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Show i 1 bTalan lemay WiHiUi Rcle ygtU ,..w Cordon had built "Si ranches which fe. Montana. King Kt 'rfuUnd unscrupu- INSTALLMENT 8 THE STOKV SO FAR: bieak Thorpe's power. His first stop was to start a cattle war In Texas. He made this decision against the opposition of Lew Gordon and the tearful plead. ng of his sweetheart, Jody Cordon. The raids upon Thorpe's herds were successful at first, but resistance was soon put up which caused Roper s men to leave him. one by one. dev. Tanner, manager of Thorpe . Texas holding,, appeared not lo feel the losse. Inflicted upon him. Roper's resources were dwindling low. cfS'tidatl J IS ted. hopeless. No irdfrom the rest of ' J spite of everything I d do. the Rangers S The wild bunch , eSened to dominate ien and split scat- wide, every man for S night. . saddle . . beside the door of the Uhich Roper slept . . . apectedly. came Sho- ten more of Roper's .jonthan this:-as Sho-,f0de Sho-,f0de up. Bill Roper al-H, al-H, gun in his hand, and and upon the bridle reirf OTce almost tumbled Alarms. He grabbed i lapels of the black, coat that Roper always l- about to travel you'll get him. all right," he added hastily. Half a block ahead another man stepped Into the street, and walked toward Bill. Before his face could be seen in the black shadow under un-der his hat. Bill Roper knew by the set of the brond shoulders, by the rolling swing of his stride, that it was Cleve. The moments during which the two men walked toward each other drew out interminably. Their eyes were upon each other's faces now; Bill could see that Cleve Tanner looked happy, almost gay, as if this was the first good thing that had happened to him for a long time. At twelve paces Cleve Tanner drew; to observers the men seemed so close together that it was impossible im-possible that either of them should live. Tanner's gun spoke five times, fast, faster than most men could slip the hammer. Nobody knew where the first four shots went; but the fifth shot was easy to place, for He was surprised to hear her saj that. He had no way of knowing how much she had heard, or what she had heard, about his shoot-out with Cleve Tanner. "A notch? I hadn't thought anything any-thing about it." All her bitter contempt of the lonely-riding men of violence came into her voice. "Isn't that what the gunmen gun-men and the cow thieves always do?" He was motionless a long time. Then he drew the skinning knife that always swung at the back of his belt in a worn sheath. Its blade was lean and hollowed, worn almost al-most out of existence by a thousand honings. He stood looking at the knife; he tossed it in the air, and caught it by the handle again. "I wouldn't go cutting marks on the handle of a gun," he said at last. His voice was thick. "Nobody cares what anybody does to the handle han-dle of a gun." Roper stepped forward, and with the keen blade cut a notch clean and deep in the left arm of Dusty's cross. When he looked at Jody she was staring at him strangely, almost as if she were afraid. All through the afternoon Jody Gordon had ridden the barren trails above Ogallala, on a pony that forever for-ever tried to turn home. Thaw was on the prairie again, and the South Platte was brimming with melted snow; in the air was something of the damp, clean smell which had marked another spring, in this same place. But it was now more than six months since Jody had seen Bill Roper; and she found it no help that she was forever hearing his name. It was with reluctance that she at last rode up the rise upon which it stood, unlighted, in the dusk. She unsaddled her own pony, booted boot-ed it into the muddy corral, and threw the forty pound kak onto the saddle-pole with the easy, one-handed swing of the western rider. As she turned toward the house she was trying not to cry. Then, as she walked through the stable, a figure rose up from the shadows beside the door and barred her way. Jody Gordon's breath caught in her throat. She said, evenly, "Looking "Look-ing for someone, Bud?" The spare-framed visitor took off his hat and held it uneasily in his two hands. "Well, I tell you, Miss Gordon could I speak to you for just a minute? I'll tell you the fact of the matter. I'm a Bill Roper man." .Tnriv Gordon's heart jumped like (UC - Shoshone's bottle-nose ld Quivered, and his eyes , tat buttons. e! He's bust he's split sed " e you talking about? inner! I tell you. he's Bill Roper turned Into stable kid that his years .it a man suddenly com-te com-te took Shoshone by the ' ok him as if he had i more than a cat. His ed bare and set. I "Shoshone you fool with cried out through the throat, "I tell you. Cleve i n't say any more, or was cool again, now. . ei you think so?" I j his delivery at the Red. was supposed to bring up ' .sand head, a little hand- ; :hers showed up with a ei He can't round his 1 e i got any cattle and he i delivery at the Red!" : t believe you," Shoshone tied on. "We all said it le done. But by gosh it! All over Texas, Tan-; Tan-; are being called, as the Is. Wells Fargo refuses :;s signature for a dime, .wthat Ben Thorpe won't er-Thorpe denies him, .nner holdings are being r.d sold out" ' e?" Roper asked, looking e ground again, sire? You think I'd risk throat coming here to ".mpthinu liUo thic if T Bill Roper bolstered his own smoking forty-four. it blew a hole in the street as Tanner's Tan-ner's gun stubbed into the dust. Bill Roper holstcred his own smoking forty-four. He had fired twice. Dry Camp Pierce was at his elbow el-bow again. "Here's the horses. It's time to ride. By God, I knew you could take him, kid." Roper was feeling deathly sick. nmething like this, if I tor sure?" .iper admitted, "I guess over," Shoshone tried to "Can't you realize it, jper said. CHAPTER XI 'easy-going, but somehow Bill Roper walked the ' Tascosa, between the d wooden buildings that oof-stirred dust. W later, he knew, Cleve uld appear upon this one Everybody knew that :' on the warpath, deter-seek deter-seek out Bill Roper. It :ilat Tanner's only remain-st remain-st was to bring down the ho had cut Texas from CHAPTER XII It was well into the summer as Bill Roper once more rode south out of Ogallala toward the pile of stones that markad the grave of Dusty King. Jody Gordon rode with him. In the few days he had stopped over in Ogallala he had hardly seen her at all. At first she had refused to ride with him today; but at the last moment, as if on an impulse, she had changed her mind. Roper, studying her sidelong, thought that Jody seemed to have aged several years in one. Impossible Impossi-ble now to find any trace of the irrepressible, ir-repressible, up-welling laughter that had been so characteristic of her a year before. Her eyes were unlighted unlight-ed and a little tired-looking; her mouth was expressionless except for a faint droop at the corners, which rhnnc rpsif?nation, per- JUU uuiuw" 4 1- a struck pony. "Billy sent you to me?" "I haven't seen Bill Roper. But I've seen Ben Thorpe. Miss Gordon Gor-don tell me one thing; Is your father fa-ther backing Bill Roper? I mean, is he backing this plowing into Ben Thorpe?" "My father," Jody Gordon said, "has quit Bill Roper in every way he possibly could." "That's what I thought," Shoshone Wilce said. "Only trouble is, people that don't know the difference, they don't none of them believe that any more." jody Gordon interrupted him sharply. "What's happened?" "Miss Gordon, your father is in a terrible bad fix. I'm afeard-I'm afcard he's going to die before this thing is through." "What do you mean?" "Most people think Lew Gordon is backing Bill Roper - maybe you know that? Well, now there s a : el er rode to Ben Thorpe from Miles City a feller that was a foreman with Thorpe's Montana outfits under Walk Lasham. Maybe this feUef had some kind of fight with Lash-amI Lash-amI don't know nothing about that But this feller swears to Thorpe that Lasham is letting the Mon'ana herds dram away to the Indians, and to the construction camps, and Ben Thorpe never seeing see-ing a penny of the money from beef suggested pernaps resiBn.., v haps a hidden bitterness. She didn't have much to say; but finally she asked him, "What did my father decide?" "He says now that I'll never have another penny out of Dusty King s share until-until he's able to dictate dic-tate to me what I'm going to do with it; or. that's what it amounts to ' 'Did you quarrel with my fa-thpr?" fa-thpr?" No. He said some kind of bitter things, but I didn't say anything, i asked for certain thmgs-hve camus in Montana, mainly, ui camps in breath." course, that was a wd.it -But you'll go on. and throw your-self your-self against Walk Lasham in Montana?" Mon-tana?" "Yes; I have to go on. They were silent after that; and presently they sat. aimost , ,rrup . to stirrup but somehow infinitely far apart looking down at the stacked boulders from which rose the ,ood en cross that Bill Roper had made. ! nearly a year and a half ag . For a little while he stood looking ' at the cross which he had made of ! railroad ties. He said, half aloud "One down. Dusty I suppose." Jody said, "you U be cutting notch on the handle of vour Eiin. now. days passed before Cleve 'Hie. !'even o'clock on a sunny Homing when Dry Camp 'ught Bill the word. 5ii. he's here. You were 'Mou won't have to hunt looking for you; all t0 do is wait." 1 he now?" bar, a block up the "e? walking from bar to ' Y you've been seen. You ke wait for him here." toper said. "I'll walk out 'J"m. I think." f Peered up into his face, -look sick!" 1 ,eel real happy," Roper liberate and slow." led. ..Take your '3l hurry, whatever you nt waste any time, ei-"' ei-"' anl smooth" t0U'". Ropcr said with a ' 6rin. "Take my time, '. "fbout it. Move plenty ;p,:st as hell. All right, 'J butt of his gun a J s"re it was loose in ""en he spun the whiskey "lm Wasted, and walked r'erCe lookt'd at 016 Vtk6XuChanged 8 worried : bartender. Then he ;"UiPK bl'nkin8 his eyes i the,."6 ' as if they were erS n,W!re white Pfltches of his mouth. i4 ,m lJo much of a "e awful bad. But 0r"Isdl'ill Roper gutting the Thorpe outfits in Montana?" -Don't know, myself. They say he's swarming all over Montana, with a bunch of kid renegades behind be-hind him riding like crazy men, a raiding night after night Some say nobody knows hew hard Lash-,m Lash-,m ." hurt, Lasham least of any; rt p ay Lasham has sold out SVlHopi. or your father-or bUv'hat dors Thoroe himself Thorpe thinks your father has u Walk Lasham. Just the same r e height your father bough. r eve Tanner in Texas, until Bill o eunned Cleve down. And Ruper gunnea ljke ?orpeSi SrJTbte dangerous al-rSs al-rSs Gordon; but now he s Sy,Um mo dangerous than he eVoVuarycufe.hink Ben Thorpe win win ; Ben 'MiS',Sg tokill Lew :i, don. Thorpe is goms luit just ao Iecotisi eh, MS |