ve to excuse me, Miss Chuckie."

The girl flamed with indignant anger. "You coward! You saw him come
up, after all that time down in those fearful depths--after fighting
his way all those miles along the terrible river--yet you dare not go
down! You coward! you quitter!"

The puncher's face turned a sickly yellow, and he seemed to shrink in
on himself. His voice sank to a husky whisper: "You can say that, Miss
Chuckie! Any man say it, he'd be dead before now. If you want to know,
I've got a mighty good reason for not wanting to go down. It ain't
that I'm afraid. You can bank on that. It's something else. I'll go
quick enough--but it's got to be on one condition. You've got to
promise to marry me."

"_Marry you?_"

"Yes. You know how I've felt towards you all these years. Promise to
marry me, and I'll go to hell and back for you. I'll do anything for
you. I'll save him!"

"You cur! You'd force me to bargain myself to you!" she cried, fairly
beside herself with righteous fury. "I thought you a man! You cur--you
cowardly cur!"

Gowan turned from her and walked rapidly away along the canyon edge,
his head hunched between his shoulders, his hands downstretched at his
thighs, the fingers crooked convulsively.

"Oh!" gasped Genevieve. "You've driven him away! Call him back! We
need him! He must go for help!"

The words shocked the girl out of her rash anger. Her flushed face
whitened with fear. "Kid!" she screamed. "Come back, Kid! You must go
to the ranch--bring the men!"

The cry of appeal should have brought him back to her on the run. It
pierced high above the booming reverberations of the canyon. Yet he
paid no heed. He neither halted nor paused nor even looked back. If
anything, he hurried away faster than before.

"Kid! dear Kid! forgive me! Come back and help us!" shrieked the
girl.

He kept on down along the canyon rim, his chin sunk on his breast, his
downstretched hands bent like claws. She ran a little way after him;
only to flutter back again, wringing her hands, distracted. "What
shall we do? what shall we do?"

"Be quiet, dear--be quiet!" urged Genevieve. "You've driven him away.
We must do the best we can. You must go yourself. I can stay and
watch--"

"No, no!" cried Isobel. "The way he looked at Lafe!--I dare not go! He
may come back--and I not here!"

She knelt to place her trembling hand on Ashton's forehead.

Genevieve looked at the setting sun. "There is no time to lose," she
said. "