Shefford did not show that he had heard.  Hurley waited, leering as looked from the keen listeners to Shefford.

“Want to have them all yerself, eh?” he jeered.

Shefford struck him—­sent him tumbling heavily, like a log.  Hurley, cursing as he half rose, jerked his gun out.  Nas Ta Bega, swift as light, kicked the gun out of his hand.  And Joe Lake picked it up.

Deliberately the Mormon cocked the weapon and stood over Hurley.

“Get up!” he ordered, and Shefford heard the ruthless Mormon in him then.

Hurley rose slowly.  Then Joe prodded him in the middle with the cocked gun.  Shefford startled, expected the gun to go off.  So did the others, especially Hurley, who shrank in panic from the dark Mormon.

“Rustle!” said Joe, and gave the man a harder prod.  Assuredly the gun did not have a hair-trigger.

“Joe, mebbe it’s loaded!” protested one of the cowboys.

Hurley shrank back, and turned to hurry away, with Joe close after him.  They disappeared in the darkness.  A constrained silence was maintained around the camp-fire for a while.  Presently some of the men walked off and others began to converse.  Everybody heard the sound of hoofs passing down the trail.  The patter ceased, and in a few moments Lake returned.  He still carried Hurley’s gun.

The crowd dispersed then.  There was no indication of further trouble.  However, Shefford and Joe and Nas Ta Bega divided the night in watches, so that some one would be wide awake.

Early next morning there was an exodus from the village of the better element among the visitors.  “No fun hangin’ round hyar,” one of them expressed it, and as good-naturedly as they had come they rode away.  Six or seven of the desperado class remained behind, bent on mischief; and they were reinforced by more arrivals from Stonebridge.  They avoided the camp by the spring, and when Shefford and Lake attempted to go to them they gave them a wide berth.  This caused Joe to assert that they were up to some dirty work.  All morning they lounged around under the cedars, keeping out of sight, and evidently the reinforcement from Stonebridge had brought liquor.  When they gathered together at their camp, half drunk, all noisy, some wanting to swagger off into the village and others trying to hold them back, Joe Lake said, grimly, that somebody was going to get shot.  Indeed, Shefford saw that there was every likelihood of bloodshed.

“Reckon we’d better take to one of the cabins,” said Joe.

Thereupon the three repaired to the nearest cabin, and, entering, kept watch from the windows.  During a couple of hours, however, they did not see or hear anything of the ruffians.  Then came a shot from over in the village, a single yell, and, after that, a scattering volley.  The silence and suspense which followed were finally broken by hoof-beats.  Nas Ta Bega called Joe and Shefford to the window he had been stationed at.  From here they saw the unwelcome visitors ride down the trail, to disappear in the cedars toward the outlet of the valley.  Joe, who had numbered them, said that all but one of them had gone.