"Is there goin' to be a hangin'?"

"You betcha--to-night! Git around early, an' you can have a front seat."

Gurley added a word of explanation. "No greaser can git biggity an'

shoot up our friends without hangin' from the end of a wagon-tongue _p.r.o.nto_."

"We'll see what a judge an' jury say about it," suggested the Ranger mildly.

"That so? No brindle-thatched guy in buckskin can interfere without sleepin' in smoke. Understand?" The long, sallow man nervously stroked his hair, which was flattened down on his forehead in a semicircle in the absurd fashion of the day.

"Don't pull on yore picket-pin, Gurley," observed Roberts. "What I say goes. There's goin' to be no hangin' till the courts say so."

A man had come into the saloon by the back door. He was a heavy-set, slouchy man in jeans, broad-shouldered and bowlegged. He laughed grimly.

"I don't reckon you can put that over on folks of the short-gra.s.s country, young fellow, me lad. We grow man-size, an' I don't expect we'll ask yore say-so when we're ready for business."

Pete Dinsmore had the advantage of his colleague. He knew that Roberts was the only Ranger in town. Also he was of tougher stuff. The leader of the Dinsmore gang would go through.

Into the gray-blue eye of the young man came a look that chilled.

"Dinsmore, I'm not here to get into a rookus with you. But I'll serve notice on you right now to keep yore mind off Alviro. He's in the hands of the Texas Rangers. You know what that means."

Dinsmore met the warning with a sneer. "I was. .h.i.ttin' my heels on this range when you was knee-high to a duck, kid. Don't make a mistake. Folks don't make 'em with me twice." He thrust the head on his bull neck forward and dropped a hand to the gun by his side.

The Ranger shook his head. "Not just now, Pete. You're a bad _hombre_; I know that. Some day we're liable to tangle. But it will be in the way of business. While I'm workin' for the State I've got no private feuds."

Jack turned and walked out of the place as casually as he had entered.

He knew now that Snark was right. Tascosa meant to hang the Mexican within a few hours.

Evidently Tony had heard the news. He looked up with quick apprehension when Snark opened the door of his cell to admit the Ranger.

"You promise' me fair trial, _senor_. Yet to-day they mean to hang me.

Not so?" he cried. The young Mexican was sweating drops of fear.

"That's why I'm here, Tony," answered Jack cheerfully. "The hangin'

programme won't go through if you do exactly as I say. I'll stand by you. They'll not get you unless they get me. Is that fair?"

Confidence is born of confidence. Alviro felt himself b.u.t.tressed by the quiet strength of this vigorous youth. Broader shoulders than his had a.s.sumed the responsibility.

"What is it that I am to do?" he asked, his liquid eyes filled with the dumb worship of a dog.

"You're to walk right beside me. No matter how the crowd presses--no matter what it does--stick right there. If you try to run, you're gone.

I can't save you. Understand?"

"_Si, senor._"

Roberts looked at his watch. "'Most time for the fireworks to begin.

You'll wait here till I come back, Tony. I'm goin' to give a little exhibition first. Be with you _p.r.o.nto_."

Little beads of sweat gathered again on the forehead of the prisoner.

The palms of his hands were hot and moist. He glanced nervously out of the window. Ten minutes before there had been a few lookouts in sight; now there were a hundred men or more. The mob was beginning to gather for the storming of the sod-house. Soon the affairs of Tony Alviro would reach a crisis.

"I--I'll nev' get out alive," said the Mexican in a dry whisper.

The Ranger grinned at him. "Don't worry. If the luck breaks right we'll camp to-night under the stars. If it doesn't they'll bury us both, Tony."

In that smile was life for Alviro. It expressed a soul unperturbed, ready for anything that might come up. With this man beside him Tony felt courage flowing back into his heart.

CHAPTER XV

A CLOSE SHAVE

The Ranger opened the door of the "soddy," stepped through, and closed it behind him. Jeers, threats, bits of advice greeted him from those in front of the jail.

"Better p'int for the hills, Mr. Ranger." ... "A whole pa.s.sel of sheriffs can't save the greaser." ... "Don't you-all try an' stop us if you know what's good for you." ... "Skedaddle while yore skin's whole."

... "It's the Mexican, anyhow; it's him an' you too, if you show fight."

The lean-flanked young Ranger looked them over coolly. Men were coming in driblets from the main street. Already perhaps there were a hundred and fifty men and boys in sight. They were the advance guard of the gathering mob.

Never in his gusty lifetime had Jack Roberts been more master of himself. He had that rare temperament which warms to danger. He stood there bareheaded, his crisp, curly bronze hair reflecting the glow of the setting sun, one hand thrust carelessly into his trousers pocket.

"Give up yore prisoner, an' we won't hurt you. We got nothin' against you," a voice cried.

Jack did not answer. His left hand came out of the pocket bringing with it half a dozen silver dollars. Simultaneously the nose of his revolver flashed into sight. A dollar went up into the air. The revolver cracked.

The coin, struck by the bullet in its descent, was flung aside at an angle. Dollar after dollar went up and was hurled from its course as the weapon barked. Out of six shots the Ranger missed only one.

It was marvelous marksmanship, but it did not in the least cow those who saw the exhibition. They were frontiersmen themselves, many of them crack shots, and they knew that one man could do nothing against several hundred. Their taunts followed Roberts as he stepped back into the sod-house.

Jack reloaded his revolver and joined the Mexican. "All ready, Tony.

We're off soon as I've put the cuffs on you," he said briskly.

"Don' handcuff me, _senor_. Give me a gun an' a chance for my life,"

begged Alviro. He was trembling like an aspen leaf in a summer breeze.

The Ranger shook his head. "No, Tony. If you weren't wearin' cuffs they'd think I meant to turn you loose. You wouldn't have a chance. I'm the law, an' you're my prisoner. That's goin' to help pull us through.

Brace up, boy. I've got an ace up my sleeve you don't know about."

A minute later a great yell of triumph rose in the air. The door of the sod-house had opened, and the Ranger and his prisoner stood in front of it. The mob pushed closer, uncertain as to what its next move would be.

Had Roberts brought out the Mexican with the intention of making a merely formal resistance?

Pete Dinsmore, just arrived on the scene at the head of a group from the saloons, shouldered his way to the front.

"We'll take care of yore prisoner now, Mr. Ranger. Much obliged for savin' us the trouble of tearin' down the soddy," he called jubilantly.

"You got more sense an' less grit than I figured you had," jeered Gurley. "Now light a shuck back to Mobeetie an' write a report on it."

Roberts waited, silent and motionless, for the tumult to die. Only his eyes and his brain were active. Homer Dinsmore was in the crowd, well to the front. So were Jumbo Wilkins, Clint Wadley, and half a dozen other line-riders and cowmen, all grouped together to the left. Fifty yards back of them a group of saddled horses waited.