stic bands an inch broad, with silver buckles, held
up the slack of the sleeves which otherwise would have enveloped his
hands.

"Are you goin' to stay in the office a while now, Tommy, and look after
things while Dora and I do the work?" the woman asked.

"I've got to get the jury together for the inquest," Conboy returned,
with the briskness of a man of importance.

"Will I be wanted to give my testimony at the inquest, do you suppose?"
Morgan inquired. "I was here when it happened; I saw the whole thing."

He spoke in the hope that he might be given the opportunity of relieving
the indignation, so strong in him that it was almost oppressive, before
the coroner's jury. Tom Conboy shook his head.

"No, the marshal's testimony is all we'll need," Conboy replied.
"Resistin' arrest and tryin' to escape after arrest. That's all there
was to it. These fellers'll have to learn better than that with this new
man. I know him of old--he's a man that always brings in the meat."

"But he didn't try to escape," Morgan protested. "He was so drunk he
didn't know whether he was coming or going."

Conboy looked at him disfavoringly, as if to warn him to be discreet in
matters of such remote concern to him as this.

"Tut, tut! no niggers in Ireland," said he, shaking his head with an
expression between a caution and a threat.

CHAPTER IV

THE OPTIMIST EXPLAINS

Not more than two hours after the tragedy at the Elkhorn hotel, of which
he was the indirect cause, Calvin Morgan appeared at Judge Thayer's
little office. The judge had finished his preparation for the cattle
thief's case, and now sat ruminating it over his cob pipe. He nodded
encouragingly as Morgan hesitated at the door.

"Come in, Mr. Morgan," he invited, as cordially as if introductions had
passed between them already and relations had been established on a
footing pleasant and profitable to both.

Morgan smiled a little at this ready identification, remembering the
torn page of the hotel register, which all the reading inhabitants of
the town who were awake must have examined before this. He accepted the
chair that Judge Thayer pushed toward him, nodding to the bone-wagon man
who came sauntering past the door at that moment, the long lash of his
bullhide whip trailing in the dust behind him.

"You've come to settle with us, I hear?" said the judge.

"I'm looking around with that thought, sir."

"I don't know how you'll do at the start in the opti