eyelids, and a smile of triumphant malice touched her face.

"Senor, I make no promises which I fail to keep," she answered, "and
there is also a promise which I made Senor Tom Bell--"

* * * * *

"There is some one knocking at the cellar door," said Tom Bell to
Phillips. "See who is there, and be careful that you let no one in
without the bullet and the password."

"Tom, I'm afraid," whined Driscoll "that Spanish devil's promised to
get you hung more than once lately, and last night I know she sent
that Mexican Jose of hers out somewhere with a string and bullet. I saw
them--"

"What! Why didn't you tell me before? Listen! Phillips is in trouble!
Go help him! Call the boys! Hurry!" As Jim Driscoll, with a halt in his
walk, left him, Tom Bell stole quietly to one of the tunnels and ran to
the trap-door which opened into an outhouse.

He found the corral full of saddle-horses and the Mountaineer House
completely surrounded by Sheriff Paul's, posse.

"Come on, boys," said a voice.

"Did he get in?"

"Ye-ah--put his hand in with the bullet on a string, got his foot in the
door, gave the password and heaved the door wide open. Come on, now, and
there's orders not to take the woman, remember."

Bell stole a rawboned roan from the corral and was far from the
frightful battle at Mountaineer House before he dared burst forth into
the vituperation which he heaped upon the name of Rosa Phillips.

* * * * *

Rosa sat strumming her guitar idly, and musing upon the events of the
past few months. Jack Phillips was serving a term in prison. Driscoll
had also been sent to the penitentiary. One day a rumor reached her that
he was threatening to turn state's evidence, and to divulge the truth in
regard to Rosenthal.

Three days later an iron bar was accidentally(?) dropped on his head;
through some mysterious agent he was given poison, and died. At the
memory of it Rosa smiled her enigmatic and implacable smile. Tom Bell
was at large somewhere far to the north and she--she was rich now and
she would go back to Monterey, perhaps. She drew her guitar closer and
sang:

"The far distant sound of a harp's soft strings--an echo on the air, The
hidden page may be full of sweet things, of things that once were fair.
There's a turned down page in each life, and mine--a story might unfold,
But the end was sad of the dream divine. It better rests untold."

It was time for Harlan to arrive. Charlie Harlan, the man whom she
hoped