e returned the citizen was on his way to
the door.

"Craddock used to come in here and wolf his meals down," she said,
picking up her theme in the same troubled key, "just like it didn't
amount to nothing to kill a man a day. I looked to see blood on the
tablecloth every time his hand touched it."

"It's a shame you girls had to wait on the brute," Morgan said.

"Girls! he wouldn't let anybody but me wait on him." Dora frowned, her
face coloring. She bent a little, lowering her voice. "Why, Mr. Morgan,
what do you suppose? He wanted me to _marry_ him!"

"That old buffalo wrangler? Well, he _is_ kind of previous!"

"He's too fresh to keep, I told him. Marry _him_! He used to come in
here, Mr. Morgan, and put his hat down by his foot so he could grab it
and run out and kill another man without losin' time. He never used to
take his guns off and hang 'em up like other gentlemen when they eat. He
just set there watchin' and turnin' his mean old eyes all the time. He's
afraid of them, I know by the way he always tried to look behind him
without turnin' his head, never sayin' a word to anybody, he's afraid."

"Afraid of whom, Dora?"

"The ghosts of them murdered men!"

Morgan shook his head after seeming to think it over a little while. "I
don't believe they'd trouble him much, Dora."

"I'd rather wait on a dog!" she said, scorn and rebellion in her pretty
eyes.

"You can marry somebody else and beat him on that game, anyhow. I'll
bet there are plenty of them standing around waiting."

"O Mr. Morgan!" Dora was drowned in blushes, greatly pleased. "Not so
many as you might think," turning her eyes upon him with coquettish
challenge, "only Mr. Gray and Riley Caldwell, the printer on the
_Headlight_."

"Mr. Gray, the druggist?"

"Yes, but he's too old for me!" Dora sighed, "forty if he's a day. He's
got money, though, and he's perfec'ly _grand_ on the pieanno. You ought
to hear him play _The Maiden's Prayer_!"

"I'll listen out for him. I saw him washing his window a while ago--a
tall man with a big white shirt."

"Yes," abstractedly, "that was him. He's an elegant fine man, but I
don't give a snap for none of 'em. I wish I could leave this town and
never come back. You'll be in for dinner, won't you?" as Morgan pushed
back from the repletion of that standard meal.

"And for supper, too, I hope," he said, turning it off as a joke.

"I hope to God!" said Dora fervently, seeing no joke in the uncertainty
at a