buildings began to show now and then through the thin
ranks of the cottonwoods along the creek.

But his face sobered as he rode along. It seemed to him that the
sleepy little meadows, the quiet murmuring of the creek, even the soft
rustling of the cottonwood leaves breathed a new loneliness, an
emptiness where the man who had called this place home, who had clung
to it in the face of opposition that was growing into open warfare, had
lived and left life suddenly--unwarrantably, Lone knew in his heart.
It might be of no use to think about it, but the vivid memory of Fred
Thurman was with him when he rode up the trail to the stable and the
small corrals. He had to think, whether he would or no.

At the corral he came unexpectedly in sight of the Swede, who grinned a
guileless welcome and came toward him, so that Lone could not ride on
unless he would advertise his dislike of the place. John Doe, plainly
glad to find an excuse to stop, slowed and came to where Swan waited by
the gate.

"By golly, this is lonesome here," Swan complained, heaving a great
sigh. "That judge don't get busy pretty quick, I'm maybe jumping my
job. Lone, what you think? You believe in ghosts?"

"Naw. What's on your chest, Swan?" Lone slipped sidewise in the
saddle, resting his muscles. "You been seeing things?"

"No--I don't be seeing things, Lone. But sometimes I been--like I
_feel_ something." He stared at Lone questioningly. "What you think,
Lone, if you be sitting down eating your supper, maybe, and you feel
something say words in your brain? Like you know something talks to
you and then quits."

Lone gave Swan a long, measuring look, and Swan laughed uneasily.

"That sounds crazy. But it's true, what something tells me in my
brain. I go and look, and by golly, it's there just like the words
tell me."

Lone straightened in the saddle. "You better come clean, Swan, and
tell the whole thing. What was it? Don't talk in circles. What words
did you feel--in your brain?" In spite of himself, Lone felt as he had
when the girl had talked to him and called him Charlie.

Swan closed the gate behind him with steady hands. His lips were
pressed firmly together, as if he had definitely made up his mind to
something. Lone was impressed somehow with Swan's perfect control of
his speech, his thoughts, his actions. But he was puzzled rather than
anything else, and when Swan turned, facing him, Lone's bewilderment
did not less