Page:The Baron of Diamond Tail (1923).pdf/221



AN GUSTIN objected again, loudly and in picturesque terms, against Fred Grubb carrying his shotgun to Bonita when they saddled up for that excursion on Saturday evening. He employed sarcasm, even ridicule, in his good-natured way, but was unable to shake the poet the width of a hair.

"You can tell 'em I'm a granger, I ain't no fightin' man," Fred said. "If them fellers don't like my tools, let 'em walk wide when they see me in the road."

Dan was a little ashamed of his company, but Fred had his way. They planned to get supper at Cattle Kate's, but there was very little anticipation, very little said among them, each man busy with his own thoughts as they rode away from the squat little cabin in the meadows.

Barrett had not seen Alma since the evening she rode abroad with Findlay. He knew that if she had anything to communicate she would seek him at the hay-ranch. He was better pleased that she had not come. This grim business upon which he was setting forth had wrapped about him as bindweed enfolds and smothers the life of growing grain.

He was eager to be about the work of ridding the world of a man so envenomed with villainy and spite, a treacherous scoundrel who held a coward's advantage and played it to insatiable ends. There was no doubt