is way out the door.

"You're crazy!" he yelled, "the whole danged town's crazy. All except
old Charley and me."

He jerked his head and winked at Charley as he hobbled towards the
street and Death Valley nodded gravely. There was a long, hateful
silence; then the great motor roared out and the white racer rushed away
across the desert.

"Well, I don't care!" declared the Widow as she gazed after his dust and
when the stage went out that day it took a lady passenger to Vegas.

CHAPTER VII

BETWEEN FRIENDS

The madness of the Widow and Old Charley and Stiff Neck George was no
mystery to Wiley Holman--it was the same form of mania which he
encountered everywhere when he went to see men who owned mines. If he
offered them a million for a ten-foot hole they would refuse it and
demand ten million more, and if he offered them nothing they
immediately scented a conspiracy to starve them out and gain
possession of their mine. It was the illusion of hidden wealth, of
buried treasure, which keeps half the mines in the West closed down
and half of the rest in litigation; except that in Keno it seemed to
be associated with gun-plays and a marked tendency towards homicide.
So, upon his return from a short stay in the hospital he came up the
main street silently, then stepped on the throttle and went through
town a-smoking. But the Widow was out waiting for him in the middle of
the road and, rather than run her down, he threw on both brakes and
stopped.

"Well, what now?" he inquired, frowning at the odor of heated rubber.
"What's your particular grievance this trip?" He regarded her coldly,
then bowed to Virginia and waved a friendly hand at Charley. "Hello,
there, Death Valley," he called out jovially, as the Widow choked with a
rush of words, "what's the news from the Funeral Range?"

"Now, here!" exclaimed the Widow, advancing from the dust cloud, and
glancing into the machine. "I want you to bring back that gun!"

"I'm sorry, Mrs. Huff," he replied with finality, "but you'll have to
get along without it. I turned it over to the sheriff, along with three
buckshot and an affidavit regarding the shooting----"

"What, you great, big coward!" stormed the Widow in a fury. "Did you run
and complain to the sheriff?"

"No, I walked," said Wiley, "and on one leg at that. But I might as well
warn you that next time you make a gun-play you're likely to break into
jail."

"You're a coward!" she taunted. "You're standi