You've got a daughter, Judge, and I'm going to make
you know how it feels to lose one. And I'm going to
bite that district attorney that spoke against me. I'm
free now, and I guess I've turned to rattlesnake all right.
I feel like one. I don't say much, but this is my rattle.
Look out when I strike.
Yours respectfully,
RATTLESNAKE.
Judge Derwent threw the letter carelessly aside. It was nothing new
to receive such epistles from desperate men whom he had been called
upon to judge. He felt no alarm. Later on he showed the letter to
Littlefield, the young district attorney, for Littlefield's name was
included in the threat, and the judge was punctilious in matters
between himself and his fellow men.
Littlefield honoured the rattle of the writer, as far as it concerned
himself, with a smile of contempt; but he frowned a little over the
reference to the Judge's daughter, for he and Nancy Derwent were to be
married in the fall.
Littlefield went to the clerk of the court and looked over the records
with him. They decided that the letter might have been sent by Mexico
Sam, a half-breed border desperado who had been imprisoned for
manslaughter four years before.
Pages:
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216