little law as we
have here is entirely in the hands of the enemy. We must now assume the
direction of our own affairs. Many of you have already served in a
vigilance committee, and you all know the purpose of such an
organization. My idea is to form one now to take possession of Crawling
Water and run Moran and his hired bullies out of the county. Between us,
we can muster about a hundred men; more than enough to turn the trick,
and the quicker we get to work the sooner we'll be able to go about our
business affairs without fear of being shot in the back. My plan is
this: Let us assemble our force quietly, ride into Crawling Water,
capture Moran and his followers, and escort them out of the county.
There must be no lynching or unnecessary bloodshed; but if they resist,
as some of them will, we must use such force as is needed to overcome
them."

He stopped speaking, and for some minutes silence prevailed. Then Bill
Santry shifted the quid in his cheek, spat unerringly through the open
window, and began to talk. His loose-jointed figure had suddenly become
tense and forceful; his lean face was determined and very grim.

"Being as I've suffered some from this skunk, and have lived here some
while, so to say, mebbe I can horn in?" he began.

"Go ahead!" said Wade heartily.

"Gordon here has stated the gist o' this business a whole lot better'n I
could, but I'd like to make a few additional remarks. We've all been
neighbors for some years, and in the natural course of things we've been
pretty good friends. Until this feller, Moran, got to monkeyin' around
here, there wasn't no trouble to talk about, and we was all able to
carry on our work calm and peaceful like. But since this skunk camped
among us, we ain't hardly knowed what a decent sleep is like; he's
grabbed our range, butchered our stock, shot up our men, lied, and
carried on high, in general. We've given the law a chance to do the
square thing by us. All we asked was a fair shake, and we turned the
other cheek, as the Bible says, hopin' that we could win through without
too much fightin', but we've been handed the muddy end of the stick
every time. It's come to a showdown, gents. We either got to let Moran
do as he damn pleases 'round here, or show him that he's tackled a
buzz-saw. Most of us was weaned some earlier than the day before
yisterday. We gradooated from the tenderfoot class some time back, and
it's up to us to prove it."

He paused and looked arou