t'll make her happy for me to go away and never come back," says
he, "I'll do that. I don't want to play any game except on the square.
Don't start anything that can't be ever mended," says he.

"It's started now," says I. "Maybe you can talk a girl down, but you
can't us."

"What're you going to do, Bonnie Bell?" says I to her, and I taken her
hands now in mine. "You've heard me and you've heard him. Which do you
want, him or us--us that's loved you and give you everything we had, or
him, this here coward, that come in the back way--our worst enemy's
hired man? You got to choose."

I felt her slip loose from my neck then. She'd kept tight hold of me all
the time, so I couldn't do anything. I looked down at her, and she was
all loose and white. I reckon she fainted, though I never seen anyone do
that before.

I laid her down on the boards, and I was so cold mad clean through now I
couldn't of said a word. I've felt that way before. There ain't no law
then. But he was white as she was.

"Curly," says he, "what have we done to the poor child?"

"She ain't your pore child," says I; and, with her in my arms and me
helpless, I felt hot in my eyes. "She's our pore child. Shut up and go
home!"

He didn't go home, but went and got some water in his hat.

"It's cruel, cruel--it's all been cruel for her, who deserves the best
that life could give. Can't you believe me, man?" says he.

She couldn't hear us now, and even the water I poured on her face didn't
wake her up. I wouldn't let him touch her.

"Lord help us all!" says I. "For now it's a hard thing to say what's
best. Tell me," says I, "was there anything I didn't hear? Did she make
any sort of promise to you?"

"Not a word," says he--"not a word."

"That's lucky," says I. "The Circle Arrow never went back on its word.
I'm glad she didn't promise you nothing," says I.

"There's nothing matters now," he says.

He set back on his heels, looking at me in a way I couldn't stand--with
us both bending over her, trying to bring her to.

"I'm better than you think," says he, after a little while. "All this
happened because things got criss-crossed."

"You queered the game the way you played it," says I to him. "The Circle
Arrow plays wide open, with all the cards on the table. It beats hell
how the luck runs in a square game sometimes! The front door is the
place for a man that talks to a girl--like Katherine Kimberly comes in,
or her brother, Tom."

"Does she