They're bad rams, most of 'em."
"There aren't many," said Paloma. "Dave tells me the whole Force
has been cut down to sixteen."
"That's plenty," her father averred. "It's like when Cap'n Bill
McDonald was sent to stop a riot in Dallas. He came to town alone,
and when the citizens asked him where his men was, he said, 'Hell!
'Ain't I enough? There's only one riot.' Are you workin' up a
case, Dave?"
"Um-m--yes! People are missing a lot of stock hereabouts."
"It's these blamed refugees from the war! A Mexican has to steal
something or he gets run down and pore. If it ain't stock, it's
something else. Why, one morning I rode into Jonesville in time to
see four Greasers walkin' down the main street with feed-sacks
over their shoulders. Each one of those gunnie's had something
long and flat and heavy in it, and I growed curious. When I
investigated, what d'you suppose I found? Tombstones! That's
right; four marble beauties fresh from the cemetery. Well, it made
me right sore, for I'd helped to start Jonesville. I was its city
father. I'd made the place fit to live in, and I aimed to keep it
safe to die in, and so, bein' a sort of left-handed, self-
appointed deppity-sheriff, I rounded up those ghouls and drove 'em
to the county-seat in my spring wagon.
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