"Melissy." Flatray spoke very gently, but something in the way he spoke
compelled the young woman to meet his eyes.

Almost instantly the long lashes went down to her pale cheeks again.

MacQueen cut in suavely: "I reckon this is the time for announcements.
Boys, Miss Lee has promised to marry me."

Before the stir which this produced had died away, Flatray flashed a
question: "In exchange for my life?"

The chief of the outlaws looked at him with insolence smoldering in his
black eyes. "Now, I wonder when you ever will learn to mind your own
business, sheriff! Nobody invited you to sit into this game."

"This _is_ my business. I make it mine. Give me a straight answer,
Melissy. Am I right? Is it for my life?"

"Yes." Her voice was so low he could hardly hear it.

"Then I won't have it! The thing is infamous. I can't hide behind the
skirts of a girl, least of all you. I can die, but, by God, I'll keep my
self-respect."

"It's all arranged," Melissy answered in a whisper.

Flatray laughed harshly. "I guess not. You can't pay my debts by giving
yourself to life-long misery."

"You're right pessimistic, sheriff," sneered MacQueen.

"What do you take me for? I won't have it. I won't have it." The sheriff's
voice was rough and hoarse. "I'd rather die fifty times."

"It's not up to you to choose, as it happens," the leader of the outlaws
suggested suavely.

"You villain! You damned white-livered coward!" The look of the young
sheriff scorched.

"Speaks right out in meeting, don't he?" grinned Lane.

"I know what he is, Jack," Melissy cried. "And he knows I think he's the
lowest thing that crawls. But I've got to save you. Don't you see, I've
got to do it?"

"No, I don't see it," Flatray answered hotly. "I can take what's coming to
me, can't I? But if you save my life that way you make me as low a thing
as he is. I say I'll not have it."

Melissy could stand it no longer. She began to sob. "I--I--Oh, Jack, I've
got to do it. Don't you see? Don't you see? _It won't make any difference
with me if I don't._ No difference--except that you'll be--dead."

She was in his embrace, her arms around his neck, whispering the horrible
truth in his ear brokenly. And as he felt her dear young fragrance of
hair in his nostrils, the warm, soft litheness of her body against his,
the rage and terror in him flooded his veins. Could such things be? Was it
possible a man like that could live? Not if he could help it.

Gently