though Dudley took to him as
though he were a long-lost brother luckily,--how luckily I couldn't
know. But I wasn't thinking about Baker that night.

"We can't worry over Dudley," I said shortly, "he'll have to take care
of himself. But you won't be helpless with Hutton, if I meet him
to-night--in your place!"

"You? I couldn't bear you to be in it!" so sharply that I winced.

"It won't hurt you to take that much from me!" It wasn't till long
afterwards that I knew I'd been a fool not to have said it with my arms
round her, while I told her why--but since I didn't do it there's no
sense in talking about it. I went on baldly: "I've got to be in it! I'm
not concerned with post-mortems and your past. All I know, personally,
is that Hutton's hiding somewhere round this mine to hold up our gold
shipments and get even with Dudley; and if you'll tell me where to meet
him to-night I can stop both--and be saved the trouble of looking for
him from here to Caraquet, let alone getting you some peace of mind
instead of the hell you're living in."

"Oh, my God," said Paulette, exactly as if she were in church. "I can't
take peace of mind like blood-money--I can't tell you where to find
Dick, if you don't know now," and I should have known why if I had had
any sense, but I had none. "It's no use, Mr. Stretton, I must go to
Dick, alone. I----" But suddenly she blazed out at me: "I won't let you
see him! And I'm going to him--now. Take your hand off me!"

I tightened it. "You'll stay here! _Please!_ And you can't go on
preventing me from meeting Hutton, either. What about the first time I
take any gold out over the Caraquet road--and he and his gang try a
hold-up on me?"

I said gang without thinking, for I was naturally dead sure he had one.
But I was not prepared to have the cork come straight out of the bottle.
Paulette clutched me till I bit my lip to keep steady.

"His gang's what I'm afraid of--for Dudley," she gasped, which certainly
steadied me--like a bucket of ice. "Look here, when first I met Dick, he
told me things, to frighten me--that he'd eighteen or twenty men laid up
between here and Caraquet--enough to raid us here, even, if he chose. It
was because I knew they were waiting somewhere on the road that night
that I drove to Billy Jones's with you. It was one of them I shot when
we tore through the swamp. But something went wrong with them; either
they'd no guns, or they didn't want to give themselves away by shoot