ad
made him ten times an Isbel. Blood was thick. His father did not
speak to dull ears. This strife of rising tumult in him seemed the
effect of years of calm, of peace in the woods, of dreamy waiting for
he knew not what. It was the passionate primitive life in him that had
awakened to the call of blood ties.

"That's aboot all, son," concluded the rancher. "You understand now
why I feel they're goin' to kill me. I feel it heah." With solemn
gesture he placed his broad hand over his heart. "An', Jean, strange
whispers come to me at night. It seems like your mother was callin' or
tryin' to warn me. I cain't explain these queer whispers. But I know
what I know."

"Jorth has his followers. You must have yours," replied Jean, tensely.

"Shore, son, an' I can take my choice of the best men heah," replied
the rancher, with pride. "But I'll not do that. I'll lay the deal
before them an' let them choose. I reckon it 'll not be a long-winded
fight. It 'll be short an bloody, after the way of Texans. I'm
lookin' to you, Jean, to see that an Isbel is the last man!"

"My God--dad! is there no other way? Think of my sister Ann--of my
brothers' wives--of--of other women! Dad, these damned Texas feuds are
cruel, horrible!" burst out Jean, in passionate protest.

"Jean, would it be any easier for our women if we let these men shoot
us down in cold blood?"

"Oh no--no, I see, there's no hope of--of.... But, dad, I wasn't
thinkin' about myself. I don't care. Once started I'll--I'll be what
you bragged I was. Only it's so hard to-to give in."

Jean leaned an arm against the side of the cabin and, bowing his face
over it, he surrendered to the irresistible contention within his
breast. And as if with a wrench that strange inward hold broke. He let
down. He went back. Something that was boyish and hopeful--and in its
place slowly rose the dark tide of his inheritance, the savage instinct
of self-preservation bequeathed by his Indian mother, and the fierce,
feudal blood lust of his Texan father.

Then as he raised himself, gripped by a sickening coldness in his
breast, he remembered Ellen Jorth's face as she had gazed dreamily down
off the Rim--so soft, so different, with tremulous lips, sad, musing,
with far-seeing stare of dark eyes, peering into the unknown, the
instinct of life still unlived. With confused vision and nameless pain
Jean thought of her.

"Dad, it's hard on--the--the young folks," he sa