Page:MacLeod Raine - The Sheriff's Son.djvu/88

 Rutherford tries to fix up a deal with him. There's no if about any of that, me young Sherlock Holmes."

"No, you've built up a case. But there's a stronger case already built for us, is n'tisn't [sic] there? Dingwell exposed the gamblers Blair and Smith, knocked one of them cold, made them dig up a lot of money, and drove them out of town. They left, swearing vengeance. He rides away, and he is never seen again. The natural assumption is that they lay in wait for him and killed him."

"Then where is the body?"

"Lying out in the cactus somewhere — or buried in the sand."

"That would n'twouldn't [sic] be a bad guess — if it was n'twasn't [sic] for another bit of testimony that came in to show that Dave was alive five hours after he left the Legal Tender. A sheepherder on the Creosote Flats heard the sound of horses' hoofs early next morning. He looked out of his tent and saw three horses. Two of the riders carried rifles. The third rode between them. He did n'tdidn't [sic] carry any gun. They were a couple of hundred yards away and the herder did n'tdidn't [sic] recognize any of the men. But it looked to him like the man without the gun was a prisoner."