drilled him before he could try again.'
Men gave way as Corcoran pushed through the crowd. Somebody yelped: 'Look out, Steve! McBride's on the warpath!'
Corcoran stepped into the gambling hall, which was deserted except for the gambler who lay dead on the floor, with a bullet-hole over his heart, and the killer who half-crouched with his back to the bar, and a smoking gun lifted in his hand.
McBride's lips were twisted hard in a snarl, and he looked like a wolf at bay.
'Get back, Corcoran,' he warned. 'I ain't got nothin' against you, but I ain't goin' to be murdered like a sheep.'
'Who said anything about murderin' you?' demanded Corcoran impatiently.
'Oh, I know you wouldn't. But Brent's got friends. They'll never let me get away with killin' him. I believe he was a Vulture. I believe the Vultures will be after me for this. But if they get me, they've got to get me fightin'.'
'Nobody's goin' to hurt you,' said Corcoran tranquilly. 'You better give me your gun and come along. I'll have to arrest you, but it won't amount to nothin', and you ought to know it. As soon as a miners' court can be got together, you'll be tried and acquitted. It was a plain case of self-defense. I reckon no honest folks will do any grievin' for Ace Brent.'
'But if I give up my gun and go to jail,' objected McBride, wavering, 'I'm afraid the toughs will take me out and lynch me.'
'I'm givin' you my word you won't be harmed while you're under arrest,' answered Corcoran.
'That's enough for me,' said McBride promptly, extending his pistol.
Corcoran took it and thrust it into his waistband. 'It's damned foolishness, takin' an honest man's gun,' he grunted. 'But accordin' to Middleton that's the law. Give me your word that you won't skip, till you've been properly acquitted, and I won't lock you up.'
'I'd rather go to jail,' said McBride. 'I wouldn't skip. But I'll be safer in jail, with you guardin' me, than I would be walkin' around loose for some of Brent's friends to shoot me in the back. After I've been cleared by due process of law, they won't dare to lynch me, and I ain't afraid of 'em when it comes to gunfightin', in the open.'
'All right.' Corcoran stooped and picked up the dead gambler's gun, and thrust it into his belt. The crowd surging about the door gave way as he led his prisoner out.
'There the skunk is!' bawled a rough voice. 'He murdered Ace Brent!'
McBride turned pale with anger and glared into the crowd, but Corcoran urged him along, and the miner grinned as other voices rose: 'A damned good thing, too!' 'Brent was crooked!' 'He was a Vulture!' bawled somebody, and for a space a tense silence held. That charge was too sinister to bring openly against even a dead man. Frightened by his own indiscretion the man who had shouted slunk away, hoping none had identified his voice.
'I've been gamblin' too much,' growled McBride, as he strode along beside Corcoran. 'Afraid to try to take my gold out, though, and didn't know what else to do with it. Brent won thousands of dollars worth of dust from me; poker, mostly.
'This mornin' I was talkin' to Middleton, and he showed a card he said a gambler dropped in his cabin last night. He showed me it was marked, in a way I'd never have suspected. I recognized it as one of the same brand Brent always uses, though Middleton wouldn't tell me who the gambler was. But later I learned that Brent slept off a drunk in Middleton's cabin. Damned poor business for a gambler to get drunk.
'I went to the King of Diamonds awhile ago, and started playin' poker with Brent and a couple of miners. As soon as he raked in the first pot, I called him--flashed the card I got from Middleton and started to show the boys where it was marked. Then Brent pulled his gun; it snapped, and I killed him before he could cock it again. He knew I had the goods on him. He didn't even give me time to tell where I'd gotten the card.'
Corcoran made no reply. He locked McBride in the jail, called the jailer from his nearby shack and told him to furnish the prisoner with food, liquor and anything else he needed, and then hurried to his own cabin. Sitting on his bunk in the room behind the sheriff's office, he ejected the cartridge on which Brent's pistol had snapped. The cap was dented, but had not detonated the powder. Looking closely he saw faint abrasions on both the bullet and brass case. They were such as might have been made by the jaws of iron pinchers and a vise.
Securing a wire-cutter with pincher jaws, he began to work at the bullet. It slipped out with unusual ease, and the contents of the case spilled into his hand. He did not need to use a match to prove that it was not powder. He knew what the stuff was at first glance--iron filings, to give the proper weight to the cartridge from which the powder had been removed.
At that moment he heard someone enter the outer room, and recognized the firm, easy tread of Sheriff Middleton. Corcoran went into the office and Middleton turned, hung his white hat on a nail.
'McNab tells me McBride killed Ace Brent!'
'You ought to know!' Corcoran grinned. He tossed the bullet and empty case on the table, dumped the tiny pile of iron dust beside them.
'Brent spent the night with you. You got him drunk, and stole one of his cards to show to McBride. You knew how his cards were marked. You took a cartridge out of Brent's gun and put that one in place. One would be enough. You knew there'd be gunplay between him and McBride, when you showed McBride that marked card, and you wanted to be sure it was Brent who stopped lead.'
'That's right,' agreed Middleton. 'I haven't seen you since early yesterday morning. I was going to tell you about the frame I'd ribbed, as soon as I saw you. I didn't know McBride would go after Brent as quickly as he did.
'Brent got too ambitious. He acted as if he were suspicious of us both, lately. Maybe, though, it was just jealousy as far as you were concerned. He liked Glory Bland, and she could never see him. It gouged him to see her falling for you.
'And he wanted my place as leader of the Vultures. If there was one man in the gang that could have kept us from skipping with the loot, it was Ace Brent.
'But I think I've worked it neatly. No one can accuse me of having him murdered, because McBride isn't in the gang. I have no control over him. But Brent's friends will want revenge.'
'A miners' court will acquit McBride on the first ballot.'
'That's true. Maybe we'd better let him get shot, trying to escape!'
'We will like hell!' rapped Corcoran. 'I swore he wouldn't be harmed while he was under arrest. His part of the deal was on the level. He didn't know Brent had a blank in his gun, any more than Brent did. If Brent's friends want his scalp, let 'em go after McBride, like white men ought to, when he's in a position to defend himself.'
'But after he's acquitted,' argued Middleton, 'they won't dare gang up on him in the street, and he'll be too sharp to give them a chance at him in the hills.'
'What the hell do I care?' snarled Corcoran. 'What difference does it make to me whether Brent's friends get even or not? Far as I'm concerned, he got what was comin' to him. If they ain't got the guts to give McBride an even break, I sure ain't goin' to fix it so they can murder him without riskin' their own hides. If I catch 'em sneakin' around the jail for a shot at him, I'll fill 'em full of hot lead.
'If I'd thought the miners would be crazy enough to do anything to him for killin' Brent, I'd never arrested him. They won't. They'll acquit him. Until they do, I'm responsible for him, and I've give my word. And anybody that tries to lynch him while he's in my charge better be damned sure they're quicker with a gun than I am.'
'There's nobody of that nature in Whapeton,' admitted Middleton with a wry smile. 'All right, if you feel your personal honor is involved. But I'll have to find a way to placate Brent's friends, or they'll be accusing me of being indifferent about what happened to him.'
Chapter 6 Vultures' Court
Next morning Corcoran was awakened by a wild shouting in the street. He had slept in the jail that night, not trusting Brent's friends, but there had been no attempt at violence. He jerked on his boots, and went out into the street, followed by McBride, to learn what the shouting was about.
Men milled about in the street, even at that early hour--for the sun was not yet up--surging about a man in the garb of a miner. This man was astride a horse whose coat was dark with sweat; the man was wild eyed, bareheaded, and he held his hat in his hands, holding it down for the shouting, cursing throng to see.
