But when thus appealed to by these somber-faced, intent-eyed men he divined that the more carefully he described the cruelty and baseness of their enemies, and the more vividly he presented his participation in the first fight of the feud the more strongly he would bind these friends to the Isbel cause.

So he talked for an hour, beginning with his meeting with Colter up on the Rim and ending with an account of his killing Greaves.
His listeners sat through this long narrative with unabated interest and at the close they were leaning forward, breathless and tense.
"Ah! So Greaves got his desserts at last," exclaimed Gordon.
All the men around the table made comments, and the last, from Blue, was the one that struck Jean forcibly.
"Shore thet was a strange an' a hell of a way to kill Greaves.

Why'd you do thet, Jean ?" "I told you.

I wanted to avoid noise an' I hoped to get more of them." Blue nodded his lean, eagle-like head and sat thoughtfully, as if not convinced of anything save Jean's prowess.

After a moment Blue spoke again.
"Then, goin' back to Jean's tellin' aboot trackin' rustled Cattle, I've got this to say.