hate to tell you this. After I seen what happened to our
boys, I rode this way, intendin' to tell you. The trail took me past the
Hamlin shack. I wasn't intendin' to stop, but it seems like they heard
me comin' an' run out to see what was up.

"It was your mother stopped me, Lawler--smiling kind of grim--like she
always smiles when things go wrong.

"'Shorty,' she says; 'you go directly to town and find Kane. You know
he's in jail, for I told you so last night. Tell Sheriff Moreton to
release him; and then tell Kane that Antrim has stolen all the Circle L
cattle and has burned all the Circle L buildings. Tell him that Antrim
himself burned the buildings, and that Antrim said he would wait for
Kane at Antrim's shack--and that he dared Kane to come there for him.
'Shorty,' she said, cold an' ca'm; 'you tell Kane to get out of jail and
go to Antrim's cabin, and kill him!'"

Lawler had sat, grim and silent, listening to Shorty. Twice had Shorty
seen his eyes quicken--when Shorty had mentioned his mother, and again
when he had spoken of Antrim's action in burning the Circle L
buildings.

Now, he leaned forward and peered intently at Shorty, and Shorty
marveled how his eyes bored into his own--with a cold intensity that
chilled the giant.

"Shorty," he said, in a low, strained voice; "Mother hasn't been hurt?"

"I forgot to tell you that," said Shorty; "she said, 'tell Kane I am all
right.'"

Shorty opened his mouth to speak further, but closed it again when he
saw Red King leap down the trails--a flaming red streak that flashed
over the new grass at a speed that took him a hundred yards before
Shorty could get his own horse turned.

The big red horse was lost in a dust cloud when Shorty urged his own
animal southward. And Shorty rode as he had never ridden before, in an
effort to lessen the space between himself and the flying Red King.

To no avail, however. Shorty's horse was fast, but Red King seemed to
have wings, so lightly did he skim over the green gulf of distance that
stretched between his master and the vengeance for which Lawler's soul
was now yearning. Shorty's horse was tired, and Red King was fresh; and
the distance between them grew greater--always greater--slowly,
surely--until the red horse was lost in the tiny dust cloud that moved
with unbelievable velocity far down the trail toward the Rabbit Ear.

CHAPTER XXXIII

THE FIGHT AT THE CABIN

When Red King struck the river trail he was t