Moreover, the news had gone abroad, the tale of the Killing of Alder and everything that went before.

It went West; it appeared in newspapers; it cropped up at firesides; it gave a spark of terror to a myriad conversations; and every one in Rickett felt that the eye of the nation was upon it; every one in Rickett dreamed nightly of the man described: "Daniel Barry, called Whistling Dan, about five feet nine or ten, slender, black hair, brown eyes, age about thirty years." Secretly, Rickett felt perfectly convinced that Sheriff Pete Glass alone could handle this fellow and trim his claws for they knew how many a "bad man" had built a reputation high as Babel and baffled posses and murdered right and left, until the little dusty man on the little dusty roan went out alone and came back alone, and another fierce name went from history into legend.

However, there were doubters, since this affair had new earmarks.

It had been buzzed abroad that Whistling Dan was not only the hunted, but also the hunter, and that he had pledged himself to strike down all the seven who first took his trail.

Five of these were already gone; two remained, and of these two one was Vic Gregg, no despicable fighter himself, and the other was no less than the invincible little sheriff himself.