Rustlers Beware CHAPTER I SEALED ORDERS. CHAPTER I I’m glad you’ve decided to throw in with us, Milt. It’ll beat punchin’ cows for a crusty uncle. You’ll have a change of scenery from Texas to Wyomin’, and all kinds of excitement, includin’, mebbe, a little shootin’, which ought to appeal to a young feller like you.” Two men sat conversing in the railroad station. One was middle-aged, with grizzled hair and mustache, tall and big-limbed, but with no extra flesh on his massive frame. His face was long-jowled and determined looking, and his keen gray eyes were overhung with bushy brows, which were often drawn together in a scowl. Asa Swingley had awed many an opponent into submission. Others, whom his aggressive appearance could not impress, he had beaten or shot, for “Two-bar Ace” was equally at home in a rough-and-tumble or a gun fight. “Well, I’ve said I’d come, and you can count me in,” said Swingley’s companion. “But I reserve the right to drop out if I think things aren’t on the level.” Swingley’s brows drew together quickly, and he shot a stabbing glance into the eyes that looked into his. But there was no quailing under the look. The big cattleman gazed into the face of a youth whose determination equaled, if it did not exceed, his own. Milton Bertram was only slightly smaller of build than the giant cattleman. Both men had laid aside their coats, owing to the heat of the station. In their flannel shirts, with cartridge belts and guns sagging at their waists, trousers tucked into high-heeled, spurred boots, they typified perfectly the man’s country from which they had come. Bertram had laid aside his sombrero, showing a luxuriant crop of black hair with a distinct tendency to curl. His forehead was broad, its whiteness in strong contrast with his deeply tanned features. His smoothly shaven face was regular in outline, and his dark eyes, for all their straightforward and fearless expression, had a half-humorous twinkle in them which mystified Swingley. “It’s too late for you to quit now,” declared the latter finally, discovering that he could not “look down” the youth at his side. “I didn’t say anything about quitting,” answered
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