Play a Lone Hand by Luke; Short

Giff’s instinct now was to send him back, even though he had taunted him into coming. But he would not do it, he knew; for he had spoken the truth when he told Welling the whole countryside would know before night that the Land Office Special Agent was a sorry man who could be pushed and crowded and eventually neutralized. Oddly, Giff cared about that, and he knew what he was about to do had to be done if Welling’s investigation were not to collapse.
    Since they were both wearing cowman’s half boots, Giff anticipated complaints from Welling during the long afternoon. But the fitful wind pressing at their backs, pushing down the grass ahead of them in uneven rhythm across the limitless plains, made talk difficult and Welling held stubbornly to silence. By unspoken agreement they gave occasional bands of cattle a wide detour, since a man afoot was considered legitimate game by these half wild beeves. Once in late afternoon they saw far ahead of them a pair of riders heading in the direction of Torreon. At Giff’s command, Welling flattened out alongside him in the grass until the riders were out of sight.
    They saw the first trees of Torreon far distant in the early evening. As they drew closer, Giff saw that Torreon headquarters was built in the shallow timbered valley of a wide stream. The house itself was set in a park of rolling lawn and isolated tremendous cottonwoods. It was built of huge timbers, the main part, three stories high, flanked by long wings of stone construction. The carriage house and stables separated the big house from the working part of the ranch.
    Beyond them was a long single-story adobe which Giff decided was the combination cookshack and bunkhouse. It was set in a grassless area of scuffed and hard-packed ground that stretched to the tangle of barns, sheds and pole corrals to the east. The first lamps, lighted against the twilight, were burning in the big house. As Giff listened, he could hear the cook’s triangle summoning the ranch hands to supper, and at this distance, he could make out men moving from the barns and corrals toward the isolated cookshack.
    He saw Welling was watching him with an expression of helplessness and distaste on his face. In order to reach the cookshack without alarming the main house, they would have to make a wide half-circle and Giff picked out his point of approach before he started out. A half hour later, they halted at the corner of a big wagon shed after crossing the horse pasture to the east of the ranch buildings. Giff was waiting for a ranch dog to pick them up in the twilight, but it seemed their coming had gone unnoticed except by a scattering of incurious horses in the pasture.
    Ahead of him and across a wide expanse of barn lot, he could see the cookshack, its door open. Lamps were lighted inside and he could even see one rider, his back to the door, industriously attacking his supper. He sensed Welling’s aching uneasiness, but he ignored him as he set out for the cookshack.
    Welling caught up with him and said hurriedly in a low voice, “I don’t like this. They’ll all be in there. What do you want me to do?”
    â€œYou’ve got a gun. Stand them off,” Giff said. As an afterthought, he drew his own gun and wordlessly passed it over to Welling. He did not want to look at the man, and he had a dismal conviction that Welling wouldn’t back up his play.
    This was gone from his mind when he took the one step up to the cookshack door, moved across the sill and halted. There were perhaps fifteen men at the big table which was not nearly full, and only a few of them faced the door; the majority had their backs to the door and were seated near the kitchen end of the table.
    Almost immediately Giff spotted the tough hungry-looking rider who had set them afoot; he was seated two places from the kitchen door and had his head inches above his plate, wolfing his food. Giff’s brief sidelong glance at Welling