The squatters gazed at each other in stupefaction.  Not a man present but could lie fearlessly on occasion, but not with such consummate art as this.

“Anything more ter say?” inquired the ‘Piker.’

“Wal, there’s this:  I tole Jake Farge that I’d shoot him on sight, and I’m mighty glad that someone else has saved me the trouble.  You mean to do me up; I see that plain.  I hated yer comin’ into a country that won’t support a crowd, and I’ve made things hot for more’n one of ye.  But I wasn’t thinkin’ o’ land when I warned Jake Farge not to set foot on my ranch.”

“What was you thinkin’ of?”

“Of my Mintie.  That feller—­a married man—­has bin after her—­and some of you know it.  She kin take keer of herself can my Mints, but some things is a man’s business.  I meant to shoot him, but I didn’t.  I’m glad the low-down cuss is dead, but the bullet that stopped his crawlin’ to my gal never come outer my rifle.  Now string me up, and be derned to ye, but let this young feller go back to look after my daughter.  That’s all.”

He faced them with a derisive smile upon his weather-beaten face.

Obviously, the Court was impressed, but the fact remained that Jake Farge was dead, and that someone must have killed him.

“What d’ye say, boys?”

“I say he’s lyin’,” observed a squatter, whom Thomas Ransom had discovered ear-marking an unbranded calf.

“Smoky knows that Pap done it,” remarked another.

This bolt went home.  Smoky’s face during the preceding five minutes had been worth studying.  He was quite sure that the old man was lying, and upon his ingenuous countenance such knowledge, illuminated by admiration and amazement, was duly inscribed.

“Pap’s yarn is too thin,” said a gaunt Missourian.

“It’s thin as you air,” said Ransom contemptuously.  “Do you boys think that I’d spring so thin a tale on ye, if it wasn’t true?”

At this they wriggled uneasily.  The ‘Piker,’ with some experience of fickle crowds, said peremptorily—­

“The old man done it, and the young ’un knows he done it.  They’re jest two of a kind.  Those in favour of hangin’ ’em both hold up their hands.  One hand apiece will do.”

Slowly, inexorably, the hands went up.  The judge pronounced sentence—­

“Ye’ve five minutes.  Say yer prayers, if ye feel like it.”

The simple preparations were made swiftly.  Two raw-hide lariats were properly adjusted.  The prisoners looked on with the stoical indifference of Red Indians.  It might have been said of the pair that neither had known how to live, but each knew how to die.

“Ready?” said the ‘Piker.’

“Hold on!” replied a high-pitched voice.

The crowd turned to behold Mintie.  She had crawled up silently and stealthily.  But now she stood upright, her small head thrown back, her eyes glittering in the moonlight.

“Got a rope fer me?” she asked.  “I’ve heard everything.”