he San Luis valley, of the gold prospect near Wagon Wheel Gap, of
its failure--how you met again in Pueblo and then went down into the
copper country--Bisbee, Arizona."

Peter had no pity now. He saw McGuire straighten again in his chair, his
gaze shifting past Peter from left to right like a trapped animal. His
fingers groped along the chair arms, along the table edge, trembling,
eager but uncertain. But the sound of Peter's narrative seemed to
fascinate--to hypnotize him.

"Go on----!" he whispered hoarsely. "Go on!"

"You got an outfit and went out into the Gila Desert," continued Peter,
painting his picture leisurely, deliberately. "It was horrible--the
heat, the sand, the rocks--but you weren't going to fail this time.
There was going to be something at the end of this terrible pilgrimage
to repay you for all that you suffered, you and Hawk Kennedy. There was
no water, but what you carried on your pack-mules--no water within a
hundred miles, nothing but sand and rocks and the heat. No chance at all
for a man, alone without a horse, in that desert. You saw the bones of
men and animals bleaching along the trail. That was the death that
awaited any man----"

"You lie!"

Peter sprang for the tortured man as McGuire's fingers closed on
something in the open drawer of the table, but Peter twisted the weapon
quickly out of his hand and threw it in the corner of the room.

"You fool," he whispered quickly as he pinioned McGuire in his chair,
"do you want to add another murder to what's on your conscience?"

But McGuire had already ceased to resist him. Peter hadn't been too
gentle with him. The man had collapsed. A glance at his face showed his
condition. So Peter poured out a glass of whisky and water which he
poured between his employer's gaping lips. Then he waited, watching the
old man. He seemed really old now to Peter, a hundred at least, for his
sagging facial muscles seemed to reveal the lines of every event in his
life--an old man, though scarcely sixty, yet broken and helpless. He
came around slowly, his heavy gaze slowly seeking Peter's.

"What--what are you going to do?" he managed at last.

"Nothing. I'm no blackmailer." And then, playing his high card, "I've
heard what Hawk said about Ben Cameron," said Peter. "Now tell me the
truth."

At the sound of the name McGuire started and then his eyes closed for a
moment.

"You know--everything," he muttered.

"Yes, _his_ side," Peter lied. "What's you