There had been a time when Isham had scoffed at the law, but that was in Tonto County. Geronimo County was different, and there was also a sharp rivalry between the mountain and valley counties. Geronimo was down in the valley, a land of heat and broad canals and alfalfa fields stretching away for miles, and its people were peaceably inclined; but the mountainous Tonto had achieved an unenviable reputation as the home of horse-thieves and outlaws. The Geronimo papers had made the most of his outlawry but Isham had reckoned well when he depended upon local jealousy to protect him from the hand of the law. No Tonto County deputy could arrest him in Geronimo, and he knew that no Geronimo deputy would. And to add to his security it soon became evident that Tonto was glad to get rid of him. The county was bankrupt already from trying to convict him and it was content to let sleeping dogs lie. This much McIvor learned before he had been in town an hour--and then he experienced a shock. A tall man that he knew sauntered into the saloon and regarded him out of the tail of his eye--it was Burge Masters, one of the Scarborough gunmen. He took a drink and sauntered out, and as Hall sat at a card table another tall Texan walked in. "Say," he said, coming over to where Hall sat, "haven't I seen you before around here somewhere?" "Why, not that I know of," responded Hall, and looked him over carefully. He belonged to a breed that he knew all too well--heavy-jawed, with high cheek-bones and narrowed eyes--he was a gunman, straight from Texas. But what was he doing here in this peaceful farming community? The answer was in his eyes. He was there for a purpose and that purpose, for some reason, was not unconnected with him, Hall. "That your horse out there?" inquired the Texan abruptly, "blue roan with a slit in one ear? Well, I'll have you to know you _stole_ 'im!" He struck the table and Hall glanced up at him quickly, but he did not make a move. "You are mistaken, my friend," he answered at last, and the Texan turned away. Hall stepped out the door after him, just in time to see three Texans making a critical examination of his roan. And then it flashed over him, the old Scarborough trick which Isham had attempted at Cold Spring. They were trying to prove him a horse-thief. He stood and watched them, stamping their faces on his memory, and at last they slouched away. But he had the answer now--they were still Scarborough gunmen, and they knew he had come with a purpose. What that purpose was he would admit to no man; but they knew, and Isham would know. He was there to kill the last of the Scarboroughs.