saw Neil for the first time. His answer was instant.

Flinging up his rifle, he pumped a shot at York.



Neil's retort came in a flash. Reilly clutched at his heart and toppled

backward from the precipice upon which he stood. Collins joined the

cowpuncher and together they stepped forward to the point from which

Reilly had plunged down two hundred feet to the jagged rocks below.



At the curve they came face to face with Bucky O'Connor. Three weapons

went up quicker than the beating of an eyelash. More slowly each went

down again.



"What are you doing here, Bucky?" the sheriff asked.



"Just pirootin' around, Val. It occurred to me Leroy might not mean

to play fair with you, so I kinder invited myself to the party. When I

heard shooting I thought it was you they had bushwhacked, so I sat in to

the game."



"You guessed wrong, Bucky. Reilly and the others rounded on Leroy. While

they were at it they figured to make a clean job and bump off York, too.

From what York says Leroy has got his."



The ranger turned a jade eye on the outlaw. "Has Mr. Neil turned honest

man, Val? Taken him into your posse, have you?" he asked, with an edge

of irony in his voice.



The sheriff laid a hand on the shoulder of the man who had been his

friend before he turned miscreant.



"Don't you worry about Neil, Bucky," he advised gently. "It was York

shot Reilly, after York had cut loose at him, and I shouldn't wonder if

that didn't save your life. Neil has got to stand the gaff for what he's

done, but I'll pull wires to get his punishment made light."



"Killed Reilly, did he?" repeated O'Connor. "I got Anderson back there."



"That makes only one left to account for. I wonder who he is?" Collins

turned absent-mindedly to Neil. The latter looked at him out of an

expressionless face. Even though his confederate had proved traitor he

would not betray him.



"I wonder," he said.



Bucky laughed. "Made a mistake that time, Val."



"I plumb forgot the situation for a moment," the sheriff grinned.

"Anyhow, we better be hittin' his trail."



"How about Phil?" Neil suggested.



"That's right. One of us has ce'tainly got to go back and attend to

him."



"You and Neil go back. I'll follow up this gentleman who is escaping,"

the ranger said.



And so it was arranged. The two men returned from their grim work of

justice to the place where the outlaw chief had been left. His eyes lit

feebly at sight of them.



"What news, York?" he asked.



"Reilly and Hardman are killed. How are you feelin', cap?" The

cow-puncher knelt beside the dying outlaw and put an arm under his head.



"Shot all to pieces, boy. No, I got no time to have you play doctor with

me." He turned to Collins with a gleam of his unconquerable spirit. "You

came pretty near making a clean round-up, sheriff. I'm the fourth to be

put out of business. You'd ought to be content with that. Let York here

go."



"I can't do that, but I'll do my best to see he gets off light."



"I got him into this, sheriff. He was all right before he knew me. I

want him to get a chance now."



"I wish I could give him a pardon, but I can't do it. I'll see the

governor for him though."



The wounded man spoke to Collins alone for a few minutes, then began

to wander in his mind He babbled feebly of childhood days back in his

Kentucky home. The word most often on his lips was "Mother." So, with

his head resting on Neil's arm and his hand in that of his friend, he

slipped away to the Great Beyond.