The Collected Westerns of William MacLeod Raine: 21 Novels in One Volume

by Unknown

  Bob loosened the bandanna from his throat and with it covered the face of the outlaw. He straightened the body and folded the hands across the breast. It was not in his power to obliterate from the face the look of ghastly, rigid terror stamped on it during the last terrible moments.

  The young husband went back to his waiting wife. He stood by her stirrup while she looked down at him, white-faced.

  "Who was it?" she whispered.

  "Jake Houck," he told her gravely. "The Utes did it--because he killed Black Arrow, I reckon."

  She shuddered. A cloud had come over the beautiful world.

  "We'll go on now," he said gently. "I'll come back later with your father."

  They rode in silence up the long hill. At the top of it he drew rein and smiled at his bride.

  "You'll not let that spoil the day, will you, June? He had it coming, you know. Houck had gone bad. If it hadn't been the Utes, it would have been the law a little later."

  "Yes, but--" She tried to answer his smile, not very successfully. "It's rather--awful, isn't it?"

  He nodded. "Let's walk over to the cabin, dear."

  She swung down, into his arms. There she found comfort that dissipated the cloud from her mind. When she ran into the house to throw her arms around Pete Tolliver's neck, she was again radiant.

  "Guess! Guess what!" she ordered her father.

  Pete looked at his daughter and at the bashful, smiling boy.

  "I reckon I done guessed, honeybug," he answered, stroking her rebellious hair.

  "You're to come and live with us. Isn't he, Bob?"

  The young husband nodded sheepishly. He felt that it was a brutal thing to take a daughter from her father. It had not occurred to him before, but old Pete would feel rather out of it now.

  Tolliver looked at Bob over the shoulder of his daughter.

  "You be good to her or I'll--" His voice broke.

  "I sure will," the husband promised.

  June laughed. "He's the one ought to worry, Dad. I'm the flyaway on this team."

  Bob looked at her, gifts in his eyes. "I'm worryin' a heap," he said, smiling.

  THE END

  Table of Contents

  Wyoming

  Brand Blotters

  Ridgway of Montana

  A Texas Ranger

  Bucky O’Connor

  Mavericks

  Crooked Trails and Straight

  The Vision Splendid

  The Pirate of Panama

  A Daughter of the Dons

  Steve Yeager

  The Highgrader

  The Yukon Trail

  The Sheriff’s Son

  A Man Four-Square

  Oh You Tex!

  The Big Town Round-Up

  Gunsight Pass

  Tangled Trails

  Man Size

  The Fighting Edge

  Contents