he
listened to this outburst; it was as if he had heard a healthy man
proclaim that he had no desire for bread and meat. Something rose to his
lips, but he swallowed it.

"Then it looks kind of simple to me," he said. "You hate fightin'. This
gent Mac Strann likes it; he lives on it; he don't do nothing but wait
from day to day hungerin' for a scrap. What's the out? Jest this! You
hop on your hoss and ride out with me. Young Jerry Strann kicks out--Mac
Strann starts lookin' for you--he hears that you've beat it--he goes off
and forgets about you. Ain't that simple?"

The old uneasiness returned to the far-seeing eyes of Dan Barry.

"I dunno," he said, "maybe----"

Then he paused again.

"Have you got anything to say agin it?" urged Buck, arguing desperately.

"I dunno," repeated Barry, confused, "except that I keep thinking what a
terrible disappointment it'll be to this Mac Strann when his brother
dies and I ain't around."

Buck Daniels stared, blinked, and then burst into unmelodious laughter.
Satan trotted across the corral and raised his head above the fence,
whinnying softly. Barry turned his head and smiled up to the horse.

Then he said: "Seems like if Jerry Strann dies I owe somebody something.
Who? Mac Strann, I reckon. I sort of got to stay and give him his
chance."

"I hope to God," burst out Daniels, smashing his hands together, "that
Mac Strann beats you to a pulp! That's what I hope!"

The eyes of Dan Barry widened.

"Why d'you hope that?" he asked gently.

It brought Daniels again to speechlessness.

"Is it possible?" he growled to himself. "Are you a human bein' and yet
you think more of your hoss and your damned wolf-dog than you do of the
life of a man? Dan, I'm askin' you straight, is that a square thing to
do?"

The fragile hands went out to him, palm up.

"Don't you see, Buck? I don't want to be this way. I jest can't help
it!"

"Then the Lord help poor old Joe Cumberland--him that took you in out of
the desert--him that raised you from the time you was a kid--him that
nursed you like you was his own baby--him that loved you more'n he loved
Kate--him that's lyin' back there now with fire in his eyes, waitin',
waitin', waitin', for you to come back. Dan, if you was to see him you'd
go down on your knees and ask him to forgive you!"

"I s'pose I would," murmured Barry thoughtfully.

"Dan, you're goin' to go with me!"

"I don't somehow think its my time for movin', Buck."

"