Contemporaneously others made it a business, using the settler as a "Smoke screen." As often as possible they made the granger an accomplice, giving him meat for domestic needs, which needs were frequently sufficient. Occasionally cowboys and near cowboys became cattle detectives, and sometimes outside detectives were empolyed.

Jack Crittendon's services were presumed to be on the side of cattlemen, but he evidently "played both ends." When Tom Kane was preparing some cases against offenders of cowmen's ethics, Jack became alarmed that he might not be on the winning side. He sought Kane to give assurance of his dependability. Kane was busy making out some papers and

HISTORY OF WESTERN NEBRASKA

told Jack to wait, but being nervous and excited he would occasionally interrupt with "I can swear to" this or that. Kane told him to wait "until 1 finish this," and he continued, "then 1 will tell you what you have got to swear to." A faithful chronicle of the event is that Jack waited.

The people on lower Pumpkin creek were disturbed during this period by the arrest of Lee Nunn by Detective Talbert. Talbert apparently decided to join in homing making, and as brought out at Nunn's trial, he made the suggestion and induced Nunn to' join him in killing a range beef. There was no dispute as to fact, but the question of the value would settle the sentence, whether a fine or the penitentiary. Talbert was the expert witness for the cattlemen who wanted the accused "sent over the road." Judge Isaac Woolf, tangled the detective's testimony, who in fact, was not an expert, but Woolf was. To the general satisfaction of grangers, Nunn was released.