The two boys waited for a moment longer, but heard nothing else.
“He ought to be back by now, shouldn’t he?” Pat asked.
They were quiet for a moment longer. Then Deekus called out. “Bobby? Bobby, you out there?”
“Bobby?” Pat shouted, adding his own call.
“I don’t like this,” Deekus said.
“What do you think is going on?”
“I don’t know, but I think we better check.”
Pulling their guns, Deekus and Pat rode into the night in search of their friend.
A moment later, gunshots erupted in the night, the muzzle flashes lighting up the herd.
“Jesus! What’s happening? Who is it? They’re all around us!” Pat shouted in terror, firing his gun wildly in the dark.
“Throw down your guns!” a voice called from the dark. “Do it now, or we’ll kill your friend, then we’ll kill you!”
“Pat, Deekus, do what they say!” Bobby called from the darkness. “They’re all around you!”
Neither Deekus nor Pat reacted, and there was another shot from the dark.
“Oww!” Deekus called out as a bullet hit him in the shoulder. He dropped his gun.
Seeing Deekus hit, Pat threw down his gun as well. He put his hands in the air.
“We quit! We quit!” he called.
The two young men sat quietly as they watched over a dozen riders materialize from the dark.
“Who are you?” Pat asked.
One rider rode in front of the others. He was a powerfully built man with hat pulled low over a bald head and brow-less eyes.
“The name is Staley, boys. Will Staley,” the rider said. “You should’a known better than to steal them cows in my country.”
“Staley? What are you doin’ here? You ain’t the sheriff no more,” Pat said.
“Nope, I ain’t,” Staley said.
“Then that means you got no jurisdiction over us.”
Staley chuckled. “No, all that means is that the judge and jury got no jurisdiction over me.”
“The judge and jury got no jurisdiction over you? What are you talkin’ about?” Pat asked.
“I’m talkin’ about hangin’ you boys as cow thieves,” Staley said. “When I was sheriff, I had to have a judge give me the word to do it. Now, I don’t need nobody’s word.”
“What?” Deekus asked, suddenly understanding what Staley had in mind. “No, what are you doing?”
“Get ’em over there under that tree,” Staley said.
“Wait, you can’t do this! You got no right!” Pat said, but even as he was calling out in terror, Staley’s men were coming toward him.
Within minutes, Deekus, Pat, and Bobby were sitting on their horses, their hands bound behind them. Three ropes were tossed over an outstretched tree limb; then the nooses were looped around the necks of the young cattle rustlers.
“You boys got ’ny last words?” Staley asked.
“You got no right to do this, Staley,” Deekus said. “You ain’t no lawman.”
“You had no right to steal them cows,” Staley replied.
“Stealin’ a few cows ain’t the same as murder and you know it. What you’re doin’ here is no more’n murder.”
“That your say?”
“That’s my say,” Deekus said.
“What about you other two boys? You got ’nything to say before you go to meet your Maker?”
Bobby and Pat gritted their teeth to keep from crying out in terror. They looked at Staley and his riders through eyes that reflected their panic, but they said nothing.
“All right, you boys don’t want to say nothin’, I’ll go along with that,” Staley said.
Staley looked at the three men who were behind the horses of the rustlers. He nodded, and all three struck the rustlers’ horses. The three horses leaped ahead, and the ropes that hung down from the tree pulled the rustlers from their saddles. The limb creaked and bent, but not before jerking the men up short. Pat and Bobby died quickly, but Deekus didn’t. He hung there for several minutes, lifting his legs up as if by so doing he could ease the pressure on his neck. He made guttural, gurgling sounds and his eyes were opened wide in terror. One of the men pulled his pistol and pointed it Deekus.
“No!” Staley called out. “Let ’im die natural.”
It took almost another full minute for Deekus to die. Finally, he quit twitching and hung there as quietly and as still as the other two.
