Coulee City dispatch. [volume] (Coulee City, Wash.) 19??-19??, 1941-08-07

tured. Roper went to look for Jody when
told she had disappeared Approaching
one Of his own shacks when he noticed out
posts keeping q careful watch.
ing the time. Yet he knew very
definitely that dawn was just two
hours away.
He shook Shoshone Wilce. The lit
tie man groaned once, then came
full awake with the sudden .esponse
of an animal.
Without the snow the rock-like i'm
penetrability of the overcast sky
would have made the night utterly
black, but the ghostly pallor of the
snow had the effect of family modi-
flying the darkness. The eye might
possibly have made out a moving
dark shape at ten yards; beyond
that there was nothing but muf-
fling blackness.
"You lead out" Roper said. His
voice was instinctively hushed, even
at this distance from the enemy.
you've had more chance to study
the lay than me-"
Shoshone Wilce delayed. "Bill," he
said, 81 lay thinking about this time
for long time, after you was
asleep" A logged stubbornness
came into his tone. 81 figure we
can probably take the cabin. And if
we take the cabin without fighting
we've got chance to get away. But
if so much as one shot is fired-Bill,
the outposts will close like bar
trap. I don't see no way we can
ever get clear"
BY the sudden frozen silence, Sho-
shone Wilce was able to sense Bill
Roper's anger.
II wish to God," Bill Roper said
at last, 81 had Hat Crick Tommy
here, or Tex Long; or even the very
greenest kid cowboy that's riding
the range with them, somewhere to-
night. need one other man for this
job. It wouldn't take an especially
brave man, or smart man, nor a
real good gunfighter. I just need
one fairly good man. But haven't
even got that!'
"Bill, I only claim-look, Bill: I
amt afraid of 'em. only"
"You amt afraid" Bill Roper re-
peated; "no-not much. But when
the guns spoke, you left a girl down
under her horse in the snow-maybe
hurt, maybe dead-and you ran for
your life.''
When Bill Roper had said that,
both were utterly still, while man
might have counted hundred.
Shoshone's voice was flat and dead
els that the way it looks to your"
''Look at it yourself"
"Then," Shoshone said, 81 guess
there amt anything more to say"
He stood up.
"There's this to say" Bill Roper
said. you're going to work with
me tonight because / haven't got
anybody else. You're going to do
exactly what l say, and when l say,
without any back talk or question.
You make one slip tonight and the
West won't hold you, nor the world
won't hold you, and you'll answer to
me in the end. You hear me?"
"Okay," Shoshone said in the
same fiat, dead voice.
Zone thing MORE" Roper said.
IF we make a quiet job, We'll try
to 60 out slow and quiet, the three
of us together. Otherwise, you take
Jody's lead rope and ride like hell.
Six miles below here, near the creek,
there's a kind of a brush corral.
You and the girl will wait for me
there. Wait for me until daylight
begins to come; then 60 on"
They moved down into the valley
of the Fork, walking fast. When they
had dropped into the bed of Fork
Creek itself they moved northward,
following its windings, for what
seemed long way; but no sign of
approaching dawn yet showed, and
Roper felt that they had plenty of
time. AS they at last passed the
point where the cabin stood, invisi-
BILE in the dark, Shoshone indicated
it's location with raised arm; but
they moved on fifty yards farther, so
that they might approach the cabin
from the north.
Cautiously now, Shoshone climbed
the bank, silent as the Indians with
whom he had spent his youth. Turn
ing, he gripped Bill Roper's arm.
His words were whispered close to
Roper's ear.
Zone of the night guards is out
hathaway, about five hundred
yards" he whispered; "about in line
with where you see that big dead
pine"
Roper could see no dead pine. 1t
annoyed him that Shoshone's eyes
were better than his own-as good
as the eyes of an Indian, or a lynx.
"I'll leave my carbine standing
just outside the door," Shoshone
said. 81 only want it for later, after
we've took to the horses
"That's all right" Roper said.
"But you remember this: If there's
any trouble in the cabin, you stand
and fight! Because if you don't, I'll
turn and plug you myself, if it takes
my last shot to do it"
"Okay"