ck Coster. Every one thought Coster had enough money and
influence to keep him immune from legal proceedings, but John
Slaughter wasted none of the county's money in arrest or trial.

"I've known what you were doing for a long time now," he announced,
holding his revolver leveled on his auditor while he spoke. There was
some debate, but the sheriff clinched his argument by going into
details, and when he had finished outlining the prosecution's case he
delivered his ultimatum: "Get out or I'll kill you."

Coster joined Juan Soto in exile. And then it became a simple matter
of hunting down outlaws and bringing them in for trial. The arm of the
law was limbered and justice functioned in the Tombstone court-house
as well as it does in any city of the land; far better than is the
case in some more pretentious communities. There was of course plenty
of work left. Tombstone is full of stories of John Slaughter's
exploits.

A desperado, seeking to kill him, threw down on him as he was entering
a saloon. Caught unawares for once, the sheriff flung up his hand and,
as he grasped the pistol, thrust his thumb under the descending
hammer. Meantime he drew his own weapon and placed the man under
arrest. Two train-robbers sought to lure him to Wilcox by a decoy
letter stating that his nephew had been killed. The instinct which had
saved him from other ambuscades made him investigate; and when he
learned that his nephew was living he summoned a friend who made the
journey with him. The spectacle of these two old-timers emerging from
opposite doors of the day coach, each with a double-barreled shotgun
under his arm, drove the conspirators from the station platform. Years
afterward one of them confessed the details of the plot.

John Slaughter served two terms as sheriff, and when he retired from
office Cochise County was as peaceable as any county in the whole
Southwest. The old-timers who witnessed the passing of events during
his regime invariably speak of him when they are telling of great
gunmen. Yet, from the time when he started up the Pecos with that herd
in the spring of 1876 until the day when he went to his San Bernardino
ranch to take up life as a peaceful cattleman, he slew fewer men than
some whose names are absolutely unknown. What he did he managed to
accomplish in most instances without pulling a trigger. That was his
way.

COCHISE

Darkness had settled down upon the wide mesquite flat, smoothing off
all