gh.
Slim, about to speak, changed his mind, and stared at her with parted
lips. She saw suspicion grow in his face and resolve itself to
certainty, helped to decision by the telltale color dyeing her cheeks.

"Does the cellar stairway from the store connect with the kitchen
cellar, Phyllie?" he asked.

"Ye-es."

He nodded, then laughed without mirth. "I reckon I can tell you, boys,
who Mr. Keller's friend in need is."

"Who? I'd like right well to know." Brill Healy, in a pallid fury, had
just come in and was listening.

Phyllis turned and faced him. "I was that friend, Brill."

"You!" He stared at her in astonishment. "You! Why, it was you sent me
out to run him down."

"I didn't tell you that I wanted you to murder him, did I?"

"I guess there's a lot between him and you that you didn't tell me," he
jeered.

Slim grinned, not at all maliciously. "I reckon that's right. I don't
need to ask you now, Phyllie, who it was I found with you in the
kitchen."

"He was just going," she protested.

"Sure, and I busted into the good-bys right inconsiderate."

"Go ahead, Slim. I'm only a girl. You and Brill say what you like," she
flashed at him, the nails of her fingers biting into the palms of her
hands.

"Only don't say it out loud," cautioned a new voice. Jim Yeager was at
the door, and he was looking very pointedly at Healy.

"I say what I think, Jim," Brill retorted promptly.

"And you think?"

Healy slammed his fist down hard on the counter. "I think things ain't
right when a Malpais girl helps a hawss thief and a rustler to escape
twice."

"Take care, Brill," advised Phyllis.

"Not right how?" asked Yeager quietly, but in an ominous tone.

"Don't you two go to twisting my meaning. All Malpais knows that no
better girl than Phyl Sanderson ever breathed."

The young woman's lip curled. "I'm grateful for this indorsement, sir,"
she murmured with mock humility.

"Do I understand that Keller has made his getaway?" Jim Yeager asked.

"He sure has--clean as a whistle."

"Then you idiots want to be plumb grateful to Phyllie. He ain't any more
a rustler than I am. If you had hanged him you would have hanged an
innocent man."

"Prove it," cried Healy.

Jim looked at him quietly. "I cayn't prove it just now. You'll have to
take my word for it."

"Yore word goes with me, Jim, even if I am an idiot by yore say-so," his
father announced promptly.

Jim smiled and let an arm fall across the shoulders