OCR Text |
Show THE STORY FROM THE OPENING CHAPTER At the Inquest Into the death of John Mason, banker, Jean, daughter of Campo Ragrland, owner of the Bar Hook ranch, where Mason met death, surreptitiously sur-reptitiously passes to Kentucky Jones the bullet which had killed Mason, she having abstracted It from the evidence. Kentucky goes to work on the Bar Hook ranch. The Mason verdict Is accidental death. Bob Elliot, owner of the "8S" ranch, adjoining the Bar Hook, drives his cattle on the Bar Hook land. Lee Bishop. Ragland'a ranch boss, expostulates, and Bill Mc-Cord, Mc-Cord, Elliot's foreman. Insults him. Bishop and Jones are astounded by Ragland's Indifference to Elliot's action. Jones tells Jean Elliot knows she purloined the bullet at the Inquest, which Jones has got rid of. Her reaction re-action mystifies him. Zack Sanders, cook at the Bar Hook ranch. Is found dead, murdered. Sheriff Hopper announces his knowledge that Mason also was murdered. In a gun fight with riders of the '"8S" ranch Jim Humphreys, Bar Hook cowboy. Is killed, and Billy Petersen wounded. Jones sends for fighting cowmen, but Ragland countermands the order. Jones seeks to trace the ownership of a gun found on Zack Sanders, as a bearing on the mystery. Jean sells him her share In the Bar Hook ranch, thus giving him a free hand with Elliot. Jones finds proof that Jean has concealed evidence connected with Mason's death, and bis faith In her Is shaken. |