f the afternoon
Sheila saw that his gaze was following her as she paced softly back and
forth in the cabin.

"So you're stuck on that Langford girl, are you?" he demanded, laughing.
"Well, it won't do you any good, Dakota, she's--well, she's some sore at
you for something. She won't listen to anything which is said about you."
The laughter died out of his eyes; they became cold with menace. "I ain't
listenin' to any more of that sorta talk, I tell you! I've got my eyes
open. Why!" he said in surprise, starting up, "he's gone!" He suddenly
shuddered and cursed. "In the back," he said. "You--you----" And profanity
gushed from his lips. Then he collapsed, closing his eyes, and lay silent
and motionless.

Out of the jumble of disconnected sentences Sheila was able to gather two
things of importance--perhaps three.

The first was that some one had told him of Dakota's complicity in the
plan to murder him and that he refused to believe his friend capable of
such depravity. The second was that he knew who had shot him; he also knew
the man who had informed him of Dakota's duplicity--though this knowledge
would amount to very little unless he recovered enough to be able to
supply the missing threads.

Sheila despaired of him supplying anything, for it seemed that he was
steadily growing worse, and when the dusk came she began to feel a dread
of remaining with him in the cabin during the night. If only the doctor
would return! If Dakota would come--Duncan, her father, anybody! But
nobody came, and the silence around the cabin grew so oppressive that she
felt she must scream. When darkness succeeded dusk she lighted the
kerosene lamp, placed a bar over the window, secured the door fastenings,
and seated herself at the table, determined to take a short nap.

It seemed that she had scarcely dropped off to sleep--though in reality
she had been unconscious for more than two hours--when she awoke suddenly,
to see Doubler sitting erect in the bunk, watching her with a wan,
sympathetic smile. There was the light of reason in his eyes and her heart
gave an ecstatic leap.

"Could you give me a drink of water, ma'am?" he said, in the voice that
she knew well.

She sprang to the pail, to find that it contained very little. She had
lifted it, and was about to unfasten the door, intending to go to the
river to procure fresh water, when Doubler's voice arrested her.

"There's some water there--I can hear it splashin': It'll do well en