ot, this man returned.

"Wolff, you've heard," said the old millman, with solemnity. "If
you've got any messages you want sent, we'll send them. If you want
time to pray, this is your chance. There's nothing you can say is
going to change it. You are as good as dead. Boys, some of you get
one of those beams that's tore loose there at the side, fasten
the rope around the end, and shove it over the edge of the wall
above the canyon there for a few feet. He shall hang above the dam he
dynamited."

Wolff knew that they were in earnest. There was something more
inexorable in their actions than in a court of law. At the last he
showed some courage of a brute kind, reviling them all, sputtering
forth his hatred, and interlarding it with a confession and threats of
what he wanted to do. They silenced him by leading him to the wall and
adjusting the noose. Once more Rogers besought him to pray and then,
when he again burst into oaths, they thrust him off. The fall was as
effective as ever hangman devised.

"In the morning, boys," said the smith, "a half-dozen of us must be up
early and come back here. The hound is at least entitled to a half-way
decent burial. I'll call some of you to come with me."

That was their sole comment. They had neither regrets, compunctions,
nor rancor. They had finished their task according to their own ideas
of justice, without hesitation.

At the Croix d'Or the partners, worried over their problems, and
somewhat astonished at the non-appearance of the force, sat on the
bench by the mess-house, smoking and silent.

In soft cadence they heard, as from the opposite side of the gulch,
the tramping of feet. Swinging along in the dusk the men came,
shadowy, unhalting, and homeward bound, like so many tired hounds
returning after the day's hunt. Their march led them past the bench;
but they did not look up. There was an unusual gravity in their
silence, a pronounced earnestness in their attitude.

"Well," called Dick, "what did you learn?"

It was the smith who answered, but the others never halted, continuing
that slow march to the bunk-house.

"We got him."

"Where is he, then?"

"Hanging to a beam across the dam he blew up," was the remorseless
response.

He started as if to proceed after the others, then paused long enough
to add: "It was that feller that used to be watchman here; the feller
that tried to shoot Bill that night. Found him in that old, deserted
cabin near the Potlach. Ha