Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/186

 Dahleen shook his head.

"Ain't anything to say, is there?"—his voice was low with just a hint of the former defiance. "It's mine, but you can't prove anything. You can't prove I drank it. D'ye think I'd be fool enough to do anything but keep my mouth shut?"

"No; I can't prove it"—Carleton's voice was deadly cold. 'You're out! I'll give you twelve hours to get out of the mountains. The boys, for Coogan's sake alone if for no other, would tear you to pieces if they knew the story. No one knows it yet but the man who found this in your pocket and myself. I'm not going to tell you again what I think of you—get out!"

Dahleen, without a word, swung slowly on his heel and started for the door.

"Wait!" said Carleton suddenly. "Here's a pass East for you. I don't want your blood on my hands, as I would have if Coogan's friends, and that's every last soul out here, got hold of you. You've got twelve hours—after that they'll know—to set Coogan straight."

Dahleen hesitated, came back, took the slip of paper with a mirthless, half-choked laugh, turned again, and the door closed behind him.

Dahleen was out.

Carleton kept his word—twelve hours—and then from the division rose a cry like the cry of savage beasts; but Regan was like a madman.

"Curse him!" he swore bitterly, breaking into a seething torrent of oaths. "What did you let him go for, Carleton? You'd no business to. You should