Half a minute later he saw a second bill, this time on the side of a store. This, too, he destroyed, with much explosive language. Between Rawhide Street and the Porphyry Lode saloon he ripped down three more notices of the finding of a bowie knife with fourteen notches. When he stopped at the bar and ordered a brandy sling the man was dangerous as a wounded grizzly. The bartender chatted affably. He was in the habit of saying that he had not lost any quarrels with gunmen and he did not intend to find any. “Fine glad day, Mr. Dutch. Nice change from Monday. Hotter’n hell or Yuma then, I say.” The bad man growled. “I was sure enough spittin’ cotton. Went up the gulch with T. B. Gill. Creek’s dry as a cork leg. Good rain wouldn’t hurt none,” the young fellow went on. “’Nother’fthesame,” snarled Dutch, his voice thick with uncontrollable fury. The bartender made a mental comment. “Sore’s a toad on a hot rock this mo’ning.” He tried another subject, with intent to conciliate. “Young fellow in a while back and wanted to hang up a bill. I said, ‘Sure, hop to it.’ Ain’t lost any hog stickers myse’f, but maybe some other gent——” Dutch glared round, found the bill with his eyes, and dragged out a navy revolver. Three bullets crashed through the poster and the wall back of it. The killer whirled and flung the fourth shot at the man behind the bar. But that garrulous youth was fleeing wildly for safety. He had no intention whatever of being Number Fifteen. Between him and the back door was a table. He took it in his stride with all the ease of a champion hurdler. Down the alley he went like a tin-canned cur with a mob of small boys behind. Inside of ten minutes Piodie knew that Sam Dutch was on the warpath again and that no man who did not want a permanent home on Boot Hill would be wise to mention posters or bowie knives to him. Piodie made a good many guesses as to the truth of the situation. Something had taken place that the town knew nothing about. The poster, Dutch’s battered face, his rage, and the absence of his bowie knife from its accustomed sheath in the man’s boot, all bore some relation to the mystery. “Who is this Hugh McClintock, anyhow?” asked a citizen newly arrived from Ohio. “Anybody know anything about him?” Irish Tom Carberry grinned. He was at the post office getting his mail when the innocent question drifted to him. He looked at the stranger. “Sam Dutch knows him. So do I. We know him domn well.” He gave no further information, but after he had gone another former resident of Aurora whispered advice to the Ohioan. “Better not be so curious in public, friend.” “Why?” “Because there’s liable to be a killin’ before night. Don’t you see McClintock has served notice on Dutch that he can’t be chief of Piodie while he’s here? It’s up to Sam to make good or shut up.” “All I asked was——”