He had the stores, the road, the village, to himself; and he patrolled a beat like a sentry watching for an Indian attack. Toward noon a single man ventured out into the road to accost the cowboy. “Las Vegas, I'm tellin' you--all the greasers air leavin' the range,” he said. “Howdy, Abe!” replied Las Vegas. “What 'n hell you talkin' about?” The man repeated his information. And Las Vegas spat out frightful curses. “Abe--you heah what Beasley's doin'?” “Yes. He's with his men--up at the ranch. Reckon he can't put off ridin' down much longer.” That was where the West spoke. Beasley would be forced to meet the enemy who had come out single-handed against him. Long before this hour a braver man would have come to face Las Vegas. Beasley could not hire any gang to bear the brunt of this situation. This was the test by which even his own men must judge him. All of which was to say that as the wildness of the West had made possible his crimes, so it now held him responsible for them. “Abe, if thet--greaser don't rustle down heah I'm goin' after him.” “Sure. But don't be in no hurry,” replied Abe. “I'm waltzin' to slow music.... Gimme a smoke.” With fingers that slightly trembled Abe rolled a cigarette, lit it from his own, and handed it to the cowboy. “Las Vegas, I reckon I hear hosses,” he said, suddenly. “Me, too,” replied Las Vegas, with his head high like that of a listening deer. Apparently he forgot the cigarette and also his friend. Abe hurried back to the store, where he disappeared. Las Vegas began his stalking up and down, and his action now was an exaggeration of all his former movements. A rational, ordinary mortal from some Eastern community, happening to meet this red-faced cowboy, would have considered him drunk or crazy. Probably Las Vegas looked both. But all the same he was a marvelously keen and strung and efficient instrument to meet the portending issue. How many thousands of times, on the trails, and in the wide-streeted little towns all over the West, had this stalk of the cowboy's been perpetrated! Violent, bloody, tragic as it was, it had an importance in that pioneer day equal to the use of a horse or the need of a plow. At length Pine was apparently a deserted village, except for Las Vegas, who patrolled his long beat in many ways--he lounged while he watched; he stalked like a mountaineer; he stole along Indian fashion, stealthily, from tree to tree, from corner to corner; he disappeared in the saloon to reappear at the back; he slipped round behind the barns to come out again in the main road; and time after time he approached his horse as if deciding to mount.