“I could raise a posse,” Johnson admitted. “But--how’m I goin’ to know the fellas I line up ain’t in with Bass? No! I’m goin’ to line my sights on Simp Dunbar an’ before I let some dam’ spy carry word, I’ll go it by myse’f!” “Simp Dunbar? Who’s he?” “He’s the skunk that killed my cousin, Billy Tucker! Two weeks ago, oveh in Tarrant. Man! I’d give a black land farm to git me Simp Dunbar oveh my front sight. An’ I shore will! ’T was like this. Bass’s outfit loped up to a saloon on the aidge o’ Fort Worth, where Billy, he was havin’ a drink. The’ was some kind o’ wranglin’, Billy bein’ the kind as won’t back down fer no man livin’. Simp Dunbar--I’ve knowed him all my life fer a useless cus an’ Billy knowed him, too--he shot from off to one side. Billy an’ me, we helled around togetheh when we was kids. Punched cows togetheh, out Menard-way. I--I thought a heap o’ Billy----” Ware’s Kid nodded silently. Here was a man he understood. Understood his vindictiveness, for it was in his own fierce Texan blood; understood his willingness to take a hundred-to-one chance to face his enemy. More and more, he liked Bos’ Johnson. “A’ right. We’ll hunt ’em up,” he grunted. “How-come yuh know they’re goin’ to be at Eagle Ford?” “My spy told me. Had him a-watchin’ fer ’em last two weeks. That boy.” Ware’s Kid stared silently at Johnson. “What’s name that other little station--east o’ here?” he asked. “Mesquite?” “Didn’t even know there was one,” shrugged Ware’s Kid, with a ghost of a grin. “Johnson, we’ll be at Mesquite, not Eagle Ford, tonight. Boy’s lyin’. In with Bass, likely. Feelin’ I got, an’ mostly my feelin’s is right.” Johnson was won over to acceptance of the altered plan, if but half-willingly. He admitted that he knew nothing much of the boy, who had appeared in the office a month before offering to spy upon the Bass gang. “In with Bass!” repeated the Ranger. “Hell! He could’ve brought yuh lots o’ news, ’fore this.” * * * * * They waited until nearly dark, then ate at a Chinese restaurant. It was pitch-dark when they went swiftly to the stable where Johnson’s horse, with the big stallion, had been fed an hour before. They saddled, talking a little for the benefit of any ears that might be stretched toward them, of the western road; that toward Eagle Ford. For a couple of miles they rode swiftly eastward, then turned south on the road to Mesquite. They were close to the railroad always, riding through woodland. Johnson led, because of his knowledge of the country. Soon he checked his mount and jerked the Winchester from its scabbard. Ware’s Kid already cuddled his carbine in the crook of his arm. They rode on again, slower, now.