There was no mistaking the V-shaped nick. It was clearly outlined in the dust and Slim stooped to look at it closely.

“Kind of looks like the mysterious rider was the guy who roped me around the neck and then left me down by the creek to hear the crickets sing,” he said.

“Maybe he was trying to get another shot at the boss,” said Walt Kelly.

“If he was, he wouldn’t have ridden right into our corral. Anyway, there’re no marks like this one coming out,” Chuck pointed out.

Slim sat back on his heels, puzzled at the turn of events, while Chuck ambled into the corral. A minute later he shouted for them to join him and they hurried inside.

Chuck was looking at his own horse but as they approached he pointed at the dust.

“My gosh, fellows, my own horse has that V-shaped mark on his left rear shoe!”

“That kind of puts you in a hole,” spoke up Doug Huston.

“Nothing of the kind,” retorted Slim sharply. “Chuck wasn’t on the range when the boss was shot and you fellows know darned well where he was the other night when the rustlers were chasing our cattle onto the Double O range. This is just a trick of the rustlers to cause suspicion in our own outfit. The fellow who slugged me last night rode away on Chuck’s horse and while he was away from the ranch he had the V-shaped mark filed in the shoe. It was clever trick, but it didn’t work.”

Joe Haines, who had been strangely silent, stepped forward.

“You’re right, Slim,” said the foreman. “Putting that nick on the shoe of that cayuse was aimed to throw us on the wrong track. What’s troubling me is how the rustlers learned we were after a horse with a shoe marked like that. As far as I know only our own outfit knew about it and Nels Anderson and Al Bass.”

“I didn’t think the Double O would shoot straight,” said Doug.

“I wouldn’t jump at conclusions,” said Slim. “When this thing is finally cleared up there’s going to be a lot of surprised people in the Creeping Shadows country.”

“Oh, you talk like a cattle detective,” snapped Doug.

“If I was a cattle detective,” replied Slim smoothly, “I’d probably be slipping the iron bracelets on these rustlers and starting them for the state penitentiary.”

“Better get a file and smooth out that mark,” Joe told Chuck. “There’s no use your cluttering up the landscape with V-shaped signs.”

Chuck departed for the blacksmith shop and Slim and Joe saddled and mounted their horses.

Joe gave the riding orders for the day to the other punchers. Then with Slim he rode north toward the Double O. After a time he spoke.

“Do you think it was someone on the ranch who waylaid you last night and rode away on Chuck’s horse?”

Slim picked his words carefully as he replied for even though he had absolute faith in the integrity of the foreman, he did not intend to reveal that he was in the employ of the Mountain States Cattlemen’s Association and working under Old Bill Needham until the showdown.

“I’m inclined to believe someone on the ranch is tipping the rustlers off to every move. That’s the only way the gang could have learned the boss was carrying money with him the night they shot him and it’s the only way they could have learned about the nick in the horseshoe. Whoever is doing the thinking for this gang is clever and dangerous.”

“He’s all of that, but he’ll never match the power of the cattlemen if we line up Hack Cook.”

Nels Anderson and Al Bass were waiting for them and they swung into their saddles as the Box B men approached.

“Anything happen last night?” asked Nels. Slim related what had occurred at the Box B corral.

“That’s no good,” he said. “It means there’s a traitor in your outfit.”

“Don’t say that until we’ve got the proof,” Joe warned him, for although he was privately convinced that Nels was right, he wasn’t going to let any outsider cast any reflections on his riders until he had ample proof.

With Nels and Joe ahead, they rode toward the Diamond Dot. Slim found Al Bass a pleasant companion and they discussed the range war at length.

“Your outfit’s pretty well loaded with men,” Slim said.

“The Box B would be if they could keep their hands on,” grinned Al, “but after those two cattle detectives were killed and a couple of the other boys got winged, a bunch of them blew out of the country.”

“The present outfit won’t blow,” said Slim.

“I don’t know about that. I wouldn’t count too much on Doug Huston. He looks like a weak sister to me.”

It was nearly noon when they reached the Diamond Dot, which lay north and well to the east of the Box B although almost directly east of the Double O.

Water on the Diamond Dot was not as plentiful as on the neighboring ranches and the grass was thinner. The buildings, almost under the Cajons, were in a poor state of repair and the corral was a ramshackled affair. Two cowboys in front of the bunkhouse looked up as the riders approached and four more men appeared to watch the visitors. On the porch of the ranch house a man pulled himself out of an old rocking chair. He was in his stocking feet and had been dozing and smoking his pipe at intervals.

“That’s Hack Cook on the porch,” said Al. “He’s a tough customer and I’ve got a hunch we won’t get any cooperation from him.”

Slim looked at the owner of the Diamond Dot. Hack Cook was almost square. His shoulders were tremendously broad and his chest was like a barrel. His face was red and his neck so short that it disappeared into his body.

“Hello, Hack,” rumbled Nels as the riders stopped in front of the porch.

“Howdy,” replied Hack, but he gave no hint that he intended to ask them to dismount and have dinner at the ranch. “What’s on your mind?”

“Plenty,” said Nels. “It’s about the rustlers. The Double O and the Box B are joining forces.”

Hack’s face reddened and his voice trembled. “Joining forces? It’s about time you big outfits did that. Now you’ll try to ruin me altogether. You haven’t been able to do it singly so you’re doubling up on me. Well, I’m serving notice on you right now that I’ve got fighting men on my payroll and we’re going to fight to the end.”

“Why you crazy fool,” broke in Joe Haines, “we’re not looking for trouble. We’re offering you a chance to join us and run the rustlers out of the valley. You claim you’ve been losing stock. Here’s your chance to prove it by throwing in with us. We’re going to give this valley the once-over with a fine-toothed comb.”

Slim had been making a survey of the Diamond Dot layout. He was surprised at the number of cowboys at the bunkhouse. There were six outside, more than the Box B carried and as many as the Double O, which were much larger ranches than the Diamond Dot.

There was the movement of a faded curtain at a window on the second floor of the ranch house and Slim started involuntarily as he got a glimpse of the face peering out from behind the curtain. It was that of Hal Titzell, the cattle buyer from Dirty Water. It was true that Titzell had visited the Box B two days before, and it was possible that he was trying to buy cattle from the Diamond Dot, but Slim didn’t like the looks of the thing as he recalled the early warning Doc Baldridge had given him about Titzell.

Nels and Joe argued for some time with Hack Cook, but the owner of the Diamond Dot was adamant and no amount of cajoling on the part of the visiting cattlemen could make him change his mind.

“Then go it alone,” exploded Nels at last, “and I hope to heaven you lose every one of your cattle, that your grass burns up and your water holes go dry.”

“They probably will if you can do anything about it,” retorted Hack.

The visitors whirled their horses about and departed at a gallop.

“What burns me up is that he didn’t ask us to eat,” grumbled Al Bass. “Our cook quit last night and one of the boys had to rustle grub this morning. We fed light.”

Slim could sympathize with Al, for even though he had enjoyed one of Lee Wu’s good breakfasts, he was hungry. When they reached the Double O, the Box B riders paused only long enough to water their horses, before pressing on toward the home ranch.

Nels and Joe had decided on night riding and Slim knew that there would be little rest for him until after the dawn of another day. When they returned to the ranch, Joe explained the new plan of action.

“We’re splitting up the range,” he said. “Most of the stuff has been stolen along our north and east line and along the south and east line of the Double O. We’ll load up a chuck wagon at once and start for our north line where we’ll make camp. Get a move on, boys, and help Lee Wu get ready. The Double O’s lost their cook and Lee’s got to cook for both outfits.”

It was just before sunset when a team was hitched to the chuck wagon and Wu, his shotgun over his knees, cracked the whip, yelled a wild Chinese chant, and the team leaped away to the accompaniment of many crashing pots and pans.

Walt Kelly, in spite of his protests, was left at the ranch to guard the boss and to feed and care for him while the others trailed out behind the fast-wheeling Wu.

It was deep twilight when they reached the site which had been selected for the camp. There was a good spring and plenty of timber. The Double O boys were waiting and they greeted Wu with wild shouts of joy for the Chinaman’s reputation as a cook was known the length and breadth of the valley.

It was well after dark before supper was ready and they fell to with ravenous appetites. The Double O riders were loud in their praises of Wu’s cooking and the grinning Chinaman served them again and again until he finally spread his hands and said, “All gone, too much hungry.”

They grinned and leaned back on the ground, waiting for orders from Nels and Joe. Slim looked them over. In addition to the Double O boss and Al Bass, there were five riders from that ranch. All of them were clean, capable-appearing fellows. In the Box B contingent were Joe, Doug, Pat Beals, Chuck and himself. With Wu to guard the camp, that meant twelve riders were available for riding the range.

Nels, by virtue of his years, took command and assigned each rider to his night’s work. Three shots, fired in rapid succession, were to be the signal that trouble was ahead.

“This is a finish fight,” Nels warned them. “The word’s gone out that we mean business. Shoot first and ask questions afterward.”

The riders scattered to their horses and a few minutes later were stringing along the east range of the Double O and the Box B. East of them lay the Diamond Dot. Slim and Chuck rode south together. They were to patrol near the trail which led from the Box B to Dirty Water.

“Think we’ll get anything by this night riding?” asked Chuck.

“We may not get anything, but neither will the rustlers,” replied Slim. “I’ve got a hunch that the key to the whole mystery is somewhere around the Diamond Dot. I saw Hal Titzell there this afternoon. He was watching us from a second story window.”

“You mean that the Diamond Dot is rustling the stuff from the Double O and the Box B and then Titzell steps in and buys the cattle?” asked Chuck.

“It might be something like that,” admitted Slim, “but I’m not going to advance too many theories. We’ve got to be careful they don’t spot us as cattle detectives.”

They parted near the trail to Dirty Water, Chuck riding further south along the east line of the Box B.

Midnight passed, and up and down the long line of riders there was nothing reported out of the way. Pat Beals was on one side of Slim and Chuck on the other. He contacted them at intervals and they talked briefly before starting the return ride down their section of the line. It was lonely work, riding the range at night, with the feeling that rustlers might be encountered at any minute. Slim fingered the six gun at his side and made sure that it was free in the holster. Then he slipped his rifle in and out of the scabbard to satisfy himself that it was ready for instant action.

The thin moonlight faded and the night became doubly black. Another hour and the sky over the Cajons would brighten, but in the interval before that Slim had the feeling that many things might happen.

He was riding north when trouble started. Behind him and from Chuck’s section of the range came three shots, one after another. Slim wheeled and listened. There was a sharp, terrible fusillade. Then silence.

Whipping his own gun from his holster he fired three times in the air and urged Lightning into a mad gallop. From behind him he could hear the alarm signal echoing up the line as other riders repeated the warning shots and he knew that they were pounding along in his wake. The rustlers were riding somewhere before him and he knew they had already silenced Chuck’s guns. With black anger in his heart, he leaned over Lightning and urged the great sorrel to even greater speed.