rtance.

Time was measured by their desires. Sometime before midnight Barkwell got
up, yawned and stretched.

"Sleep suits me. If 'Firebrand' ain't reckonin' on a guardian, I ain't
surprisin' him none. He's mighty close-mouthed about his doin's, anyway."

"You're shoutin'. I ain't never seen a man any stingier about hidin' away
his doin's. He just nacherly hawgs all the trouble."

Weaver got up and sauntered to the far end of the gallery, leaning far out
to look toward Manti. His sharp exclamation brought Barkwell leaping to
his side, and they both watched in perplexity a faint glow in the sky in
the direction of the town. It died down as they watched.

"Fire--looks like," Weaver growled. "We're always too late to horn in on
any excitement."

"Uh, huh," grunted Barkwell. He was staring intently at the plains,
faintly discernable in the starlight. "There's horses out there, Jud!
Three or four, an' they're comin' like hell!"

They slipped off the gallery into the shadow of some trees, both
instinctively feeling of their holsters. Standing thus they waited.

The faint beat of hoofs came unmistakably to them. They grew louder,
drumming over the hard sand of the plains, and presently four dark figures
loomed out of the night and came plunging toward the gallery. They came to
a halt at the gallery edge, and were about to dismount when Barkwell's
voice, cold and truculent, issued from the shadow of the trees:

"What's eatin' you guys?"

There was a short, pregnant silence, and then one of the men laughed.

"Who are you?" He urged his horse forward. But he was brought to a quick
halt when Barkwell's voice came again:

"Talk from where you are!"

"That goes," laughed the man. "Trevison here?"

"What you wantin' of him?"

"Plenty. We're deputies. Trevison burned the courthouse and the bank
tonight--and killed Braman. We're after him."

"Well, he ain't here." Barkwell laughed. "Burned the courthouse, did he?
An' the bank? An' killed Braman? Well, you got to admit that's a pretty
good night's work. An' you're wantin' him!" Barkwell's voice leaped; he
spoke in short, snappy, metallic sentences that betrayed passion long
restrained, breaking his self-control. "You're deputies, eh? Corrigan's
whelps! Sneaks! Coyotes! Well, you slope--you hear? When I count three, I
down you! One! Two! Three!"

His six-shooter stabbed the darkness at the last word. And at his side
Weaver's pistol barked viciously. But the deputies h