d her real feelings. Confidences,
confessions, even from a husband, were repugnant to her.

Jeff remained standing. He gazed for a few silent moments in the
direction of the open window. The expression of his blue eyes
suggested a deep, searching introspection. He might have been
searching for an opening. Again, he might simply have been reviewing
scenes which stirred his innermost soul with their horror and pain.

At last, however, Elvine made a half impatient movement. Instantly the
blue eyes turned in her direction, and their expression startled her.
They were full of a stony, passionless regard. Not for her, but
inspired by the thought behind them. She shivered under their gaze and
their impression upon her was never afterward obliterated.

"It's four years past now," he began, in a voice she scarcely
recognized. "These rustlers brought it all back to me. Say, Evie, I
had a twin brother, Ronald. Maybe that won't convey much. I sort of
loved him--better than myself. That's all. He was a bit queer. I
mean he just didn't care a heap for running along the main trail of
things. He was apt to get all mussed up running around byways. Well,
when Bud and I fixed up the Obar partnership, I was just crazy to hunt
Ronny down, and hand him a share. Bud's a great feller, and I told
him. I knew whereabouts the boy had staked out, and, figuring we'd
earned a vacation, Bud and I set out to round him up, and hand him a
piece which I guessed would keep him with me the rest of his life."

He paused. He drew a deep breath, and his eyes, hard as marble, had
turned again in the direction of the window.

Elvine was held even against herself. The expression of his eyes, even
more than the curious sharpness of his voice, troubled her, alarmed her.

"I'm not going to yarn more than necessary," he went on after a moment.
"There isn't any need. I just want to give you the deadly facts. As I
said, I knew his layout, where he was--supposed to be trapping pelts.
Supposed. Bud had been raised in the district, so he acted scout. He
made the location and found him. D'you know how?"

There was a restrained fierceness in the sharp demand.

The woman shook her head. Any word would have seemed out of place.

"Hanging by the neck to the bough of a tree."

"Jeff, don't!" the woman gasped.

But now there was a smile in the man's eyes. It was a terrible smile
which drove every vestige of color from his wife's cheeks.