ession, he lost the two bags of gold,
his original share. He had lost utterly. Gulden had the great heap of
dirty little buckskin sacks, so significant of the hidden power within.

Joan was amazed and sick at sight of Kells then, and if it had been
possible she would have withdrawn her gaze. But she was chained there.
The catastrophe was imminent.

Kells stared down at the gold. His jaw worked convulsively. He had the
eyes of a trapped wolf. Yet he seemed not wholly to comprehend what had
happened to him.

Gulden rose, slow, heavy, ponderous, to tower over his heap of gold.
Then this giant, who had never shown an emotion, suddenly, terribly
blazed.

"One more bet--a cut of the cards--my whole stake of gold!" he boomed.

The bandits took a stride forward as one man, then stood breathless.

"One bet!" echoed Kells, aghast. "Against what?"

"AGAINST THE GIRL!"

Joan sank against the wall, a piercing torture in her breast. She
clutched the logs to keep from falling. So that was the impending
horror. She could not unrivet her eyes from the paralyzed Kells, yet
she seemed to see Jim Cleve leap straight up, and then stand, equally
motionless, with Kells.

"One cut of the cards--my gold against the girl!" boomed the giant.

Kells made a movement as if to go for his gun. But it failed. His hand
was a shaking leaf.

"You always bragged on your nerve!" went on Gulden, mercilessly. "You're
the gambler of the border!... Come on."

Kells stood there, his doom upon him. Plain to all was his torture,
his weakness, his defeat. It seemed that with all his soul he combated
something, only to fail.

"ONE CUT--MY GOLD AGAINST YOUR GIRL!"

The gang burst into one concerted taunt. Like snarling, bristling wolves
they craned their necks at Kells.

"No, damn--you! No!" cried Kells, in hoarse, broken fury. With both
hands before him he seemed to push back the sight of that gold, of
Gulden, of the malignant men, of a horrible temptation.

"Reckon, boss, thet yellow streak is operatin'!" sang out Jesse Smith.

But neither gold, nor Gulden, nor men, nor taunts ruined Kells at this
perhaps most critical crisis of his life. It was the mad, clutching,
terrible opportunity presented. It was the strange and terrible nature
of the wager. What vision might have flitted through the gambler's mind!
But neither vision of loss nor gain moved him. There, licking like a
flame at his soul, consuming the good in him at a blast, overpowering