I had no time to make inquiries, for my roving eye caught Frank Morton in the doorway, and evidently he wanted to attract my attention.  He turned away and I followed.  When I got outside, he was leaning against the hitching-rail.  One look at this big rancher was enough for me to see that he had been told my part in Steele’s game, and that he himself had roused to the Texas fighting temper.  He had a clouded brow.  He looked somber and thick.  He seemed slow, heavy, guarded.

“Howdy, Russ,” he said.  “We’ve been wantin’ you.”

“There’s ten of us in town, all scattered round, ready.  It’s goin’ to start to-day.”

“Where’s Steele?” was my first query.

“Saw him less’n hour ago.  He’s somewhere close.  He may show up any time.”

“Is he all right?”

“Wai, he was pretty fit a little while back,” replied Morton significantly.

“What’s come off?  Tell me all.”

“Wai, the ball opened last night, I reckon.  Jack Blome came swaggerin’ in here askin’ for Steele.  We all knew what he was in town for.  But last night he came out with it.  Every man in the saloons, every man on the streets heard Blome’s loud an’ longin’ call for the Ranger.  Blome’s pals took it up and they all enjoyed themselves some.”

“Drinking hard?” I queried.

“Nope—­they didn’t hit it up very hard.  But they laid foundations.”  Of course, Steele was not to be seen last night.  This morning Blome and his gang were out pretty early.  But they traveled alone.  Blome just strolled up and down by himself.  I watched him walk up this street on one side and then down the other, just a matter of thirty-one times.  I counted them.  For all I could see maybe Blome did not take a drink.  But his gang, especially Bo Snecker, sure looked on the red liquor.

“By eleven o’clock everybody in town knew what was coming off.  There was no work or business, except in the saloons.  Zimmer and I were together, and the rest of our crowd in pairs at different places.  I reckon it was about noon when Blome got tired parading up and down.  He went in the Hope So, and the crowd followed.  Zimmer stayed outside so to give Steele a hunch in case he came along.  I went in to see the show.

“Wai, it was some curious to me, and I’ve lived all my life in Texas.  But I never before saw a gunman on the job, so to say.  Blome’s a handsome fellow, an’ he seemed different from what I expected.  Sure, I thought he’d yell an’ prance round like a drunken fool.  But he was cool an’ quiet enough.  The bio win’ an’ drinkin’ was done by his pals.  But after a little while it got to me that Blome gloried in this situation.  I’ve seen a man dead-set to kill another, all dark, sullen, restless.  But Blome wasn’t that way.  He didn’t seem at all like a bloody devil.  He was vain, cocksure.  He was revelin’ in the effect he made.  I had him figured all right.