Laramie Holds the Range. Frank H. Spearman

Hawk was evidently at home in Laramie's cabin. He stepped through the door and pushing his hat back on his forehead took a chair and sat down. The two men, masters of taciturnity, looked at each other while this was taking place, and as Hawk seated himself Laramie called for a cup and pushed the coffee pot toward his visitor. Paying no attention to the unspoken invitation, Hawk's features assumed the quizzical lines they sometimes wore when he relaxed and poked questions at his friend.

      "Well," he demanded, banteringly, "where's Jimmie been?"

      "Medicine, Sleepy Cat—pretty near everywhere."

      "I hear you got a job."

      "I was offered one."

      "Deputy marshal, eh?"

      "Farrell Kennedy got me down to Medicine Bend to talk it over."

      "What's the matter, couldn't you hold it?"

      "I didn't want it."

      "You're out of practise on this law-and-order stuff—you've lived up here too long among thieves, Jim. Find out who tore down your wire?"

      Laramie replied in even tones but his voice was hard: "I trailed them across the Crazy Woman. It was somebody from Doubleday's ranch."

      "They had a story at Stormy Gorman's you'd gone over there to blow Barb's head off."

      "Barb wasn't home."

      Hawk was conscious of the evasion. "Was Stormy's talk true?" he demanded curtly.

      "I expected to ask Barb whether he wanted to put my wire back. I was going to give him a chance."

      "It wouldn't be hard to guess how that would come out. Where was he?" asked Hawk, with evident disappointment.

      "They said he was in Sleepy Cat. I rode in and missed him there. He'd gone to the mines. I took the train up to the Junction, There I accidentally got switched off my job and came home."

      "How'd you get switched off?" asked Hawk, resenting the outcome.

      Laramie's manner showed he disliked being bored into. He leaned forward with a touch of asperity and looked, straight at his visitor: "By not 'tending strictly to my own business, Abe."

      Hawk knew from the expression of Laramie's eyes he must drop the subject, and though he lost none of his bantering manner, he desisted: "They didn't have a warrant for me down at the marshal's office, did they?"