"Answer me!" "An' if I don't?" replied Wallie in a bantering tone. The masked man stepped back a pace and drew his gun. He held it at a hip, the muzzle pointing at the stomach of the other. "You saw how Lonergan died," he said softly. "It wasn't easy to watch." Wallie glanced at the gun, then at the masked man's face. He saw something in those steady eyes behind the mask that made him almost feel the frightful drilling of a slug in the pit of his stomach. "I--I didn't know anything about it," he said. "Mort an' Vince planned it by themselves an'--" "Yuh damned squealer!" yelled Vince. "Go on." "Rangoon bossed the job--" "You'd o' done it yer ownself," bellowed Vince, "if yuh hadn't been so damned yeller. All of us all the time had tuh take orders from you while you strutted around in fancy clothes!" "That's what I wanted to know," the masked man said, holstering his weapon. "That's a confession," shouted Bryant, "an' I heard it. I'll witness that in court." "But wait," fairly shouted Wallie. "You've nothin' to gain by hangin' us! It'll just mean that Penelope dies too! You don't understand." One of the windows in the room looked out across the Basin to the Gap. The masked man had glanced toward this frequently throughout the conversation. Now he saw horsemen coming from the canyon. "Yuma will be here in a few minutes," he said. "He's crossing the Basin now." "Then you've got damned little time to decide. I made arrangements in Red Oak, like I told you last night." Wallie addressed himself to Bryant. "There's a woman there that's agreed to take care of Penny an' those kids. I didn't say how she was goin' to take care of her! It's Breed Martin's wife!" "Breed Martin!" Bryant roared the name. "A skunk that'll do anything includin' murder fer the price of a drink! Why you--" The old man was trembling in rage, struggling to get on his feet; his hands were working as if his fingers itched to feel Wallie's thick throat. "That's just it," said Wallie. "I admit all you've said here, I admit it tuh prove that I was willin' to go to any lengths to have my way! I planned to be the richest man in this part of the country!" Wallie's voice was shrill and getting shriller. "I wanted every killer in this state takin' orders from me. I was goin' to control the state an' I wouldn't let the life of one girl stand between me an' what I wanted. I told that Redskin where tuh take Penelope. I described the house! He can't miss it! Two hours after she gets there, Breed an' his woman'll have everything all set to take her an' the kids south of the border, an' that'll be the last of 'em! You know damned well what'll happen to a girl as pretty as Penelope in some of them outlaw greaser dives! "I told Breed an' his wife to get her out of Red Oak an' go in hidin' till they heard from me! They'll do just that! If I don't show up, they'll go on south with her." "Where's that hidin' place?" barked Bryant. "Where is it? Answer me, yuh louse!"