The Rangeland Avenger | Page 9

the persistence of a
guilty conscience. "Say," he said, "while we're talking about it, you
don't happen to believe what Lowrie said?"
"Lowrie was pretty sick; maybe he was raving. So you're all along up
here? Nobody near?"

His restless, impatient eye ran over the surroundings. There was not a
soul in sight. The mountains were growing stark and black against the
flush of the western sky. His glance fell back upon Quade.
"But how did Lowrie happen to die?"
"He got shot."
"Did a gang drop him?"
"Nope, just one gent."
"You don't say! But Lowrie was a pretty slick hand with a gun--next to
Bill Sandersen, the best I ever seen, almost! Somebody got the drop on
him, eh?"
"Nope, he killed himself!"
Quade gasped. "Suicide?"
"Sure."
"How come?"
"I'll tell you how it was. He seen a gent coming. In fact he looked out
of the window of his hotel and seen Riley Sinclair, and he figured that
Riley had come to get him for what happened to his brother, Hal.
Lowrie got sort of excited, lost his nerve, and when the hotel keeper
come upstairs, Lowrie thought it was Sinclair, and he didn't wait. He
shot himself."
"You seem to know a pile," said Quade thoughtfully.
"Well, you see, I'm Riley Sinclair." Still he smiled, but Quade was as
one who had seen a ghost.
"I had to make sure that you was alone. I had to make sure that you was
guilty. And you are, Quade. Don't do that!"
The hand of Quade slipped around the butt of his gun and clung there.
"You ain't fit for a gun fight right now," went on Riley Sinclair slowly.
"You're all shaking, Quade, and you couldn't hit the side of the
mountain, let alone me. Wait a minute. Take your time. Get all settled
down and wait till your hand stops shaking."
Quade moistened his white lips and waited.
"You give Hal plenty of time," resumed Riley Sinclair. "Since Lowrie
told me that yarn I been wondering how Hal felt when you and the
other two left him alone. You know, a gent can do some pretty stiff
thinking before he makes up his mind to blow his head off."
His tone was quite conversational.
"Queer thing how I come to blunder into all this information, partner. I

come into a room where Lowrie was. The minute he heard my name he
figured I was after him on account of Hal. Up he comes with his gun
like a flash. Afterward he told me all about it, and I give him a pretty
fine funeral. I'll do the same by you, Quade. How you feeling now?"
"Curse you!" exclaimed Quade.
"Maybe I'm cursed, right enough, but, Quade, I'd let 'em burn me, inch
by inch in a fire, before I'd quit a partner, a bunkie in the desert! You
hear? It's a queer thing that a gent could have much pleasure out of
plugging another gent full of lead. I've had that pleasure once; and I'm
going to have it again. I'm going to kill you, Quade, but I wish there
was a slower way! Pull your gun!"
That last came out with a snap, and the revolver of Quade flicked out of
its holster with a convulsive jerk of the big man's wrist. Yet the spit of
fire came from Riley Sinclair's weapon, slipping smoothly into his hand.
Quade did not fall. He stood with a bewildered expression, as a man
trying to remember something hidden far in the past; and Sinclair
fingered the butt of his gun lightly and waited. It was rather a
crumbling than a fall. The big body literally slumped down into a heap.
Sinclair reached down without dismounting and pulled the body over
on its back.
"Because," he explained to what had been a strong man the moment
before, "when the devil comes to you, I want the old boy to see your
face, Quade! Git on, old boss!"
As he rode down the trail toward Sour Creek he carefully and deftly
cleaned his revolver and reloaded the empty chamber.

4
Perhaps, in the final analysis, Riley Sinclair would not be condemned
for the death of Lowrie or the killing of Quade, but for singing on the
trail to Sour Creek. And sing he did, his voice ringing from hill to hill,
and the echoes barking back to him, now and again.
He was not silent until he came to Sour Creek. At the head of the long,
winding, single street he drew the mustang to a tired walk. It was a very
peaceful moment in the little town Yonder a dog barked and a coyote
howled a thin answer far away, but, aside from these, all other sounds
were the happy