"Drunk, en?"

"Nope. Not drunk. He was asked if he didn't do the murder."

"Great guns! Who asked him?"

"I done it," said Bull as simply as ever.

Reeve bit his lip. He had just put Bull down as a simple-minded hulk.

He was forced to revise his opinion.

"You done that? You follered him up, eh?"

"I just done a little thinking. So I asked him."

Reeve shook his head. "Maybe you hypnotized him," he suggested.

"Nope. I just asked him. I got a lot of folks sitting around, and then I began telling the sheriff how he done the shooting."

"And he admitted it?"

"Nope. He jumped for a gun."

"And then you heaved a chair at him." Pete Reeve drew in a long breath. "But what reason did you have, son? I got to ask you that before I thank you the way I want to thank you. But, before you kick out, you'll find that Pete Reeve is a friend."

"My reason was," said Bull, "that I had business to do with you that couldn't be done in a jail. So I had to get you out."

"And now where're we headed?"

"Where we can do that business."

They had reached a broad break in the cottonwoods; the moonlight was falling so softly and brightly.

Bull paused and looked around him. "I guess this'll have to do," he declared.

"All right, son. You can be as mysterious as you want. Now what you got me here for?"

"To kill you," said Bull gently.

Pete Reeve flinched back. Then he tapped his holster, made sure of the gun, became more easy. "That's interesting," he announced. "You couldn't wait for the law to hang me, eh?"

Bull began explaining laboriously. He pushed back his hat and began to count off his points into the palm of one hand. "You shot up Uncle Bill Campbell," he explained. "It ain't that I got any grudge agin'

you for that, but you see, Uncle Bill took me in young and give me a home all these years. I thought it would sort of pay him back if I run you down. So I walked across the mountains and come after you."

"Wait!" exclaimed Pete Reeve. "You walked?"

"Yep," he went on, heedless of the fact that Pete Reeve was peering earnestly into the face of his companion, now puckered with the earnest frown of thought. "I come down hoping to get you and kill you.

Besides, that wouldn't only pay back Uncle Bill. It would make him think that I was a man. You see, Reeve, I ain't quick thinking, and I ain't bright. I ain't got a quick tongue and sharp eyes, and they been treating me like I was a kid all my life. So I got to do something. I got to! I ain't got anything agin' you, but you just happen to be the one that I got to fight. Stand over yonder by that stump. I'll stand here, and we'll fight fair and square."

Pete Reeve obeyed, his movements slow, as if they were the result of hypnotism. "Bull," he said rather faintly, looking at the towering bulk of his opponent, "I dunno. Maybe I'm going nutty. But I figure that you come down here to kill me for the sake of getting your uncle to pat you on the back once or twice. And you find you can't get at me because I'm in jail, so you work out a murder mystery to get me out, and then you tackle me. You say you ain't very bright. I dunno. Maybe you ain't bright, but you're mighty different!"

He paused and rubbed his forehead. "Son, I've seen pretty good men in my day, but I ain't never seen one that I cotton to like I do to you.

You've saved my life. How can you figure on me going out and taking yours, now?"

"You ain't going to, maybe," said Bull calmly. "Maybe I'll get to you."

"Son," answered the other almost sadly, shaking his head, "when I'm right, with a good, steady nerve, they ain't any man in the world that can sling a gun with me. And tonight I'm right. If it comes to a showdown--but are you pretty good with a gun yourself, Bull?"

"No," answered Bull frankly. "I ain't any good compared to an expert like you. But I'm good enough to take a chance."

"Them sort of chances ain't taken twice, Bull!"

"You see," said Bull, "I'm going to make a rush as I pull the gun, and if I get to you before I'm dead, well--all I ask is to lay my hands on you, you see?"

The little man shuddered and blinked. "I see," he said, and swallowed with difficulty. "But, in the name of reason, Bull, have sense! Lemme talk! I'll tell you what that uncle of yours was--"

"Don't talk!" exclaimed Bull Hunter. "I sort of like you, partner, and it sort of breaks me down to hear you talk. Don't talk, but listen.

The next time that frog croaks we go for our guns, eh? That frog off in the marsh!"

He had hardly spoken before the ominous sound was heard, and Bull reached for his gun. For all his bulk of hand and unwieldy arms, the gun came smoothly, swiftly into his hand. He would have had an ordinary man covered, long before the latter had his gun muzzle-clear of the leather. But Pete Reeve was no ordinary man. His arm jerked down; his fingers flickered down and up. They went down empty; they came up with the burden of a long revolver, shining in the moonlight, and he fired before Bull's gun came to the level for a shot.

Only Pete Reeve knew the marvel of his own shooting this day. He had sworn a solemn and silent oath that he would not kill this faithful, courageous fellow from the mountains. He could have planted a bullet where the life lay, at any instant of the fight. But he fired for another purpose. The moment Bull reached for his weapon he had lurched forward, aiming to shoot as he ran. Pete Reeve set himself a double goal. His first intention was to disarm the giant; the other was to stop his rush. For, once within the grip of those big fingers, his life would be squeezed out like the juice of an orange.

His task was doubly difficult in the moonlight. But the first shot went home nicely, aimed as exactly as a scientist finds a spot with his instruments. Where the moon's rays splashed across the bare right forearm of Bull, he sent a bullet that slashed through the great muscles. The revolver dropped from the nerveless hand of the giant, but Bull never paused. On he came, empty-handed, but with power of death, as the little man well knew, in the fingers of his extended left hand. He came with a snarl, a savage intake of breath, as he felt the hot slash of Pete's bullet. But Reeve, standing erect like some duelist of old, his left hand tucked into the hollow of his back, took the great gambling chance and refused to shoot to kill.

He placed his second shot more effectively, for this time he must stop that tremendous body, advancing upon him. He found one critical spot.

Between the knee and the thigh, halfway up on the inside of the left leg, he drove that second bullet with the precision of a surgeon. The leg crumpled under Bull and sent him pitching forward on his face.

Perhaps the marsh ground was unstable, but it seemed to Pete Reeve that the very earth quaked beneath his feet as the big man fell. He swung his gun wide and leaned to see how serious was the damage he had done. Bleeding would be the greater danger.

But that fraction of a second brought him into another peril. The giant heaved up on his sound right leg and his sound left arm, and flung himself forward, two limbs dangling uselessly. With a hideously contorted face, Bull swung his left arm in a wide circle for a grip and scooped in Pete Reeve, as the latter sprang back with a cry of horror.

The action swept Pete in and crushed his gun hand and arm against the body of his a.s.sailant, paralyzing his only power of attack or defense.

Reeve was carried down to the ground as if beneath the bulk of a mountain. There was no question of sparing life now. Pete Reeve began to fight for life. He wrestled at his gun to tug it free, but found it anch.o.r.ed. He pulled the trigger, and the gun spoke loud and clear, but the bullet plunged into empty s.p.a.ce. Then he felt that left arm begin to move, and the hand worked up behind his back like a great spider.

Higher it rose, and the huge, thick fingers reached up and around his throat, fumbling to get at the windpipe. Pete Reeve made his last effort; it was like striving to free himself from a ton's weight.

Hysteria of fear and horror seized him, and his voice gave utterance to his terror. As he screamed, the big fingers joined around his throat. Any further pressure would end him!

He looked up into the glaring eyes and the contorted face of the giant; the rasping, panting breathing paralyzed his senses. There was a slight inward contraction of the grip; then it ceased.

Miraculously he felt the great hand relax and fall away. The bulk was heaved away from him, and staggering to his own feet, he saw Bull Hunter supported against a tree, one leg useless, one arm streaming.

"I couldn't seem to do it," said Bull Hunter thickly. "I couldn't noways seem to do it, Reeve. You see, I sort of like you, and I couldn't kill you, Pete."

When Pete Reeve recovered from his astonishment he said, "You can do more. You can go home and tell that infernal hound of an uncle of yours that you had the life of Pete Reeve under your fingertips and that you didn't take it. It's the second time I've owed my life, and both times in one day, and both times to one man. You tell your uncle that!"

The big man sagged still more against the tree. "I'll never go home, Pete, unless ghosts walk; and I'll never tell Uncle Bill anything, unless the ghosts talk. I'm dying pretty p.r.o.nto, I think, Pete."

"Dyin'? You ain't hurt bad, Bull!"