tter. Why doesn't
he ever say anything? He is certainly the rudest creature I ever saw!
He stares at me until I am so confused that I can not even be
courteous. He isn't nearly so nice as Mr. Wellesly--I don't care, he
isn't! I like Mr. Wellesly, and he seems to like me, but--he does not
look at me out of his eyes as Mr. Mead does. I wonder--if he--looks at
any one else that way?"

After Mead had returned the child he rode at once to his room, and
while he bathed and shaved and dressed himself in the garments of
civilization he gave himself up to gloomy thoughts about Marguerite.

"Of course, she thinks I am a criminal of the worst sort,--a thief and
a murderer,--and maybe she does not like to have me stop at her gate.
She was nervous about it to-day, and she wouldn't come out until the
kid made her. It is plain enough that she doesn't want to see me any
more, and I suppose I ought not to stop there again. Still, the boy is
always so pleased to ride with me that it would be a shame to take
that pleasure away from him. But she doesn't like it--how sweet she
looked in that sunbonnet!--and she's too kind-hearted to ask me not
to. Well, she would rather I would not--yes, it is plain that she does
not want me to do it--so--well--all right--I'll not stop there again."

His revolver lay on the table, hidden by some of the clothing he had
just taken off. Under the stress of his thoughts it escaped both eye
and mind. As he put on vest and coat he struggled to his final
resolution. Then he quickly jammed his hat on his head, thinking, "I
suppose I can't see her any more at all," and hurried into the street.
Presently he heard a loud whoop from the direction of the jail.
"That's Nick's yell, sure," he thought, "and it sounds as if he was
drunk. Now what's to pay, I wonder!"

He hurried in the direction from which the sound had come, and was
just in time to see Ellhorn, yelling and waving his hat, led by Jim
Halliday into the jail, while a half-dozen excited Chinese, who had
been following close behind, stood chattering at the door.

When the train which carried Thomson Tuttle northward left the
station, Nick Ellhorn watched it disappear in the hot, white,
quivering distance, and then wandered forlornly up town. He went first
to Emerson Mead's room, but Mead had not yet returned. He went to
Judge Harlin's office, and found that he was out of town. He next
tried the Palmleaf saloon, where he solaced and cooled himself with
som