Laramie. "I don't
want to take any advantage at all of an old pardner. Keep it cocked
but listen.

"I don't want to talk with Van Horn," Laramie went on, "not even with
Barb Doubleday, fine a man as he might be--I ain't 'a' sayin', Tom.
But I don't want to talk to him. I want to talk to you. Just you and
me, Tom--talkin' it over together. Don't be goat for nobody, Tom.
What?"

The drunken foreman's brow contracted in irresolute perplexity: "What
do you say?" urged Laramie. Vacillating, Stone let down the hammer to
talk it over. It went up again almost instantly. There may in that
last brief instant have flashed across his muddled consciousness a
realization of his fatal mistake; perhaps he saw in the wicked flash of
Laramie's glazed eyes a warning of blunder.

Knowing that mountain men carry only five cartridges in their
revolvers, leaving the hammer for safety on an empty chamber, Laramie
had parleyed with Stone only long enough to suit his own purpose. His
right arm shot out at Stone's jaw. As his fist reached it, the gun
against his stomach snapped viciously. But the hammer, already raised
six times, came down on the sixth and empty chamber. It was the chance
Laramie had played for. Stone sank like an ox. As he went down his
head struck the foot-rail. He lay stunned.

Men drew long breaths. McAlpin, stooping in a flash, wrenched Stone's
revolver from his hand and with a grin, laid it on the bar. Laramie,
watching Stone coldly, did not move. His left foot still rested on the
rail, his left arm on the bar. But without taking his eyes off the
prostrate man he in some way saw the white-faced bartender peering over
in amazement at the fallen foreman:

"It seems to take you a good while, Luke," protested Laramie, mildly,
"to open that bottle."

CHAPTER XI

A DUEL WITH KATE

When the eating-house at the Junction was closed, Harry Tenison sent
for Belle and offered her the position of housekeeper at the Mountain
House. This Belle declined. She had long had in her head the idea of
taking a place and serving meals on her own hook, as she expressed it.
Her instinct for independence, always strong, had not only prevented
her getting married but made her restive under orders. She was
stubborn--her enemies called her abusive names and her best friends
admitted that she was sometimes difficult. At Sleepy Cat she took a
cottage in lower Main Street. She had some furniture, and having a
litt