The freight train clanked to a stop while a quarter of a mile away the cattle churned restlessly. Slim was impatient for the break that would mean action, the break that he hoped would mean the end of the rustlers in the Creeping Shadows country.

While the train crew unloaded the portable chute, the rustlers drove the cattle nearer. Slim looked around at the riders grouped nearby. Impatiently Joe was fingering his six gun and behind him Al Bass sat calmly, his face tense and a little white. Three other horsemen were ready to sweep out and cut off the escape of the rustlers.

Watching the approach of the cattle and the riders, Slim was not surprised to recognize the squat, heavy form of Hack Cook, owner of the Diamond Dot.

“I’m taking Cook,” muttered Joe, who recognized the Diamond Dot owner just as Slim did. The cowboy detective nodded. He’d let Joe have the first chance, for after all it was a feud between the ranches of the valley. If Joe failed to get Cook, Slim knew that with Lightning under him he could overtake anything in the country.

The rustlers whirled around the cattle, keeping them in a compact mass as they neared the train. Suddenly there was a burst of gunfire. The riflemen hidden in the bushes had blazed away.

A horse and rider went down. In another blast of lead a second rustler threw up his hand and pitched from the saddle to lie inert upon the ground.

Guns leaped into the hands of the remaining rustlers and they opened a rapid fire on the riflemen. Joe spurred his horse, and the riders swept out from behind the rock. Slim was riding easily, cautiously, ready to take the trail of the first rustler who made a break for liberty.

“Get ’em all,” shouted Joe. “It’s the Diamond Dot outfit.”

The gunfire was savage, ripping the silence and hurling echoes against the boxcars. The astonished train crew scurried for shelter.

The rustlers knew they were up against tremendous odds, for the cattlemen far outnumbered them and were shooting from shelter.

Hack Cook whirled to meet the menace of the riders. He was using two guns, both of them spouting flame and smoke. A Double O rider who had leaped ahead of Slim slumped in his saddle and his fright-crazed horse pitched him to the ground.

Another Diamond Dot rider went down before the hail of lead. There were only three rustlers left, Hack Cook, one of his cowboys and Newt Bemis, whom Slim knew as a henchman of Hal Titzell’s.

Slim saw Bemis shooting at Joe. He opened fire with his own six gun and the second shot sent Bemis tumbling out of his saddle.

The remaining Diamond Dot cowboy made a dash for the train while Hack Cook whirled his cayuse and rode straight toward Al Bass. Al didn’t flinch, his own gun blazing away steadily at the two-gun desperado. But Al never had a chance. Cook’s heavy bullet caught him in the shoulder and he spun to the ground.

Slim had been too far away to get a draw on Cook, and the rustler broke through the cordon of riders and dashed away up the trail leading through the Cajons.

The cowboy detective paused only long enough to make sure that the other rustler would be captured. Then he spoke to Lightning and set out in pursuit of Cook.

The great sorrel could have overtaken the Diamond Dot owner within a mile, but Slim had other plans. There was a fair chance that Cook, ridden by fear, would lead him to the mountain hideout of the rustlers and there Slim felt that he would find Chuck. He didn’t dare think that anything had happened to Chuck, that he wouldn’t find his companion alive.

Lightning struck an easy pace, keeping within sight of the fleeing Cook, and Slim carefully reloaded his gun. Behind him the sound of firing died out and he knew that the last Diamond Dot cowboy had either been brought down by the blazing guns of the cowboys or had surrendered.

Slim looked down at the trail ahead and something in one of the hoofprints made him pull Lightning to a sudden halt. He slid out of his saddle. The left rear hoofprint of Cook’s horse was marked by a V-shaped nick. There was no doubting it now. Cook was the man who had ambushed the owner of the Box B. He was the rider who had directed the raids on the Box B and the Double O in an attempt to get those outfits fighting each other in a finish battle.

When Slim remounted, he rode with new determination. The rustling mystery was near its solution.