ious fragment of a second in hesitation
the Duke sent Whetstone thundering along the platform in pursuit of the
train.

It seemed a foolish thing to do, and a risky venture, for the platform
was old, its planks were weak in places. It was not above a hundred feet
long, and beyond it only a short stretch of right-of-way until the
public road crossed the track, the fence running down to the cattle
guard, blocking his hope of overtaking the train.

More than that, the train was picking up speed, as if the engineer
wanted to get out of sight and hearing of that demonstrative crowd, and
put his humiliation behind him as quickly as possible. No man's horse
could make a start with planks under his feet, run two hundred yards
and overtake that train, no matter what the inducement. That was the
thought of every man who sat a saddle there and stretched his neck to
witness this unparalleled streak of folly.

If Whetstone had run swiftly in the first race, he fairly whistled
through the air like a wild duck in the second. Before he had run the
length of the platform he had gained on the train, his nose almost even
with the brass railing over which the girl leaned, the handkerchief in
her hand. Midway between the platform and the cattle guard they saw the
Duke lean in his saddle and snatch the white favor from her hand.

The people on the train end cheered this feat of quick resolution,
quicker action. But the girl whose handkerchief the Duke had won only
leaned on the railing, holding fast with both hands, as if she offered
her lips to be kissed, and looked at him with a pleasure in her face
that he could read as the train bore her onward into the West.

The Duke sat there with his hat in his hand, gazing after her, only her
straining face in his vision, centered out of the dust and widening
distance like a star that a man gazes on to fix his course before it is
overwhelmed by clouds.

The Duke sat watching after her, the train reducing the distance like a
vision that melts out of the heart with a sigh. She raised her hand as
the dust closed in the wake of the train. He thought she beckoned him.

So she came, and went, crossing his way in the Bad Lands in that hour of
his small triumph, and left her perfumed token of appreciation in his
hand. The Duke put it away in the pocket of his shirt beneath the
calfskin vest, the faint delicacy of its perfume rising to his nostrils
like the elusive scent of a violet for which one sear