Range Ghost by Bradford Scott Page A

think they were much hurt—and then he shoved ’em out. I wouldn’t have paid the whole business much mind—we ever now and then have a ruckus in the place—but as I said, I just didn’t like their looks.”
    “And do you think you’d recognize the man who came in and talked to them, if you saw him again?”
    Once more the bartender shook his head. “I doubt it,” he replied. “As I said, I was sorta busy at the time and just glanced at him as I poured his drink. I might, though, if he came in and ordered a drink the same way; can’t tell.”
    “You say he was dressed like a ranch owner?” interpolated the sheriff.
    “Sorta, I’d say,” the bartender agreed.
    “And he was big and tall?”
    “That’s the way I remember him. Uh-huh, I’m sure he was a sorta tall feller. Not as tall as Mr. Slade, but not short, either.”
    “Hmmm!” said the sheriff. Slade smiled at the bartender.
    “You may have been a big help,” he said. “Thank you, very much, for coming in.”
    “I was just sorta curious,” said the other. “We get some purty rough characters in the Deuces Up every now and then, and I was just wondering if I’d seen these fellers in there. Well, got to get on the job. Be seeing you.”
    “What do you think?” the sheriff asked Slade after the drink juggler had departed.
    “I don’t know,” the Ranger admitted frankly. “There are a number of ranch owners in the section, and some of them are tall. Quite a few would answer to that vague description.”
    “I can think of one it fits sorta well,” the sheriff remarked pointedly.
    “Yes, but no positive identification, so take it easy,” Slade advised. The sheriff subsided to mutterings.
    “Well, guess that was all,” he said, glancing around the empty room. “Suppose we amble over to the Trail End and then call it a day. I’m feeling a mite tuckered.”

Chapter Eight
    Again it was Slade’s amazingly keen hearing that saved them. It was but the faintest whisper of metallic sound, a key turning slowly in the lock of the back door, but it was a thunderclap warning to El Halcon’s ears. His arm shot out and hurled Sheriff, chair, and lamp to the floor. Black darkness fell like a thrown blanket even as Slade went half way across the room in a sideways leap, both guns blazing as the back door banged open. Answering shots flamed the darkness. Slugs whizzed past, thudded into the wall. One grazed the back of his left hand.
    Then he heard a queer gurgling cry followed by the thud of something falling. He fired twice at the sound, shifting position as he pulled trigger. There were no answering reports. He hesitated a moment, straining his ears, then glided forward, guns ready for action. Outside was a clatter of hoofs, fading into the distance.
    The sheriff was roaring profanity and surging to his feet. “Get a light going,” Slade called to him, his gaze riveted on a shadowy shape lying just inside the door. Carter started to obey, fell over the smashed chair and swore weirdly. Again he scrambled to his feet and a moment later a second lamp flared, its glow falling on a dead man on the floor, blood still pulsing from his bullet-slashed throat.
    Slade reloaded his guns before addressing the raving sheriff. “Guess we’d better send word to the bartender,”he said, peering at the corpse’s contorted face. “This is another of the three who braced me in the Deuces Up.”
    “You sure?” demanded Carter.
    “Yes, I’m sure,” Slade replied.
    “Well, that’s just fine!” said the sheriff. “Now if you can just get a chance to line sights with the other sidewinder! How in blazes did you catch on so fast?”
    “Heard the key turning in the lock,” Slade explained. “Where’d they get a key? No trouble to make one for these old locks, perhaps from a wax impression, if you know how, and evidently they know how.” He dragged the body to where the others lay, placed it beside them, removed the key from the outside of the door and