By the time that Dave had made a tour of two thirds of the room he knew that Sheriff Sweeney was not among those present. His inquiries brought out the fact that he must have just left. Dingwell sauntered toward the door, intending to follow him, but what he saw there changed his mind. Buck Rutherford and Slim Sanders were lounging together at one end of the bar. It took no detective to understand that they were watching the door. A glance to the rear showed Dave two more Rutherfords at the back exit. That he would have company in case he left was a safe guess.
The cattleman chuckled. The little devils of mischief already mentioned danced in his eyes. If they were waiting for him to go, he would see that they had a long session of it. Dave was in no hurry. The night was young yet, and in any case the Legal Tender never closed. The key had been thrown away ten years before. He could sit it out as long as the Rutherfords could.
Dingwell was confident no move would be made against him in public. The sentiment of the community had developed since that distant day when the Rutherford gang had shot down Jack Beaudry in open daylight. Deviltry had to be done under cover now. Moreover, Dave was in the peculiar situation of advantage that the outlaws could not kill him until they knew where he had hidden the gold. So far as the Rutherfords went, he was just now the goose that laid the golden egg.
He stood chatting with another cattleman for a few moments, then drifted back to the rear of the hall again. Underneath an elk's head with magnificent antlers a party sat around a table playing draw poker with a skinned deck. Two of them were wall-eyed strangers whom Dingwell guessed to be professional tinhorns. Another ran a curio store in town. The fourth was Dan Meldrum, one of the toughest crooks in the county. Nineteen years ago Sheriff Beaudry had sent him to the penitentiary for rustling calves. The fifth player sat next to the wall. He was a large, broad-shouldered man close to fifty. His face had the weather-beaten look of confidence that comes to an outdoor Westerner used to leading others.
While Dave was moving past this table, he noticed that Chet Fox was whispering in the ear of the man next the wall. The poker-player nodded, and at the same moment his glance met that of Dingwell. The gray eyes of the big fellow narrowed and grew chill. Fox, starting to move away, recognized the cattleman from whom he had escaped half an hour before. Taken by surprise, the little spy looked guilty as an urchin caught stealing apples.
It took no clairvoyant to divine what the subject of that whispered colloquy had been. The cheerful grin of Dave included impartially Fox, Meldrum, and the player beneath the elk's head.
The ex-convict spoke first. "Come back to sit in our game, Dave?" he jeered.
Dingwell understood that this was a challenge. It was impossible to look on the ugly, lupine face of the man, marked by the ravages of forty years of vice and unbridled passion, without knowing that he was ready for trouble now. But Meldrum was a mere detail of a situation piquant enough even for so light-hearted a son of the Rockies as this cattleman. Dave had already invited himself into a far bigger game of the Rutherford clan than this. Moreover, just now he was so far ahead that he had cleared the table of all the stakes. Meldrum knew this. So did Hal Rutherford, the big man sitting next the wall. What would be their next move? Perhaps if he joined them he would find out. This course held its dangers, but long experience had taught him that to walk through besetting perils was less risk than to run from them.
"If that's an invitation, Dan, you're on," he answered gayly. "Just a minute, and I'll join you. I want to send a message to Sweeney."
Without even looking at Meldrum to see the effect of this, Dave beckoned a Mexican standing near. "Tell the sheriff I want to see him here pronto. You win a dollar if he is back within an hour."
The Mexican disappeared. Fox followed him.
The cattleman drew in his chair and was introduced to the two strangers. The quick, searching look he gave each confirmed his first impression. These men were professional gamblers. It occurred to him that they had made a singularly poor choice of victims in Dan Meldrum and Hal Rutherford. Either of them would reach for his gun at the first evidence of crooked play.
No man in Battle Butte was a better poker psychologist than Dingwell, but to-night cards did not interest him. He was playing a bigger game. His subconscious mind was alert for developments. Since only his surface attention was given to poker he played close.
While Rutherford dealt the cards he talked at Dave. "So you're expecting Sweeney, are you? Been having trouble with any one?"
"Or expect to have any?" interjected Meldrum, insolence in his shifty pig eyes.
"No, not looking for any," answered Dingwell amiably. "Fact is, I was prospecting around Lonesome Park and found a gold mine. Looks good, so I thought I'd tell Sweeney about it. … Up to me? I've got openers." He pushed chips to the center of the table.
Rutherford also pushed chips forward. "I'll trail along. … You got an idea of taking in Sweeney as a partner? I'm looking for a good investment. It would pay you to take me in rather than Sweeney."
Three of those at the table accepted this talk at its face value. They did not sense the tension underneath the apparently casual give-and-take. Two of them stayed and called for cards. But Dave understood that he had been offered a compromise. Rutherford had proposed to divide the gold stolen from the express car, and the proffer carried with it a threat in case of refusal.
"Two when you get to me. … No, I reckon I'll stick to the sheriff. I've kinda arranged the deal."
As Rutherford slid two cards across to him the eyes of the men met. "Call it off. Sweeney is not the kind of a partner to stay with you to the finish if your luck turns bad. When I give my word I go through."
Dingwell looked at his cards. "Check to the pat hand. … Point is, Hal, that I don't expect my luck to turn bad."
"Hmp! Go in with Sweeney and you'll have bad luck all right. I'll promise you that. Better talk this over with me and put a deal through." He rapped on the table to show that he too passed without betting.
The curio dealer checked and entered a mild protest. "Is this a poker game or a conversazione, gentlemen? It's stuck with Meldrum. I reckon he's off in Lonesome Park gold-mining the way he's been listening."
Meldrum brought his attention back to the game and bet his pat hand. Dave called. After a moment's hesitation Rutherford threw down his cards.
"There's such a thing as pushing your luck too far," he commented. "Now, take old man Crawford. He was mightily tickled when his brother Jim left him the Frying Pan Ranch. But that wasn't good enough as it stood. He had to try to better it by marrying the Swede hash-slinger from Los Angeles. Later she fed him arsenic in his coffee. A man's a fool to overplay his luck."
At the showdown Meldrum disclosed a four-card flush and the cattleman three jacks.
As Dave raked in the pot he answered Rutherford casually. "Still, he hadn't ought to underplay it either. The other fellow may be out on a limb."
"Say, is it any of your business how I play my cards?" demanded Meldrum, thrusting his chin toward Dingwell.
"Absolutely none," replied Dave evenly.
"Cut that out, Dan," ordered Rutherford curtly.
The ex-convict mumbled something into his beard, but subsided.
Two hours had slipped away before Dingwell commented on the fact that the sheriff had not arrived. He did not voice his suspicion that the Mexican had been intercepted by the Rutherfords.
"Looks like Sweeney didn't get my message," he said lazily. "You never can tell when a Mexican is going to get too tired to travel farther."
"Better hook up with me on that gold-mine proposition, Dave," Hal Rutherford suggested again.
"No, I reckon not, Hal. Much obliged, just the same."
Dave began to watch the game more closely. There were points about