Page:MacLeod Raine - The Sheriff's Son.djvu/165

 bors hanged, Dan?" drawled Dingwell in a voice of gentle irony.

Furious at this cool reference to his penitentiary days, Meldrum kicked their captive in the ribs. Hal Rutherford, his eyes blazing, caught the former convict by the throat.

"Do that again and I 'll hang yore hide up to dry." He shook Meldrum as if he were a child, then flung the gasping man away. "I 'll show you who's boss of this rodeo, by gum!"

Meldrum had several notches on his gun. He was, too, a rough-and-tumble fighter with his hands. But Hal Rutherford was one man he knew better than to tackle. He fell back, growling threats in his throat.

Meanwhile Dave was making discoveries. One was that the first two men who had attacked him were the gamblers he had driven from the Legal Tender earlier in the evening. The next was that Buck Rutherford was sending the professional tinhorns about their business.

"Git!" ordered the big rancher. "And keep gitting till you 've crossed the border. Don't look back any. Jest burn the wind. Adios."

"They meant to gun you, Dave," guessed the owner of the horse ranch. "I reckon they