have wronged you
all along. I haven't time to write, I am afraid to put it on paper. But
there is great danger to you. Come tonight. I will be under the pear
trees in the front yard, at twelve o'clock.

"WINIFRED WAVERLY."

Thornton whirled about, confronting Comstock.

"Where'd this come from?" he demanded sharply.

"Special delivery," smiled Comstock. "A young fellow, calling himself
Bud King from the Bar X, brought it."

"When?"

"About an hour ago. He said he couldn't wait and couldn't take time to
look you up, and I told him that I'd see that you got it."

Thornton read the short note again, frowning. This girl, only a few
nights ago, had called him a liar, had angered him as thoroughly as she
knew how, had sent him from her vowing that he was a fool to have ever
thought of her, and that he'd die before he'd be fool to seek again to
see the niece of Henry Pollard. And now this note, speaking of having
wronged him, telling him that she was afraid to write all that she
wanted to tell him, warning him of danger to him, asking him to meet her
in Hill's Corners ... at her uncle's house ... at midnight!

He knew nothing of the danger to which she referred, but he did know
that for him there was danger in going into Dead Man's Alley even in
broad daylight. There came to him a swift suspicion that this note had
never been written by the girl whose signature it bore, that it had been
dictated by a man who sought to lure him to a spot where it would be an
easy matter to put a bullet in him in safe, cowardly fashion. Suppose
that he went, that he entered Pollard's place, and at such an hour?
Pollard, himself, could kill him, admit the deed and claim that he was
but protecting his own premises. Any one of the Bedloe boys could shoot
him and who would know?

Another suspicion, allied to this one, came and darkened the frown in
his eyes. Was it possible that Winifred Waverly had written it, acting
at Pollard's command? that she was but doing the sort of thing he should
look to one of Pollard's blood to do?

Comstock, saying nothing further, now seemed entirely engrossed in his
cigar. Thornton, the note in his fingers, hesitated. A third time he
read the pencilled words. Then he folded the paper and slipped it into
his pocket.

"If a man wants to know anything real bad," he said at last, "it's up
to him to go and find out, huh, Billy Comstock?"

Comstock, turning his cigar thoughtfully, answered:

"That's right,