ealous regard for the relative distance
between him and his self-appointed executioners, moved backward. In
crossing the room, Sandusky, without objection from his companions,
moved across their front, and when the four lined up at the bar their
positions had changed. De Spain stood at the extreme left, Sandusky
next, Logan beside him, and Gale Morgan, at the other end of the line,
pretended to pound the bar for service. De Spain, following mountain
etiquette in the circumstances, spread his open hands, palms down, on
the bar. Sandusky's great palms slid in the same fashion over the
checked slab in unspoken recognition of the brief armistice. Logan's
hands came up in turn, and Morgan still pounded for some one to
serve.

De Spain in the new disposition weighed his chances as being both
better and worse. They had put Sandusky's first shot at no more than
an arm's length from his prey, with Logan next to cover the
possibility of the big fellow's failing to paralyze de Spain the first
instant. On the other hand, de Spain, trained in the tactics of
Whispering Smith and Medicine Bend gunmen, welcomed a short-arm
struggle with the worst of his assailants closest at hand. One factor,
too, that he realized they were reckoning with, gave him no concern.
No men in the mountains understood better or were more expert in the
technicalities of the law of self-defense than the gunmen of
Calabasas. The killing of de Spain they well knew would, in spite of
everything, raise a hornet's nest in Sleepy Cat, and they wished to be
prepared for it. Their manoeuvring on this score caused no disquiet
to their slender, compactly built victim. "You'll wait a long time, if
you wait for service here, Morgan," he said, commenting with composure
on Morgan's impatience. Logan looked again at his two companions and
laughed.

Every hope de Spain had of possible help from the back room died with
that laugh. Then the door behind the bar slowly opened, and the
scar-featured face of Sassoon peered cautiously from the gloom. The
horse thief, stooping, walked in with a leer directed triumphantly at
the railroad man.

If it were possible to deepen it, the sinister spot on de Spain's face
darkened. Something in his blood raged at the sight of the malevolent
face. He glanced at Logan. "This," he smiled faintly, nodding toward
Sassoon as he himself took a short step farther to the left, "is your
drink, Harvey, is it?"

"No," retorted Logan loudly, "this is