outlaw camp. And that was what he had determined to achieve.

Three times in as many days he rode up the valley to the Star, each time
talking with Haydon--then leaving the latter to go out and lounge around
among the men, listening to their talk, but taking little part in it. He
did not speak until he was spoken to, and thus he challenged their
interest, and they began to make advances to him.

Their social structure was flimsy and thin, their fellowship as
spontaneous as it was insincere; and within a few days the edge had worn
off the strangeness that had surrounded Harlan, and he had been accepted
with hardly a ripple of excitement.

And yet no man among them had achieved intimacy with Harlan. There was a
cold constraint in his manner that held them off, figuratively, barring
them from becoming familiar with him. Several of them tried familiarity,
and were astonished to discover that they had somehow failed--though they
had been repelled so cleverly that they could not resent it.

Harlan had established a barrier without them being aware of how he had
done it--the barrier of authority and respect, behind which he stood, an
engaging, saturnine, interesting, awe-compelling figure.

At the end of a week the men of the Star outfit were addressing him as
"boss;" listening to him with respect when he spoke, striving for his
attention, and trying to win from him one of those rare smiles with which
he honored those among them whose personalities interested him.

At the end of two weeks half of the Star outfit was eager to obey any order
he issued, while the remainder betrayed some slight hesitation--which,
however, vanished when Harlan turned his steady gaze upon them.

Behind their acceptance of him, though--back of their seeming willingness
to admit him to their peculiar fellowship--was a reservation. Harlan felt
it, saw it in their eyes, and noted it in their manner toward him. They
had heard about him; they knew something of his record; reports of his
cleverness with a weapon had come to them. And they were curious.

There was speculation in the glances they threw at him; there was some
suspicion, cynicism, skepticism, and not a little doubt. It seemed to
Harlan that though they had accepted him they were impatiently awaiting a
practical demonstration of those qualities that had made him famous in
the country. They wanted to be "shown."

Their wild, unruly passions and lurid imaginations were the urges that
drov