"Thanks," said the marshal, with sarcasm, "I kind of thought I would, anyway."

Two hundred yards short of the bend in the draw that concealed the ranchhouse from view the district attorney's horse which was leading, snorted at something that lay across his path, and shied with great vigor, coming within a red hair of throwing the district attorney off on his ear.

The district attorney swore and jerked the animal back. Then he dismounted hurriedly and ran forward to view at close range the object that had startled the horse.

The three others pulled up and followed his example.

"My Gawd!" shrilled the district attorney. "It's Rafe Tuckleton!"

It was indeed Rafe Tuckleton. There he lay on his back, his legs and arms spread-eagled abroad, his body displaying the flattened appearance a corpse a.s.sumes for the first few hours after death. Rafe's throat had been slit from ear to ear. His head was cut open and lay in a pool of blood. His face was scored with scratches. There was blood on his coat and vest and shirt, they found on examination. The district attorney ripped open the shirt and found four distinct stab wounds in the region of Rafe's heart. From one of these wounds protruded the broken end of a broad-bladed knife.

"Pull it out," urged Sam Larder, with a slight shudder, his fat face so white that it showed green in the moonlight.

"I can't," said the district attorney. "Jammed in between his ribs, I guess. That's what busted her. See if you can find the handle, Red."

"There it is," pointed out the marshal. "Right by his elbow."

"Oh, yeah," said the district attorney, picking up the knife handle.

From force of habit he fitted the broken part of the knife remaining attached to the handle to the part protruding from the wound. Of course they fitted perfectly.

The marshal ran his hand along Rafe's naked waist. Then he lifted one of Rafe's arms and let it go. The arm snapped stiffly back into position.

"Been dead about two hours," proffered the marshal.

"About that," agreed Felix. "What you lookin' at, Arthur?"

"This," replied the district attorney, holding up the handle of the butcher knife.

With his fingers he traced two initials on the wood. The initials were T.W.

"You can't tell me," said the district attorney belligerently, "that this butcher knife didn't come from the Walton ranch."

Sam Larder stated his belief at once. "She couldn't have done it, Arthur. Why Rafe's carved up like an issue steer. She----"

"She's a woman," interrupted the district attorney. "And a woman will do anything when her dander is up. And we know what this particular woman will do when she's mad. Didn't she try to split open Nate Samson's head when he was hardly more than joking with her? Didn't she throw down on us with a rifle without any excuse a-tall? I tell you this Hazel Walton is a murderess, and I'm going to see her hung."

"Are you?" said Felix Craft. "Seems to me you've overlooked a bet.

Didn't we run across Red Herring at the end of the draw?"

"Now look here, Craft," cried the marshal. "You can't hook this killing up with me! I can prove I was in Golden Bar an hour ago. I can get people to swear I was."

The district attorney nodded. "Red's innocent of this, all right. He couldn't have done it. It wouldn't be reasonable. He always was friendly with Rafe, and this was a grudge killing. It couldn't have been robbery, because nothing of Rafe's was stolen; watch, money, it's all here. It's Hazel Walton, and you can stick a pin in that. C'mon, let's go."

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

THE DISTRICT ATTORNEY'S NIGHTMARE

Behind the corral of Guerilla Melody, at the tip end of Golden Bar, Main Street, a small spring bubbled to life amid rocks. It was the custom of Guerilla Melody to slip out to this spring for a long cool drink of fresh water each night before going to bed.

On the night of the first of April, Guerilla, having spent a short but profitable poker evening with several friends in a saloon, reached the spring at eleven o'clock.

"I thought you were never coming," announced a peevish voice from the black shadow of a large rock. "I've been waiting here since nine o'clock."

"You talk much louder, Bill," said Guerilla calmly, "and you'll wait here a while longer--say about twenty years longer or fifteen, if the judge feels good-natured. Man alive, ain't you got _any_ sense?"

"I was lonesome," Billy excused himself. "I've got to talk to somebody. And anyway, a feller hardly ever gets more'n ten years for a hold-up where n.o.body's killed."

"But where somebody is killed the penalty is worth considerin',"

pointed out Guerilla Melody. "And Tip O'Gorman was found yesterday morning lying on the floor of his front room dead as Julius Caesar, with your quirt beside him, and your snakeskin hatband inside the door."

"Tip killed! Tip!"

"Yes, Tip, and on account of the quirt and the hatband there's a warrant issued for you for the murder, and two posses are out looking for you."

"I saw them," said Billy placidly. "I thought it was on account of the stage hold-up. And they think I downed Tip?"

"Half the town's sure you did, and half is sure you didn't, and the other half is straddlin' the fence."

"That makes three halves," Billy said dryly. "Golden Bar must have considerably increased in population since I left."

"You know what I mean," snapped Guerilla, irritated at what he chose to consider callous flippancy on the part of his friend. "And Tip ain't the only one cashed. Rafe Tuckleton pa.s.sed out last night."

"How?"

"Throat cut, head cut, and three knife cuts through his heart. Hazel Walton is in jail charged with the job."

Billy Wingo stiffened where he sat. Hazel Walton in jail! For an instant he couldn't realize it. His fingers closed on Guerilla's forearm.

Guerilla jerked away the arm. "You don't need to cut my arm in two,"

he remonstrated, tenderly fingering the member in question. "I didn't have nothing to do with it. Lord A'mighty, Bill, I'll bet you squeezed a muscle out of place."

"My mistake," apologized Billy. "I forgot myself for a minute."

"Then I don't want to be around when you remember yourself. I----"

"What evidence is there against Hazel?" Billy cut in sharply.

"In the first place there's the knife that killed Rafe," said Guerilla, seating himself beside his friend in the shadow of the rock. "Butcher knife with T.W. on the handle that Hazel admitted was hers when they showed it to her. But she said Dan Slike had taken the knife--stuck it in his boot when he left. Then there was Rafe's own gun which Hazel had lying on her kitchen table, showing he'd been there. She admitted that too, but said he'd attacked her, and she'd managed to get hold of his gun after the clock fell on him, and drive him out."

"Rafe attacked her, huh? And she drove him out?" Billy leaned back against the rock in order to steady his shaking body. When he spoke, he found some difficulty in keeping his voice down. "_He attacked her and she drove him out_! Then what in h.e.l.l is she arrested for--defending herself?"

"Now, listen, Bill, you know me. I believe anything that girl says, no matter what. But there are some other people harder to convince. The district attorney, and he's got a good many others stringing their chips with his, says how this story of Rafe's attacking her ain't true.

That Rafe wouldn't hurt her on a bet, because he liked her too much.

And to back that up, here's Rafe's foreman, Jonesy, steps up and swears Rafe told him he was going to see Hazel last night and ask her to marry him. Hazel says Rafe was drunk when he came to see her, and Jonesy says he wasn't. So there's that."

"Weren't there any tracks round Rafe's body to show----"