Page:J Allan Dunn--The Girl of Ghost Mountain.djvu/126

108 Quong, wordless, impassive in relief as he had been in peril, passed down the line. Pedro, holding aloft his dripping wrists, pleaded for a respite.

"No!" barked Sheridan. "Hurry up, Quong. I don't want to have a general murder on my hands," he said slowly. "My boys are on their way with the Diamond W outfit and they'll be a trifle warm under the collars by the time they get here. Hold on, Quong, drop that!"

His voice rang out sharply. Quong had just taken a knife from a sheath in the belt of one of the masked men Sheridan had placed as Hollister. As the blade gleamed Quong had crouched and his calm face had twisted into a sudden murderous fury. But he obeyed. The weapons were piled in a heap by Sheridan's feet. "Throw them out into the desert as far as you can," he ordered. "You prick-eared curs of hell can collect them later. But not tonight." His voice took a higher note. His rage was mounting and he was having hard work to control it. But he knew that the best judgment on these men, outside the law, by reason of crooked politics, was the one he had devised.

"If there was tar enough to go round," he said, "I'd treat you all to the dose you meant for Quong. I may not be able to find a judge to treat you the way you deserve but I can make you laughing stocks and take some of the deviltry out of you before you get back to Metzal. For you are going to walk, unless you want to hunt your horses in the cactus. If you had killed Jim Lund I'd go further, but he'll