a man who is bent to compromise, every time.
Undoubtedly it looked that way. But he had killed a man. It was a
heavy thing to carry on his soul.

This depressing shadow thickened over him as the sun drew down to
the hills, and he went working his flock slowly to the night's
bedding-ground. The complaint of the lambs, weary from following and
frisking the day through, was sadder to him than it ever had fallen
on his ears before. It seemed a lament for the pollution of his hands
in human blood, moving a regret in his heart that was harder to bear
than fear.

Mackenzie sat above the resting sheep as the shadows drew toward him
between the hills, a glow as of a distant city where the sun went down
an hour past. The rifle was beside him, his pistol in his belt, for
regret of past violence would not make the next hour secure. If
trouble should lift its head in his path again, he vowed he would kill
it before it could dart and strike.

No, it was not a joke that Reid had pulled on him that afternoon. Reid
had meant to rob him, urged on to the deed by his preying discontent
and racking desire to be away. Reid was on his way out of the country
now, and if they caught him and took him before the judge who had
sentenced him to this unique penance, he would have the plea that
Mackenzie drove him out, and that he fled to save his life.

That might be sufficient for the judge; certainly it would be enough
for Tim Sullivan. Sullivan would bring him back, and Mackenzie would
be sent to pick up the trail of his fortunes in another place, with
years of waiting between him and Joan, perhaps.

So Mackenzie sat with his moody thoughts, depressed, downhearted,
regretting bitterly the necessity that had risen for taking away a
fellow-creature's life. It bore on him heavily now that the heat of
his blood had subsided; it stood before him an awful accusation. He
had killed a man! But a man who had forfeited his right to live, a man
who had attempted to take his life in the past, who had come again
that day to hunt him like a coyote on the hills. The law would
exculpate him; men would speak loudly of his justification. But it
would stand against him in his own conscience all his days. Simple for
thinking of it that way, he knew; simple as they held him to be in the
sheep country, even down to old Dad Frazer, simplest among men.

He had no desire in his mouth for supper, although he set about
preparing it, wanting it over before dark. No n