Ryan looked full at him. "You've said it. I was a wild young colt thim days, full of the divil and all. But remimber this. I held no grudge at Jack Beaudry. That's what he was elected for--to put me and my sort out of business. Why should I hate him because he was man enough to do it?" "That's not what some of your friends thought." "You're right, worse luck. I was out on the range when it happened. I'll say this for Hal Rutherford. He was full of bad whiskey when your father was murdered. . . . But that ended it for me. I broke with the Huerfano gang outfit and I've run straight iver since." "Why have you come to me? What do you want?" asked the young lawyer, his throat dry. "I need your help." "What for? Why should I give it? I don't know you." "It's not for mysilf that I want it. There's a friend of your father in trouble. When I saw the sign with your name on it I came in to tell you." "What sort of trouble?" "That's a long story. Did you iver hear of Dave Dingwell?" "Yes. I've never met him, but he put me through law school." "How come that?" "I was living in Denver with my aunt. A letter came from Mr. Dingwell offering to pay the expenses of my education. He said he owed that much to my father." "Well, then, Dave Dingwell has disappeared off the earth." "What do you mean--disappeared?" asked Roy. "He walked out of the Legal Tender Saloon one night and no friend of his has seen him since. That was last Tuesday." "Is that all? He may have gone hunting--or to Denver--or Los Angeles." "No, he didn't do any one of the three. He was either murdered or else hid out in the hills by them that had a reason for it." "Do you suspect some one?" "I do," answered Ryan promptly. "If he was killed, two tinhorn gamblers did it. If he's under guard in the hills, the Rutherford gang have got him." "The Rutherfords, the same ones that--?" "The ver-ry same--Hal and Buck and a brood of young hellions they have raised." "But why should they kidnap Mr. Dingwell? If they had anything against him, why wouldn't they kill him?" "If the Rutherfords have got him it is because he knows something they want to know. Listen, and I'll tell you what I think." The Irishman drew up a chair and told Beaudry the story of that night in the Legal Tender as far as he could piece it together. He had talked with one of the poker-players, the man that owned the curio store, and from him had gathered all he could remember of the talk between Dingwell and Rutherford. "Get these points, lad," Ryan went on. "Dave comes to town from a long day's ride. He tells Rutherford that he has been prospecting and has found gold in Lonesome Park. Nothing to that. Dave is a cattleman, not a prospector. Rutherford knows that as well as I do. But he falls right in with Dingwell's story. He offers to go partners with Dave on his gold mine--keeps talking about it--insists on going in with him." "I don't see anything in that," said Roy.