"Go, then--and leave me. You mustn't unnerve me now, when there's a
desperate game to finish."

"Need it be desperate?" she whispered, coming close to him.

"Yes; it can't be else."

MacNelly had sent her to weaken him; of that Duane was sure. And he felt
that she had wanted to come. Her eyes were dark, strained, beautiful,
and they shed a light upon Duane he had never seen before.

"You're going to take some mad risk," she said. "Let me persuade you not
to. You said--you cared for me--and I--oh, Duane--don't you--know--?"

The low voice, deep, sweet as an old chord, faltered and broke and
failed.

Duane sustained a sudden shock and an instant of paralyzed confusion of
thought.

She moved, she swept out her hands, and the wonder of her eyes dimmed in
a flood of tears.

"My God! You can't care for me?" he cried, hoarsely.

Then she met him, hands outstretched.

"But I do-I do!"

Swift as light Duane caught her and held her to his breast. He stood
holding her tight, with the feel of her warm, throbbing breast and the
clasp of her arms as flesh and blood realities to fight a terrible fear.
He felt her, and for the moment the might of it was stronger than all
the demons that possessed him. And he held her as if she had been his
soul, his strength on earth, his hope of Heaven, against his lips.

The strife of doubt all passed. He found his sight again. And there
rushed over him a tide of emotion unutterably sweet and full, strong
like an intoxicating wine, deep as his nature, something glorious and
terrible as the blaze of the sun to one long in darkness. He had become
an outcast, a wanderer, a gunman, a victim of circumstances; he had lost
and suffered worse than death in that loss; he had gone down the
endless bloody trail, a killer of men, a fugitive whose mind slowly
and inevitably closed to all except the instinct to survive and a black
despair; and now, with this woman in his arms, her swelling breast
against his, in this moment almost of resurrection, he bent under the
storm of passion and joy possible only to him who had endured so much.

"Do you care--a little?" he whispered, unsteadily.

He bent over her, looking deep into the dark wet eyes.

She uttered a low laugh that was half sob, and her arms slipped up to
his neck.

"A littler Oh, Duane--Duane--a great deal!"

Their lips met in their first kiss. The sweetness, the fire of her mouth
seemed so new, so strange, so irresistible to Duane. H