"Well, there's where I come in. I've got the girl who made those tracks on the floor."

The sheriff was thoughtful. "I guess you'd better call up Carmody—he's the whole works till his verdict is rendered, and he ought to be notified at once."

A moment's talk with the doctor's office disclosed the fact that he was out in the country on a medical trip, and would not return till late. "Reckon we'll have to wait," said the sheriff.

The ranger's face fell. After a pause he asked, "When does that train get in?"

"About six; it's an hour late."

"And they'll be jailed?"

"Sure thing! No other way. Carmody told me to take charge of them and see that they were both on hand to-morrow."

Hanscom's fine eyes flamed with indignation. "It's an outrage. That girl is as innocent of Watson's killing as you are. I won't have her humiliated in this way."

"You seem terribly interested in this young lady," remarked Throop, with a grin.

Hanscom was in no mood to dodge. "I am—and I'm going to save her from coming here if I can." He started for the door. "I'll see Judge Brinkley and get her released. Carmody has no authority to hold her."

"I hope you succeed," said the sheriff, sympathetically; "but at present I'm under orders from the coroner. It's up to him. So you think you've got the girl who made them tracks?"

"I certainly do, and I want you to hold these prisoners till Carmody gets home. Don't let anybody see them, and don't let them talk with one another. They'll all come before that jury to-morrow, and they mustn't have any chance to frame up a lie."

"All right. I see your point. Go ahead. Your prisoners will be here when you come back."

Hanscom went away, raging against the indignity which threatened Helen. At Carmody's office he waited an hour, hoping the coroner might return, and, in despair of any help from him, set out at last for Brinkley's office, resolute to secure the judge's interference.

The first man he met on the street stopped him with a jovial word: "Hello, Hans! Say, you want to watch out for Abe Kitsong. He came b'ilin' in half an hour ago, and is looking for you. Says you helped that Dutchman and his girl (or wife, or whatever she is) to get away, and that you've been arresting Henry, his nephew, without a warrant, and he swears he'll swat you good and plenty, on sight."

Hanscom's voice was savage as he replied: "You tell him that I'm big enough to be seen with the naked eye, and if he wants me right away he'll find me at Judge Brinkley's office."

The other man also grew serious. "All the same, Hans, keep an eye out," he urged. "Abe is sure to make you trouble. He's started in drinking, and when he's drunk he's poisonous as a rattler."

"All right. I'm used to rattlers—I'll hear him before he strikes. He's a noisy brute."

The ranger could understand that Rita's father might very naturally be thrown into a fury of protest by the news of his daughter's arrest, but Kitsong's concern over a nephew whom he had not hitherto regarded as worth the slightest care did not appear especially logical or singularly important.

Brinkley was not in his office and so Hanscom went out to his house, out on the north bend of the river in a large lawn set with young trees.

The judge, seated on his porch in his shirt-sleeves, exhibited the placid ease of a man whose office work is done and his grass freshly sprinkled.

"Good evening, Hanscom," he pleasantly called. "Come up and have a seat and a smoke with the gardener."

"I have but a moment," the ranger replied, and plunged again into the story, which served in this instance as a preface to his plea for intervention. "You must help me, Judge. Miss McLaren must not go to jail. To arrest her in this way a second time is a crime. She's a lady, Judge, and as innocent of that shooting as a child."

"You surprise me," said Brinkley. "According to all reports she is very, very far from being a lady."

Hanscom threw out his hands in protest. "They're all wrong, Judge. I tell you she is a lady, and young and handsome."

"Handsome and young!" The judge's eyes took on a musing expression. "Well, well! that accounts for much. But what was she doing up there in the company of that old Dutchman?"

"I don't know why she came West, but I'm glad she did. I'm glad to have known her. That old Dutchman, as you call him, is her stepfather and a fine chap."

"But Carmody has arrested her. What caused him to do that?"

"I don't know. I can't understand it. It may be that Kitsong has put the screws on him some way."

The judge reflected. "As the only strange woman in the valley, the girl naturally falls under suspicion of having made those footprints."

"I know it, Judge, but you have only to see her—to hear her voice—to realize how impossible it is for her to kill even a coyote. All I ask, now, is that you save her from going to jail."

"I don't see how I can interfere," Brinkley answered, with gentle decision. "As coroner, Carmody has the case entirely in his hands till after the verdict. But don't take her imprisonment too hard," he added, with desire to comfort him. "Throop has a good deal of discretion and I'll 'phone him to make her stay as little like incarceration as possible. You see, while nominally she's only a witness for the state, actually she's on trial for murder, and till you can get your other woman before the jury she's a suspect. If you are right, the jury will at once bring in a verdict against other parties, known or unknown, and she will be free—except that she may have to remain to testify in her own case against the raiders. Don't worry, my dear fellow. It will come out all right."

Hanscom was now in the grasp of conflicting emotions. In spite of Brinkley's refusal to interfere, he could not deny a definite feeling of pleasure in the fact that Helen was returning and that he was about to see her again. "Anyhow, I have another opportunity to serve her," he thought, as he turned down the street toward the station. "Perhaps after the verdict she will not feel so eager to leave the country."

VI

Meanwhile the fugitives on the westbound express were nearing the town in charge of the marshal of Lone Rock, and Helen (who had telegraphed her plight to Hanscom and had received no reply) was in silent dread of the ordeal which awaited her. Her confidence in the ranger had not failed, but, realizing how difficult it was to reach him, she had small hope of seeing his kindly face at the end of her journey.

"He may be riding some of those lonely heights this moment," she thought, and wondered what he would do if he knew that she was returning, a prisoner. "He would come to me," she said, in answer to her own question, and the thought that in all that mighty spread of peak and plain he was the one gracious and kindly soul lent a kind of glamour to his name. "After all, a loyal soul like his is worth more than any mine or mountain," she acknowledged.

The marshal, a small, quaint, middle-aged person with squinting glance and bushy hair, was not only very much in awe of his lovely prisoner, but so accustomed to going about in his shirt-sleeves that he suffered acutely in the confinement of his heavy coat. Nevertheless, in spite of his discomfort, he was very considerate in a left-handed way, and did his best to conceal the official relationship between himself and his wards. He not only sat behind them all the way, but he made no attempt at conversation, and for these favors Helen was genuinely grateful. Only as they neared the station did he venture to address her.

"Now the sheriff will probably be on hand," he said; "and if he is I'll just naturally turn you over to him; but in case he isn't I'll have to take you right over to the jail. I'm sorry, but that's my orders. So if you'll kindly step along just ahead of me, people may not notice you're in my charge."

Helen assured him that she would obey every suggestion, and that she deeply appreciated his courtesy.

Kauffman's spirit was sadly broken. His age, the rough usage of the day before, and this unwarranted second arrest had combined to take away from him a large part of his natural courage. He insisted that Helen should wire her Eastern friends, stating the case and appealing for aid.

"We need help now," he said. "We are being persecuted."

Helen, however, remembering Carmody's kindness, said: "Don't be discouraged, daddy. It may be that we are only witnesses and that after we have testified we shall be released. Wait until to-morrow; I hate to announce new troubles to my relatives."

"But we shall need money," he said, anxiously. "We have only a small balance."

It was nearly six o'clock as they came winding down between the grassy buttes which formed the gateway to the town, and the girl recalled, with a wave of self-pity, the feeling of exaltation with which she had first looked upon that splendid purple-walled canyon rising to the west. It had appealed to her at that time as the gateway to a mystic sanctuary. Now it was but the lair of thieves and murderers, ferocious and obscene. Only one kindly human soul dwelt among those majestic, forested heights.

She was pale, sad, but entirely composed, and to Hanscom very beautiful, as she appeared in the vestibule of the long day-coach, but her face flushed with pleasure at sight of him, and as she grasped his hand and looked into his fine eyes something warm and glowing flooded her heart.

"Oh, how relieved I am to find you here!" she exclaimed, and her lips trembled in confirmation of her words. "I did not expect you. I was afraid my telegram had not reached you."

"Did you telegraph me?" he asked. "I didn't get it—but I'm here all the same," he added, and fervently pressed the hands which she had allowed him to retain.

Oblivious of the curious crowd, she faced him in a sudden realization of her dependence upon him, and her gratitude for his stark manliness was so deep, so full, she could have put her hands about his neck. How dependable, how simple, how clear-eyed he was!

He on his part found her greatly changed in both face and voice. She seemed clothed in some new, strange dignity, and yet her glance was less remote, less impersonal than before and her pleasure at sight of him deeply gratifying. In spite of himself his spirits lightened.

"I have a lot to tell you," he began, but the sheriff courteously interposed:

"Put her right into my machine—You go too, Hanscom."

"I couldn't prevent this," he began, sorrowfully, as he took a seat beside her; "but you will not be put into a cell. Mrs. Throop will treat you as a guest."

The self-accusation in his voice moved her to put her hand on his arm in caressing reassurance. "Please don't blame yourself about that," she said. "I don't mind. It's only for the night, anyway. Let us think of to-morrow."

The ride was short and Mrs. Throop, a tall, dark, rather gloomy woman, came to the door to meet her guests with the air of an old-fashioned village hostess, serious but kindly.

"Mrs. Throop," said her husband. "This is Miss McLaren and her father, Mr. Kauffman. Make them as comfortable as you can."

Mrs. Throop greeted Helen with instant kindly interest. "I am pleased to know you. Come right in. You must be tired."

"I am," confessed the girl, "very tired and very dusty. I hope you always put your prisoners under the hose."

"I'll give you my spare chamber," replied the matron, with abstracted glance. "It's next the bath-room. I'm sorry, but I guess your father'll have to go down below."

"What do you mean by that?"

The sheriff explained, "The cells are below."

Helen was instantly alarmed. "Oh no!" she protested. "My father is not at all well. Please give him my room. I'll go down below."

"It won't be necessary for either of you to go below," interposed the sheriff. "Hanscom, I'll put Kauffman in your charge. You can take him to your boarding-house if you want to."

"You're very kind," said Helen, with such feeling that the sheriff reacted to it. "I hope it won't get you into trouble."

"Oh, I don't think it will," he said, cheerily. "So long as I know he's safe, it don't matter where he sleeps."

"Well, you'd better all stay to supper, anyhow," said Mrs. Throop. "It's ready and waiting."

No one but Helen perceived anything unusual in this hearty offhand invitation. To Hanscom it was just another instance of Western hospitality, and to the sheriff a common service, and so a few minutes later they all sat down at the generous table, in such genial mood (with Mrs. Throop doing her best to make them feel at home) that all their troubles became less than shadows.

Although disinclined to go into a detailed story of his return to the hills, Hanscom described the capture of the housebreakers and, in spite of a careful avoidance of anything which might sound like boasting, disclosed the fact that at the moment when he threw open the door of the cabin he had exposed himself to the weapons of a couple of reckless young outlaws and might have been killed.

"You shouldn't have risked that," Helen protested. "Our poor possessions are not worth such cost."

"I couldn't endure the notion of those hoodlums looting the place," he explained.

At the thought of Rita (who was occupying a cell in the women's ward) Helen grew a little sad, for, according to the ranger's own account, she was hardly more than a child, and had been led away by her first passion.

At the close of the meal, upon Mrs. Throop's housewifely invitation, they all took seats in the "front room" and Helen quite forgot that she was a prisoner, and the ranger almost returned to boyhood as he faced the marble-topped table, the cabinet organ, and the enlarged family portraits on the walls, for of such quality were his mother's adornments in the old home at Circle Bend. Something vaguely intimate and a little confusing filled his mind as he listened to the voice of the woman before him. Only by an effort could he connect her with the cabin in the high valley. She was becoming each moment more alien, more aloof, but at the same time more desirable, like the girls he used to worship in the church choir.

Speech was difficult with him, and he could only repeat: "It makes me feel like a rabbit to think I could not keep you from coming here, and the worst of it is I had nothing to offer as security. All I have in the world is a couple of horses, a saddle, and a typewriter."

"It really doesn't matter," she replied in hope of easing his mind. "See how they treat us! They know we're unjustly held and that we shall be set free to-morrow."

Strange to say, this did not lighten his gloom. "And then—you will go away," he said, soberly.

"Yes; we cannot remain here."

"And I shall never see you again," he pursued.

Her face betrayed a trace of sympathetic pain. "Don't say that! Never is such a long time."

"And you'll forget us all out here—"

"I shall never forget what you have done, be sure of that," she replied.

Nevertheless, despite the tenderness of her tone and her gratitude openly expressed, something disconcerting had come into her eyes and voice. She was more and more the lady and less and less the recluse, and as she receded and rose to this higher plane, the ranger lost heart, almost without knowing the cause of it.

At last he turned to Kauffman. "I suppose we'd better go," he said. "You look tired."

"I am tired," the old man admitted. "Is it far to your hotel?"

"Only a little way."

"Good night," said Helen, extending her hand with a sudden light in her face which transported the trailer. "We'll meet again in the morning."

He took her hand in his with a clutch in his throat which made reply difficult; but his glance expressed the adoration which filled his heart.

* * * * *

Kauffman left the house, walking like a man of seventy. "My bones are not broken, but they are weary," he said, dejectedly; "I fear I am to be ill."

"Oh, you'll be all right in the morning," responded the ranger much more cheerily than he really felt.

"Is it not strange that any reasonable being should accuse my daughter and me of that monstrous deed?"

"That is because no one knows you. When the towns-folk come to know you and her they will think differently. That is why I am glad the coroner is to hold his court here in the town."

"Well, if only we are set free—We shall be set free, eh?"

"Surely? But what will you do then? Where will you go?"

"I hope Helen will return to her people." He sighed deeply. "It was all very foolish to come out here. But it was natural. She was stricken, and sensitive—so morbidly sensitive—to pity, to gossip. Then, too, a romantic notion about the healing power of the mountains was in her thought. She wished to go where no one knew her—where she could live the simple life and regain serenity and health. She said: 'I will not go to a convent. I will make a sanctuary of the green hills.'"

"Something very sorrowful must have happened—" said Hanscom, hesitatingly.

The old man's voice was very grave as he replied: "Not sorrow, but treachery," he said. "A treachery so cruel, a betrayal so complete, that when she lost her lover and her most intimate girl friend (one nearer than a sister) she lost faith in all men and all women—almost in God. I cannot tell you more of her story—" He paused a moment, then added: "She believes in you—she already trusts you—and some time, perhaps, she herself will tell the story of her betrayal. Till then you must be content with this—she is here through no fault or weakness of her own."

The ranger, pondering deeply, dared not put into definite form the precise disloyalty which had driven a broken-hearted girl to seek the shelter of the hills, but he understood her mood. Hating her kind and believing that she could lose herself in the immensity of the landscape, she had come to the mountains only to be cruelly disillusioned. The Kitsongs had taught her that in the wilderness a woman is more noticeable than a peak.

Just why she selected the Shellfish for her retreat remained to be explained, and to this question Kauffman answered: "We came here because a friend of ours, a poet, who had once camped in the valley, told us of the wonderful beauty of the place. It is beautiful—quite as beautiful as it was reported—but a beautiful landscape, it appears, does not make men over into its image. It makes them seem only the more savage."

Hanscom, refraining from further question, helped the old man up the stairway to his bed and then returned to the barroom, in which several of the regular boarders were loafing. One or two greeted him familiarly, and it was evident that they all knew something of the capture and were curious to learn more. His answers to their questions were brief: "You'll learn all about it to-morrow," he said.

Simpson, the proprietor of the hotel, jocosely remarked: "Well, Hans, as near as I can figure it out, to-morrow is to be your busy day, but you'd better lay low to-night. The Kitsongs'll get ye, if ye don't watch out."

"I'll watch out. What do you hear?"

"The whole of Shellfish Valley is coming in to see that your Dutchman and his girl gets what's coming to them. Abe has just left here, looking for you. He's turribly wrought up. Says you had no right to arrest them youngsters and he'll make you sorry you did."

One of the clerks dryly remarked: "They's a fierce interest in this inquest. Carmody will sure have to move over to the court-house. Gee! but he feels his feed! For one day, anyhow, he's bigger than the entire County Court."

The ranger had a clearer vision of his own as well as Helen's situation as he replied: "Well, I'm going over to see him. When it comes to a show-down he's on my side, for he needs the witnesses I've brought him."

"Abe sure has got it in for you, Hans. Your standing up for the Dutchman and his woman was bad enough, but for you to arrest Hank without a warrant has set the old man a-poppin'." He glanced at the ranger's empty belt. "Better take your gun along."

"No; I'm safer without it," he replied. "I might fly mad and hurt somebody."

The loafers, though eager to witness the clash, did not rise from their chairs till after Hanscom left. No one wished to betray unseemly haste.

"There'll be something doing when they meet," said Simpson. "Let's follow him up and see the fun."

As he walked away in the darkness the ranger began to fear—not for himself, but for Helen. The unreasoning ferocity with which the valley still pursued her was appalling. For the first time in his life he strongly desired money. He felt his weakness, his ignorance. In the face of the trial—which should mean complete vindication for the girl, but which might prove to be another hideous miscarriage of justice—he was of no more value than a child. Carmody had seemed friendly, but some evil influence had evidently changed his attitude.

"What can I do?" the ranger asked himself, and was only able to answer, "Nothing."

From a sober-sided, capable boy, content to do a thing well, he had developed at thirty into a serious but singularly unambitious man. Loving the outdoor life and being sufficiently resourceful to live alone in a wilderness cabin without becoming morbid, he had naturally drifted into the Forest Service. Without being slothful, he had been foolishly unaspiring, and he saw that now. "I must bestir myself," he said, sharply. "I must wake up. I must climb. I must get somewhere."

He took close grip on himself. "Carmody must squeeze the truth out of these youngsters to-morrow, and I must help him do it. If Brinkley can't help, I must have somebody else." And yet deep in his heart was the belief that the sight of Helen as she took the witness-chair would do more to clear her name than any lawyer could accomplish by craft or passionate speech.

At the door of Carmody's office he came upon Kitsong and a group of his followers, waiting for him. Abe was in a most dangerous mood, and his hearers, also in liquor, were listening with approval to the description of what he intended to do to the ranger.

"You can't arrest a man without a warrant," he was repeating. "Hanscom's no sheriff—he's only a dirty deputy game-warden. I'll make him wish he was a goat before I get through with him."

Although to advance meant war, Hanscom had no thought of retreating. He kept his way, and as the band of light which streamed from the saloon window fell on him one of the watchers called out, "There's the ranger now."

Kitsong turned, and with an oath of savage joy advanced upon the forester. "You're the man I have been waiting for," he began, with a menacing snarl.

"Well," Hanscom retorted, "here I am. What can I do for you?"

His quiet tone instantly infuriated the ruffian. Shaking his fist close to the ranger's nose, he shouted: "I'll do for you, you loafer! What right had you to arrest them kids? What right had you to help them witnesses to the train? You're off your beat, and you'd better climb right back again."

Righteous wrath flamed hot in the ranger's breast. "You keep your fist out of my face or I'll smash your jaw," he answered, and his voice was husky with passion. "Get out of my way!" he added, as Kitsong shifted ground, deliberately blocking his path.

"You can't bluff me!" roared the older man. "I'm going to have you jugged for false arrest. You'll find you can't go round taking people to jail at your own sweet will."

The battle song in the old man's voice aroused the street. His sympathizers pressed close. All their long-felt, half-hidden hatred of the ranger as a Federal officer flamed from their eyes, and Hanscom regretted the absence of his revolver.

Though lean and awkward, he was one of those deceptive men whose muscles are folded in broad, firm flakes like steel springs. A sense of danger thrilled his blood, but he did not show it—he could not afford to show it. Therefore he merely backed up against the wall of the building and with clenched hands awaited their onset.

Something in his silence and self-control daunted his furious opponents. They hesitated.

"If you weren't a government officer," blustered Abe, "I'd waller ye—But I'll get ye! I'll put ye where that Dutchman and his—"

Hanscom's fist crashing like a hammer against the rancher's jaw closed his teeth on the vile epithet which filled his mouth, and even as he reeled, stunned by this blow, the ranger's left arm flashed in another savage swing, and Abe, stunned by the swift attack, would have fallen into the gutter had not one of his gang caught and supported him.

"Kill him! Kill the dog!" shouted one of the others, and in his voice was the note of the murderer.

Eli Kitsong whipped out his revolver, but the hand of a friendly bystander clutched the weapon. "None of that; the man is unarmed," he said.

At this moment the door of the saloon opened and five or six men came rushing, eager to see, quick to share in a fight. Believing them to be enemies, Hanscom with instant rush struck the first man a heavy blow, caught and wrenched his weapon from his fist, and so, armed and desperate, faced the circle of inflamed and excited men.

"Hands up now!" he called.

"Don't shoot, Hans!" shouted the man who had been disarmed. "We're all friends."

In the tense silence which followed, the sheriff, attracted by the noise, emerged from the coroner's door with a shout and hurled himself like an enormous ram into the crowd. Pushing men this way and that, he reached the empty space before the ranger's feet.

"What's the meaning of all this?" he demanded, with panting intensity. "Put up them guns." The crowd obeyed. "Now, what's it all about?" he said, addressing Abe.

"He jumped me," complained Kitsong. "I want him arrested for that and for taking Henry without a warrant."

"Where's your warrant?" asked Throop.

Abe was confused. "I haven't any yet, but I'll get one."

Throop addressed the crowd, which was swiftly augmenting. "Clear out of this, now! Vamose, every man of you, or I'll run you all in. Clear out, I say!" The throng began to move away, for the gestures with which he indicated his meaning were made sinisterly significant by the weapon which he swung. The leaders fell back and began to move away. Throop said to the ranger: "Hans, you come with me. The coroner wants you."

Hanscom returned the revolver to the man from whom he had snatched it. "I'm much obliged, Pete," he said, with a note of humor. "Hope I didn't do any damage. I didn't have time to see who was coming. I wouldn't have been so rough if I'd known it was you."

The other fellow grinned. "'Peared to me like you'd made a mistake, but I couldn't blame you. Feller has to act quick in a case like that."

"Bring your prisoner here," called Carmody from his open door. "I'll take care of him."

"I'll get you yet," called Kitsong, venomously. "I'll get you to-morrow!"

"Go along out o' here!" repeated the sheriff, hustling him off the walk. "You're drunk and disturbing the peace. Go home and go to bed."

With a sense of having made a bad matter worse the ranger followed the coroner into his office and closed the door.

VII

Dr. Carmody, who had held the office of coroner less than a year, had a keen sense of the importance which this his first murder case had given him. His procedure at the cabin had been easy and rather casual, it is true, but contact with the town-folk and a careful perusal of the State Code had given him a decided tone of authority and an air of judicial severity which surprised and somewhat irritated Hanscom, fresh from his encounter with Kitsong.

"What was the cause of that row out there?" demanded the doctor, resuming his seat behind his desk with the expression of a police magistrate.

The ranger, still hot with anger, looked at his questioner with resentful eyes. "Kitsong and his gang were laying for me and I stood 'em off—that's all. Old Abe was out for trouble, and he got it. I punched his jaw and the other outlaws started in to do me up."

Carmody softened a bit. "Well, you're in for it. He'll probably have you arrested and charged with assault and battery."

"If he can," interposed Throop. "He'll find some trouble gettin' a warrant issued in this town to-night."

Carmody continued his accusing interrogation: "What about this report of your helping the Kauffmans to leave the country? Is that true?"

Hanscom's tone was still defiant as he replied: "It is, but I wonder if you know that they were being chased out of the country at the time?"

"Chased out?"

"Yes. After receiving several warnings, they got one that scared them, and so they hitched up and started over early in the morning to find me. On the way they were waylaid by an armed squad and chased for several miles. I heard the shooting, and by riding hard across the Black Hogback intercepted them and scared the outlaws off, but the Kauffmans were in bad shape. One of the horses had been killed and Kauffman himself was lying on the ground. He'd been thrown from the wagon and was badly bruised. The girl was unhurt, but naturally she wanted to get out of the country at once. She wasn't scared; she was plain disgusted. She wanted me to take them to the train, and I did. Any decent citizen would have done the same. I didn't know you wanted them again, and if I had I wouldn't have tried to hold them at the time, for I was pretty well wrought up myself."

Carmody was less belligerent as he said: "What about arresting these young people? How did that happen?"

"Well, on the way back from the station I got to thinking about those raiders, and it struck me that it would be easy for them to ride down to the Kauffman cabin and do some damage, and that I'd better go over and see that everything was safe. It was late when I got home, but I saddled up and drove across. Good thing I did, for I found the house all lit up, and Henry Kitsong, young Busby, and old Pete Cuneo's girl were in full possession of the place and having a gay time. I arrested the boys for breaking into the house on the theory that they were both in that raid. Furthermore, I'm sure they know something about Watson's death. That's what Abe and Eli were fighting me about to-night—they're afraid Henry was mixed up in it. He and Watson didn't get on well."

The vigor and candor of the ranger's defense profoundly affected Carmody. "You may be right," he said, thoughtfully. "Anyhow, I'll bring them all before the jury to-morrow. Of course, I can't enter into that raid or the housebreaking—that's out of my jurisdiction—but if you think this Cuneo girl knows something—"

"I am certain she does. She made those tracks in the flour."

The coroner turned sharply. "What makes you think so?"

Hanscom then told him of the comparison he had made of her shoes with the drawings in his note-book, and the coroner listened intently.

"That's mighty important," he said, at last. "You did right in bringing her down. I'll defend your action."

Hanscom persisted: "You must make it clear to that jury that Helen McLaren never entered Watson's gate in her life."

Carmody was at heart convinced. "Don't worry," said he. "I'll give you a chance to get all that evidence before the jury, and for fear Abe may try to arrest you and keep you away from the session, I reckon I'd better send you home in charge of Throop." He smiled, and the sheriff smiled, but it was not so funny to the ranger.

"Never mind about me," he said. "I can take care of myself. Kitsong is only bluffing."

"All the same, you'd better go home with Throop," persisted the coroner. "You're needed at the hearing to-morrow, and Miss McLaren will want you all in one piece," he said.

Hanscom considered a moment. "All right. I'm in your hands till to-morrow. Good night."

"Good night," replied Carmody. "Take good care of him," he added to the sheriff as he rose.

"He won't get away," replied Throop. As he stepped into the street he perceived a small group of Kitsong's sympathizers still hanging about the door of the saloon. "What are you hanging around here for?" he demanded.

"Waiting for Abe. He's gone after a warrant and the city marshal," one of them explained.

"You're wasting time and so is Abe. You tell him that the coroner has put Hanscom in my custody and that I won't stand for any interference from anybody—not even the county judge—so you fellers better clear off home."

The back streets were silent, and as they walked along Throop said: "I'm going to lose you at the door of the hotel, but you'd better turn up at my office early to-morrow."

Hanscom said "Good night" and went to his bed with a sense of physical relaxation which should have brought slumber at once, but it didn't. On the contrary, he lay awake till long after midnight, reliving the exciting events of the day, and the hour upon which he spent most thought was that in Mrs. Throop's front room when he sat opposite Helen and discussed her future and his own.

When he awoke it was broad day, and as Kauffman, who occupied a bed in the same chamber, was still soundly slumbering, the ranger dressed as quietly as possible and went out into the street to take account of a dawn which was ushering in the most important morning of his life—a day in which his own fate as well as that of Helen McLaren must be decided.

The air was clear and stinging and the mountain wall, lit by the direct rays of the rising sun, appeared depressingly bald and prosaic, like his own past life. The foot-hills, in whose minute wrinkle the drama of which he was a vital part had taken place, resembled a crumpled carpet of dull gold and olive-green, and for the first time in his experience L. J. Hanscom, wilderness trailer, acknowledged a definite dissatisfaction with his splendid solitude.

"What does my life amount to?" he bitterly inquired. "What am I headed for? Where is my final camping-place? I can't go on as I'm going. If I were sure of some time getting a supervisor's job, or even an assistant supervisor's position, the outlook would not be so hopeless. But to get even that far means years of work, years of riding." And then, as he thought of his lonely cabin, so unsuited to a woman's life, he said: "No, I must quit the service; that's sure."

Returning to the hotel, he wrote out his resignation with resolute hand and dropped it into the mail-box. "There," he told himself, "now you're just naturally obliged to hustle for a new job," and, strange to say, a feeling of elation followed this decisive action.

Kauffman was afoot and dressing with slow and painful movements as Hanscom re-entered, saying, cheerily, "Well, uncle, how do you feel by now?"

With a wan smile the old man answered: "Much bruised and very painful, but I am not concerned about myself. I am only afraid for you. I hope you will not come to harm by reason of your generous aid to us."

"Don't you fret about me," responded Hanscom, sturdily. "I'm hard to kill; and don't make the mistake of thinking that the whole country is down on you, for it isn't. Abe and his gang are not much better than outlaws in the eyes of the people down here in the valley, and as soon as the town understands the case the citizens will all be with you—and—Helen." He hesitated a little before speaking her name, and the sound of the word gave him a little pang of delight—brought her nearer, someway. "But let's go down to breakfast; you must be hungry."

The old man did not reply as cheerily as the ranger expected him to do. On the contrary, he answered, sadly: "No, I do not feel like eating, but I will go down with you. Perhaps I shall feel better for it."

The dining-room was filled with boarders, and all betrayed the keenest interest in Kauffman. It was evident also that the ranger's punishment of Kitsong was widely known, for several spoke of it, and Simpson warningly said:

"Abe intends to have your hide. He's going to slap a warrant on you as soon as you're out of Carmody's hands and have you sent down the line for assault with intent to kill."

All this talk increased Kauffman's uneasiness, and on the way over to the jail he again apologized for the trouble they had brought upon him.

"Don't say a word of last night's row to Helen," warned Hanscom. "Throop promised to keep it from her, and don't consider Kitsong; he can't touch me till after Carmody is through with me."

The deputy who let them in said that the sheriff was at breakfast—a fact which was made evident by the savory smell of sausages which pervaded the entire hall, and a moment later, Throop, hearing their voices, came to the dining-room door, napkin in hand. "Come in," he called. "Come in an have a hot cake."

"Thank you, we've had our breakfast," Hanscom replied.

"Oh, well, you can stand a cup of coffee, anyway, and Miss Helen wants to see you."

The wish to see Helen brought instant change to the ranger's plan. Putting down his hat, he followed Kauffman into the pleasant sunlit breakfast-room with a swiftly pounding heart.

Helen, smiling cheerily, rose to meet her stepfather with a lovely air of concern. "Dear old daddy, how do you feel this morning?"

"Very well indeed," he bravely falsified.

She turned to Hanscom with outstretched hand. "Isn't it glorious this morning!" she exclaimed, rather than asked.

The sheriff, like the good boomer that he was, interrupted the ranger's reply. "Oh, we have plenty of mornings like this."

She protested. "Please don't say that! I want to consider this morning especially fine. I want it to bring us all good luck."

Evidently Throop had kept his promise to Hanscom, for Helen said nothing of the battle of the night before, and with sudden flare of confidence the ranger said:

"You're right. This is a wonderful morning, and I believe this trial is coming out right, but just to be prepared for anything that comes, I think I'd better get a lawyer to represent you. I don't feel able properly to defend your interests."

"But you must be there," she quickly answered. "You are the one sure friend in all this land."

His sensitive face flushed with pleasure, for beneath the frank expression of her friendship he perceived a deeper note than she had hitherto expressed, and yet he was less sure of her than ever, for in ways not easily defined by one as simple as he she had contrived to accent overnight the alien urban character of her training. She no longer even remotely suggested the hermit he had once supposed her to be. A gown of graceful lines, a different way of dressing her hair, had effected an almost miraculous change in her appearance. She became from moment to moment less of the mountaineer and more of the city dweller, and, realizing this, the trailer's admiration was tinged with something very like despair. He was not a dullard; he divined that these outer signs of change implied corresponding mental reversals. Her attitude toward the mountains, toward life, had altered.

"She is turning away from my world back to the world from which she came," was his vaguely defined conclusion.

Meanwhile the sheriff was saying: "Well, now, Carmody opens court in the town-hall at ten this morning, and, Hans, you are to be on hand early. I'll bring Miss McLaren up in the car about a quarter to ten and have her in the doctor's office, which is only a few doors away."

"How is the Cuneo girl?" asked Hanscom.

"She seems rested and fairly chipper, but I can see she's going to be a bad witness."

Helen's face clouded. "Poor girl! I feel sorry for her."

Mrs. Throop was less sympathetic. "She certainly has made a mess of it. I can't make out which of these raiders she ran away with."

"She's going to defend them both," said Throop; "and she's going to deny everything. I'd like to work the third degree on her. I'd bet I'd find out what she was doing down at Watson's."

Helen, who knew the value which her defenders placed on the correspondence between Rita's shoes and the footprint, was very grave as she said: "I hope she had no part in the murder. Mrs. Throop says she is hardly more than a child."

"Well," warned the sheriff, "we're not the court. It's up to Carmody and his jury."

They said no more about the trial, and Hanscom soon left the room with intent to find a lawyer who would be willing for a small fee to represent the Kauffmans—a quest in which he was unsuccessful.

The sheriff followed him out. "Reckon I'd better take you up to Carmody's office in my car," he said. "Kitsong may succeed in clapping a warrant on your head."

VIII

The valley had wakened early in expectation of an exciting day. The news of the capture of Busby and his companions had been telephoned from house to house and from ranch to ranch, and the streets were already filled with farmers and their families, adorned as for a holiday. The entire population of Shellfish Canyon had assembled, voicing high indignation at the ranger's interference. Led by Abe and Eli, who busily proclaimed that the arrest of Henry and his companions was merely a trick to divert suspicion from the Kauffman woman, they advanced upon the coroner.

Abe had failed of getting a warrant for the ranger, but boasted that he had the promise of one as soon as the inquest should be ended. "Furthermore," he said, "old Louis Cuneo is on his way over the range, and I'll bet something will start the minute he gets in."

Carmody, who was disposed to make as much of his position as the statutes permitted, had called the hearing in a public hall which stood a few doors south of his office, and at ten o'clock the aisles were so jammed with expectant auditors that Throop was forced to bring his witnesses in at the back door. Nothing like this trial in the way of free entertainment had been offered since the day Jim Nolan was lynched from the railway bridge.

Hanscom was greatly cheered by the presence of his chief, Supervisor Rawlins, who came into the coroner's office about a quarter to ten. He had driven over from Cambria in anxious haste, greatly puzzled by the rumors which had reached him. He was a keen young Marylander, a college graduate, with considerable experience in the mountain West. He liked Hanscom and trusted him, and when the main points of the story were clear in his mind he said:

"You did perfectly right, Hans, and I'll back you in it. I'm something of a dabster at law myself, and I'll see that Kitsong don't railroad you into jail. What worries me is the general opposition now being manifested. With the whole Shellfish Valley on edge, your work will be hampered. It will make your position unpleasant for a while at least."

Hanscom uneasily shifted his glance. "That doesn't matter. I'm going to quit the work, anyhow."

"Oh no, you're not!"

"Yes, I am. I wrote out my resignation this morning."

Rawlins was sadly disturbed. "I hate to have you let this gang drive you out."

"It isn't that," replied Hanscom, somberly. "The plain truth is, Jack, I've lost interest in the work. If Miss McLaren is cleared—and she will be—she'll go East, and I don't see myself going back alone into the hills."

The supervisor studied him in silence for a moment, and his voice was gravely sympathetic as he said: "I see! This girl has made your cabin seem a long way from town."

"She's done more than that, Jack. She's waked me up. She's shown me that I can't afford to ride trail and camp and cook and fight fire any more. I've got to get out into the world and rustle a home that a girl like her can be happy in. I'm started at last. I want to do something. I'm as ambitious as a ward politician!"

The supervisor smiled. "I get you! I'm sorry to lose you, but I guess you are right. If you're bent on winning a woman, you're just about obliged to jump out and try something else. But don't quit until I have time to put a man in your place."

Hanscom promised this, although at the moment he had a misgiving that the promise might prove a burden, and together they walked over to the hall.

The crowded room was very quiet as the ranger and his chief entered and took seats near the platform on which the coroner and his jury were already seated. It was evident, even at a glance, that the audience was very far from being dominated, or even colored, by the Shellfish crowd, and yet, as none of the spectators, men or women, really knew the Kauffmans, they could not be called friendly. They were merely curious.

Hanscom was somewhat relieved to find that the jury was not precisely the same as it had been on the hillside. An older and better man had replaced Steve Billop, a strong partisan of Kitsong's; but to counter-balance this a discouraging feature developed in the presence of William Raines, a dark, oily, whisky-soaked man of sixty, a lawyer whose small practice lay among the mountaineers of Watson's type.

"He's here as Kitsong's attorney," whispered the ranger, who regretted that he had not made greater efforts to secure legal aid. However, the presence of his chief, a man of education and experience, reassured him in some degree.

Carmody, rejoicing in his legal supremacy, and moved by love of drama, opened proceedings with all the dignity and authority of a judge, explaining in sonorous terms that this was an adjourned session of an inquest upon the death of one Edward Watson, a rancher on the Shellfish.

"New witnesses have been secured and new evidence has developed," he said in closing, "and Mr. L. J. Hanscom, the forest ranger, who has important testimony to give, will first take the stand."

Though greatly embarrassed by the eyes of the vast audience and somewhat intimidated by the judicial tone of Carmody's voice, Hanscom went forward and told his story almost without interruption, and at the end explained his own action.

"Of course, I didn't intend to help anybody side-step justice when I took the Kauffmans to the station, because I heard the coroner say he had excused them."

"What about those raiders?" asked one of the jurors. "Did you recognize the man who shot Kauffman's horse?"

Carmody interrupted: "We can't go into that. That has no connection with the question which we are to settle, which is, Who killed Watson?"

"Seems to me there is a connection," remarked Rawlins. "If those raiders were the same people Hanscom arrested in the cabin, wouldn't it prove something as to their character?"

"Sure thing!" answered another of the jurors.

"A man who would shoot a horse like that might shoot a man, 'pears to me," said a third.

"All right," said Carmody. "Mr. Hanscom, you may answer. Did you recognize the man who fired that shot?"

"No, he was too far away; but the horse he rode was a sorrel—the same animal which the Cuneo girl rode."

Raines interrupted: "Will you swear to that?"

"No, I won't swear to it, but I think—"

Raines was savage. "Mr. Coroner, we don't want what the witness thinks—we want what he knows."

"Tell us what you know," commanded Carmody.

"I know this," retorted Hanscom. "The man who fired that shot rode a sorrel blaze-faced pony and was a crack gunman. To drop a running horse at that distance is pretty tolerable shooting, and it ought to be easy to prove who the gunner was. I've heard say Henry Kitsong—"

"I object!" shouted Raines, and Carmody sustained the objection.

"Passing now to your capture of the housebreakers," said he, "tell the jury how you came to arrest the girl."

"Well, as I entered the cabin the girl Rita was sitting with her feet on a stool, and the size and shape of her shoe soles appeared to me about the size and shape of the tracks made in the flour, and I had just started to take one of her shoes in order to compare it with the drawings I carried in my pocket-book when Busby jumped me. I had to wear him out before I could go on; but finally I made the comparison and found that the soles of her shoes fitted the tracks exactly. Then I decided to bring her down, too."

A stir of excited interest passed over the hall, but Raines checked it by asking: "Did you compare the shoes with the actual tracks on the porch floor?"

"No, only with the drawings I had made in my note-book."

Raines waved his hand contemptuously. "That proves nothing. We don't know anything about those drawings."

"I do," retorted Carmody, "and so does the jury; but we can take that matter up later. You can step down, Mr. Hanscom, and we'll hear James B. Durgin."

Durgin, a bent, gray-bearded old rancher, took the stand and swore that he had witnessed a hot wrangle between Kauffman and Watson, and that he had heard the Dutchman say, "I'll get you for this!"

Hanscom, realizing that Durgin was Kitsong's chief new witness, was quick to challenge his testimony, and finally forced him to admit that Watson had also threatened Kauffman, so that the total effect of his testimony was rather more helpful than harmful.

"Is it not a matter of common report, Mr. Coroner," demanded the ranger, "that Watson has had many such quarrels? I am told that he had at least one fierce row with Busby—"

"We'll come to that," interjected Carmody, as Durgin left the chair. "Have you Rita's shoes, Mr. Sheriff?" Throop handed up a pair of women's shoes, and Carmody continued: "You swear these are the shoes worn by Margarita Cuneo when you took charge of her?"

"I do."

"Mr. Hanscom, will you examine these shoes and say whether they are the ones worn by Rita Cuneo when you arrested her?"

Hanscom took them. "I think they are the same, but I cannot tell positively without comparing them with my drawings."

The jury, deeply impressed by this new and unexpected evidence, minutely examined the shoe soles and compared them with the drawings while the audience waited in tense expectancy.

"They sure fit," said the spokesman of the jury.

Raines objected. "Even if they do seem to fit, that is not conclusive. We don't know when the tracks were made. They may have been made after the murder or before."

"Call Rita Cuneo," said Carmody to the sheriff.

The girl came to the stand, looking so scared, so pale, and so small that some of the women, without realizing the importance of her testimony, clicked their tongues in pity. "Dear, dear! How young she is!" they exclaimed.

Carmody, by means of a few rapid questions gently expressed, drew out her name, her age, and some part of her family history, and then, with sudden change of manner, bluntly asked:

"How did you happen to be in that cabin with those two men?"

Pitifully at a loss, she finally stammered out an incoherent explanation of how they were just riding by and saw the door standing open, and went in, not meaning any harm. She denied knowing Watson, but admitted having met him on the road several times, and hotly insisted that she had never visited his house in her life.

"Where have you been living since leaving home?"

"In the hills."

"Where?"

"At the sawmill."

"How long had you been there when you heard of Watson's death?"

"About two weeks."

"Were you in camp?"

"No, we were staying in the old cabin by the creek."

"You mean Busby and Kitsong and yourself?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, now, which one of these men did you leave home with—Busby or Kitsong?"

Her head drooped, and while she wavered Raines interposed, arguing that the question was not pertinent. But Carmody insisted, and soon developed the fact that she was much more eager to defend Busby than Kitsong. She denied that he had ever cursed Watson or threatened to do him harm, but the coroner forced her to admit that Busby had told her of having had trouble with the dead man, and then, thrusting a pair of shoes at her, he sternly asked:

"Are these your shoes?"

"No, sir," she firmly declared.

Her answer surprised Hanscom and dazed the sheriff, who exclaimed beneath his breath, "The little vixen!"

Carmody's tone sharpened: "Do you mean to tell me that these are not the shoes you wore in town yesterday?"

"No, I don't mean that."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean they're not my shoes. They belong to that Kauffman girl. I found them in that cabin."

Hanscom sprang to his feet. "She's lying, Your Honor."

"Sit down!" shouted Raines.

The entire audience rose like a wave under the influence of the passion in these voices; the sheriff shouted for silence and order, and Carmody hammered on his desk, commanding everybody to be seated. At last, when he could be heard, he rebuked Hanscom.

"You're out of order," he said, and, turning to Raines, requested him to take his seat.

Raines shook his fist at the ranger. "You can't address such remarks to a witness. You sit down."

Hanscom was defiant. "I will subside when you do."

"Sit down, both of you!" roared Carmody.

They took seats, but eyed each other like animals crouching to spring.

Carmody lectured them both, and, as he cooled, Hanscom apologized. "I'm sorry I spoke," he said; "but the ownership of those shoes has got to be proved. I know they belong to this girl!"

"We'll come to that; don't you worry," said Carmody, and he turned to Rita, who was cowering in the midst of this uproar like a mountain quail. "Who told you to deny the ownership of these shoes?"

"Nobody."

"Just reasoned it out yourself, eh?" he asked, with acrid humor. "Well, you're pretty smart."

The girl, perceiving the importance of her denial, enlarged upon it, telling of her need of new shoes and of finding this dry, warm pair in a closet in the cabin. She described minutely the worn-out places of her own shoes and how she had thrown them into the stove and burned them up, and the audience listened with renewed conviction that "the strange woman" was the midnight prowler at the Watson cabin, and that Rita and her companions were but mischievous hoodlums having no connection with the murder.

Hanscom, filled with distrust of Carmody, demanded that the sheriff be called to testify on this point, for he had made search of the cabin in the first instance.

"We proved at the other session that Miss McLaren was unable to wear the shoes which made the prints."

"We deny that!" asserted Raines. "That is just the point we are trying to make. We don't know that this Kauffman woman is unable to wear those shoes."

Carmody decided to call young Kitsong, and Throop led Rita away and soon returned with Henry, who came into the room looking like a trapped fox, bewildered yet alert. He was rumpled and dirty, like one called from sleep in a corral, but his face appealed to the heart of his mother, who flung herself toward him with a piteous word of appeal, eager to let him know that she was present and faithful.

The sheriff stopped her, and her husband—whose parental love was much less vital—called upon her not to make a fool of herself.

The boy gave his name and age, and stated his relationship to the dead man, but declared he had not seen him for months. "I didn't know he was dead till the ranger told me," he said. He denied that he had had any trouble with Watson. "He is my uncle," he added.

"I've known relatives to fight," commented the coroner, with dry intonation, and several in the audience laughed, for it was well known to them that the witness was at outs not only with his uncle, but with his father.

"Now, Henry," said the coroner, severely, "we know this girl, Rita, made a night visit to Watson's cabin. We have absolute proof of it. She did not go there alone. Who was with her? Did you accompany her on this trip?"

"No, sir."

"She never made that trip alone. Some man was with her. If not you, it must have been Busby."

A sullen look came into the boy's face. "Well, it wasn't me—I know that."

"Was it Busby?"

He paused for a long time, debating what the effect of his answer would be. "He may of. I can't say."

Carmody restated his proof that Rita had been there and said: "One or the other of you went. Now which was it?"

The witness writhed like a tortured animal, and at last said, "He did," and Mrs. Eli sighed with relief.

Carmody drew from him the fact that Watson owed Busby money, and that he had vainly tried to collect it. He would not say that Rita left camp with Busby, but his keen anxiety to protect her was evident to every one in the room. He admitted that he expected Busby to have trouble with Watson.

Mrs. Kitsong, who saw with growing anxiety the drift of the coroner's questioning, called out: "Tell him the truth, Henry; the whole truth!"

Raines silenced her savagely, and Carmody said: "So Busby had tried to collect that money before, had he?"

"Tell him 'yes,' Henry," shouted Eli, who was now quite as eager to shield his son as he had been to convict Helen.

Carmody warned him to be quiet. "You'll have a chance very soon to testify on this very point," he said, and repeated his question: "Busby had had a fight with Watson, hadn't he—a regular knockdown row?"

Henry, sweating with fear, now confessed that Busby had returned from Watson's place furious with anger, and this testimony gave an entirely new direction to the suspicions of the jurors, several of whom knew Busby as a tough customer.

Dismissing Henry for the moment, Carmody recalled Margarita. "You swear you never visited Watson's cabin?" he began. "Well, suppose that I were to tell you that we know you did, would you still deny it?" She looked at him in scared silence, trying to measure the force of his question, while he went on: "You mounted the front steps and went down the porch to the right, pausing to peer into the window. You kept on to the east end of the porch, where you dropped to the ground, and continued on around to the back door. Do you deny that?"

Amazed by the accuracy of his information and awed by his tone, the girl struggled for an answer, while the audience waited as at a crisis in a powerful play.

Then the coroner snapped out, "Well, what were you doing there?"

She looked at Henry, then at Mrs. Eli. "I went to borrow some blankets," she confessed, in a voice so low that only a few heard her words.

"Was Watson at home?"

"Yes."

"Did you see him?"

"Yes."

"What did he say?"

At this point she became tearful, and the most that could be drawn from her was a statement that Watson had refused to loan or sell her any blankets. She denied that Busby was with her, and insisted that she was alone till Carmody convinced her that she was only making matters worse by such replies.

"Your visit was at night," he said. "You would never have walked in that flour in the daytime, and you wouldn't have gone there alone in the night. Busby wouldn't have permitted you to go to Watson's alone—he knew Watson too well." The force of this remark was felt by nearly every person in the room.

Hanscom said: "Mr. Coroner, this girl is trying to shield Busby, and I want her confronted by him, and I want Eli Kitsong called."

By this time many admitted that they might have been mistaken in accusing the Kauffmans of the deed.

Busby, a powerful young fellow, made a bad impression on the stand. His face was both sullen and savage, and the expression of his eyes furtive. He was plainly on guard even before Raines warned him to be careful.

"My name is Hart Busby," he said, in answer to Carmody. "I'm twenty-six years old. I was born in the East. I've been here eight years." Here he stopped, refusing to say where his parents lived or when he first met Margarita. He flatly denied having had any serious trouble with Watson, and declared that he had not seen him for almost a year.

"What were you doing in the Kauffmans' cabin?" demanded Hanscom. "You won't deny my finding you there, will you?"

He told the same story that Rita had sworn to. "We were riding by and saw that the place was deserted, and so we went in to look around."

"When did you first hear of Watson's death?" asked Carmody.

The witness hesitated. A look of doubt, of evasion, in his eyes. "Why, the ranger told us."

"Which of you owns that sorrel horse?" asked one of the jury.

Raines again interposed. "You needn't answer that," he warned. "That's not before the court."

Carmody went on. "Now, Busby, you might as well tell us the truth. Henry and Rita both state that Watson had refused to pay you, and that you had a scrap and Watson kicked you off the place. Is that true?"

Raines rescued him. "You don't have to answer that," he said, and the witness breathed an almost inaudible sigh of relief.

A violent altercation arose at this point between the coroner and the lawyer. Carmody insisted on his right to ask any question he saw fit, and Raines retorted that the witness had a right to refuse to incriminate himself.

"You stick to your bread pills and vials," he said to the coroner, "and don't assume a knowledge of the law. You become ridiculous when you do."

"I know my powers," retorted Carmody in high resentment, "and you keep a civil tongue in your head or I'll fine you for contempt. I may not know all the ins and outs of court procedure, but I'm going to see justice done, and I'm going to see that you keep your place."

"You can't steam-roll me," roared Raines.

The argument became so hot that Throop was forced to interfere, and in the excitement and confusion of the moment Busby mad a dash for the door, and would have escaped had not Hanscom intercepted him. The room was instantly in an uproar. Several of Busby's friends leaped to his aid, and for a few minutes it seemed as if the coroner's court had resolved itself into an arena for battling bears. Busby fought desperately, and might have gained his freedom, after all, had not Rawlins taken a hand.

At last Throop came into action. "Stop that!" he shouted, and fetched Busby a blow that ended his struggles for the moment. "Let go of him, Hanscom," he said. "I'll attend to him."

Hanscom and Rawlins fell back, and Throop, placing one huge paw on the outlaw's shoulder, shoved the muzzle of a revolver against his neck.

"Now you calm right down, young man, and remember you're in court and not in a barroom."

Raines, still unsubdued, shouted out, "You take your gun away from that man, you big stiff!"

"Silence!" bellowed Carmody. "I'll have you removed if you utter another word."

"I refuse to take orders from a pill-pusher like you."

"Sheriff, seat that man," commanded Carmody, white with wrath.

Throop, thrusting Busby back into his chair, advanced upon Raines with ponderous menace. "Sit down, you old skunk."

"Don't you touch me!" snarled the lawyer.

"Out you go," said Throop, with a clutch at the defiant man's throat.

Raines reached under his coat-tails for a weapon, but Rawlins caught him from behind, and Throop, throwing his arms around his shoulders in a bearlike hug, carried him to his chair and forced him into it.

"Now will you be quiet?"

The whole room was silent now, silent as death, with a dozen men on their feet with weapons in their hands, waiting to see if Raines would rise.

Breaking this silence, Carmody, lifted by excitement to unusual eloquence, cried out: "Gentlemen, I call upon you to witness that I am in no way exceeding my authority. The dignity of this court must be upheld." He turned to the jury, who were all on end and warlike. "I call upon you to witness the insult which Mr. Raines has put on this court, and unless he apologizes he will be ejected from the room."

Raines saw that he had gone too far, and with a wry face and contemptuous tone of voice muttered an apology which was in spirit an insult, but Carmody accepted the letter of it with a warning that he would brook no further displays of temper.

When the coroner resumed his interrogation of Busby, whose sullen calm had given place to a look of alarm and desperation, he refused to speak one word in answer to questions, and at last Carmody, ordering him to take a seat in the room, called Mrs. Eli Kitsong to the chair.

She was a thin, pale little woman with a nervous twitch on one side of her face, and the excitement through which she had just passed rendered her almost speechless; but she managed to tell the jury that Busby and Watson had fought and that she had warned her son not to run with Hart Busby.

"I knew he'd get him into trouble," she said. "I told Henry not to go with him; but he went away with him in spite of all I could say."

"Did you actually see the fight between Busby and Watson?"

"No, I only heard Ed tell about it."

"Did he say Busby threatened to kill him?"

"Yes, he did, but he laughed and said he was not afraid of a fool kid like him."

Busby was deeply disturbed. He sat staring at the floor, moistening his lips occasionally with the tip of his tongue as the coroner called one after another of his neighbors to testify against him. The feeling that Carmody was on the right track spread through the audience, but Abe insisted that the Kauffmans be called to the stand, and to this Hanscom added:

"I join in that demand. Call Miss McLaren. I want the ownership of these shoes settled once and for all."

In the tone of one making a concession, Carmody said, "Very well. Mr. Sheriff, take Busby out and ask Miss McLaren to step this way."

As the young ruffian was led out Rita sprang up as if to follow him, but Carmody restrained her. "Stay where you are. I want you to confront Miss McLaren."

A stir, a sigh of satisfaction, passed over the room, and every eye was turned toward the door through which Helen must approach. Not one of all the town-folk and few of the country-folk had ever seen her face or heard her voice. To them she was a woman of mystery, and for the most part a woman of dark repute, capable of any enormity. They believed that she had been living a hermit life simply and only for the reason that she had been driven out of the East by the authorities, and most of them believed that the man she was living with was her paramour.

Every preconception of her was of this savage sort, and so when the sheriff reappeared, ushering in a tall, composed, and handsome young woman whose bearing, as well as her features, suggested education and refinement, the audience stared in dumb amazement.

Hanscom and Rawlins both rose to their feet, and Carmody, moved by a somewhat similar respect and admiration, followed their example. He went further; he indicated, with a bow, the chair in which she was to sit, while the jurors with open mouths followed her every movement. They could not believe that this was the same woman they had examined at the previous session of the court.

Hanscom, without considering her costume as designed to produce an impression—he was too loyal for that—exulted in its perfectly obvious effect on the spectators, and glowed with confidence over the outcome.

She looked taller, fairer, and younger in her graceful gown, and her broad hat—which was in sharpest contrast to the sunbonnet which had so long been her disguise—lent a girlish piquancy to her glance. Mrs. Brinkley expressed in one short phrase the change of sentiment which swept almost instantly over the room. "Why, she's a lady!" she gasped.

Carmody, while not so sure the witness's costume was unpremeditated, nevertheless acknowledged its power. He opened his examination with an apology for thus troubling her a second time, and explained that new witnesses and new evidence made it necessary.

She accepted his apology with grave dignity, and in answer to questions by Raines admitted that Kauffman had told her of his clash with Watson over some cattle.

"But he never threatened to shoot Watson. He is not quarrelsome. On the contrary, he is very gentle and patient, and only resented Watson's invasion of our home."

Upon being shown the shoes which Rita Cuneo had worn she sharply answered:

"No, they are not mine. I could not wear them. They are much too small for me."

This answer, though fully expected by Hanscom and the coroner, sent another wave of excitement over the audience, and when Carmody said, almost apologetically, "Miss McLaren, will you kindly try on these shoes?" the women in the room rose from their seats in access of interest, and loud cries of "Down in front!" arose from those behind them.

Seemingly without embarrassment, yet with heightened color, Helen removed one of her shoes—a plain low walking-shoe—and handed it to Carmody, who received it with respectful care and handed it to the foreman of the jury, asking him to make comparison of it with the footprints.

The jurors, two by two, examined, measured, muttered, while the audience waited in growing impatience for their report. Most of the onlookers believed this to be a much more important test than it really was, and when at last the foreman returned the shoe, saying, "This ain't the shoe that made the tracks," the courtroom buzzed with pleased comment.

Raines was on his feet. "Mr. Coroner, we demand that the witness try on that other pair of shoes. We are not convinced that she cannot wear them."

Carmody yielded, and the room became very quiet as Helen, with noticeable effort, wedged her foot into the shoe.

"I cannot put it on; it is too small," she said to Carmody, and Rita, who sat near, bent a terrified gaze upon her.

Raines then called out: "She's playing off. Have her stand up."

Hanscom, furious at this indignity, protested that it was not necessary, but Helen rose and, drawing aside the hem of her skirt, calmly offered her foot for inspection.

"I can't possibly walk in it," she said, addressing the jury.

One by one the jury clumsily knelt and examined her foot, then returned to their seats, and when the foreman said, "That never was her shoe," a part of the audience applauded his utterance as conclusive.

"That will do, Miss McLaren," said Carmody; "you may step down." And, turning sharply to where Rita sat with open mouth and dazed glance, he demanded: "Do you know what the court calls your testimony? It's perjury! That's what it is! Do you know what we can do to you? We can shut you up in jail. These shoes are yours. Are you ready to say so now?"

She shrank from him, and her eyes fell.

Raines intervened. "You are intimidating the witness," he protested.

Carmody repeated his question, "Are these your shoes?"

"Yes, sir," she faintly answered; a sigh of relief, a ripple of applause, again interrupted the coroner.

Hanscom rose. "Mr. Coroner, in view of this testimony, I move Miss McLaren be excused from further attendance on this court."

The unmistakable rush of sympathy toward Helen moved Carmody to dramatize the moment. "Miss McLaren," he said, with judicial poise, "I am convinced that you are not a material witness in this case. You are dismissed."

The hearty handclapping of a majority of the auditors followed, and Helen was deeply touched. Her voice was musical with feeling as she said:

"Thank you, sir. I am very grateful. Is my father also excused?"

"Unless the jury wishes to question him."

The jurors conferred, and finally the spokesman said, "I don't think we'll need him."

"Very well, then, you are both free."

Mrs. Brinkley, a round-faced, fresh-complexioned little woman, who had been sitting near the front seat, made a rush for Helen, eager to congratulate her and invite her to dinner. Others, both men and women, followed, and for a time all business was suspended. It was evident that Helen had in very truth been on trial for murder, and that the coroner's dismissal was in effect her acquittal. Hanscom, on the edge of the throng, waited impatiently for an opportunity to present Rawlins. Raines and Kitsong excitedly argued.

Meanwhile the jury and the coroner were in conference, and at last Carmody called for the finding: "We believe that the late Edward Watson came to his death at the hands of one Hart Busby, with Henry Kitsong and Margarita Cuneo knowing to it, and we move that they be held to the grand jury for trial at the next term of court," drawled the foreman and sat down.

No one applauded now, but a murmur of satisfaction passed over the room. Eli and Abe sprang up in excited clamor, and Raines made violent protest against the injustice of the verdict.

"It's all irregular!" he shouted.

Carmody remained firm. "This finding will stand," he said. "The court is adjourned."

Raines immediately made his way to Hanscom and laid a hand on his shoulder. "In that case," he said, "I'll take you into camp. Mr. Sheriff, I have a warrant for this man's arrest."

Hanscom was not entirely surprised, but he resented their haste to humiliate him before the crowd—and before Helen. "Don't do that now," he protested. "Wait an hour or two. Wait till I can get Miss McLaren and her father out of the country. I give you my word I'll not run away."

Carmody, seeing Raines with his hand on the ranger's arm, understood what it meant and hurried over to urge a decent delay. "Let him put the girl on the train," he said.

"I'll give him two hours," said Raines, "and not a minute more."

Hanscom glanced at Helen and was glad of the fact that, being surrounded by her women sympathizers, she had seen and heard nothing of the enemy's new attack upon him.

IX

Helen and the ranger left the room together, and no sooner were they free from the crowd than she turned to him with a smile which expressed affection as well as gratitude.

"How much we owe to you and Dr. Carmody, and what a sorry interruption we've caused in your work."

He protested that the interruption had been entirely a pleasure, but she, while knowing nothing of his impending arrest, was fully aware that he had undergone actual hardship for her sake, and her plan for hurrying away seemed at the moment most ungracious. Yet this, after all, was precisely what she now decided to do.

"Is there time for us to catch that eastbound express?" she asked.

Her words chilled his heart with a quick sense of impending loss, but he looked at his watch. "Yes, if it should happen to be late, as it generally is." Then, forgetting his parole, in a voice which expressed more of his pain than he knew, he said: "I hate to see you go. Can't you wait another day?"

His pleading touched a vibrant spot in her, but she was resolved. "I have an almost insane desire to get away," she hurriedly explained. "I am afraid of this country. Its people scare me!" A quick change in her voice indicated a new thought. "I hope the Kitsongs will not continue in pursuit of you."

"They won't have a chance to do that," he replied, gloomily. "I'm leaving, too. I have resigned."

"Oh no! You mustn't do that."

"I turned in my papers this morning." He suddenly recalled his parole. "I shall soon be free—I hope—to go anywhere and do anything—and I'd like to keep in touch with you—if you'll let me."

She evaded him. "I shall be very sorry if we are the cause of your leaving the service."

"Well, you are—but not in the way you mean. You have made me discontented with myself, that's all, and I'm going to get out of the tall timber and see if I can't do something in the big world. I want to win your respect."

"I respect you now. Your work as a forester seems to me very fine and honorable."

"The work is all right, but I'm leaving it, just the same. I can't see a future in it. Fact is, I begin to long for a home; that lunch in your cabin started me on a new line of thought."

The memory of his visit to her garden in the valley seemed now like a chapter in the story of a far-off community, and she could hardly relate herself to the hermit girl who served the tea, but the forester—whom she recognized as a lover—was becoming every moment nearer, more insistent. A time of reckoning was at hand, and because she could not meet it she was eager to escape—to avoid the giving of pain. His face and voice had become dear—and might grow dearer. Therefore she made no comment on his statement of a desire for a home, and he asked:

"Don't you feel like going back to your garden once more?"

"No," she answered, sharply, "I never want to see the place again. It is repulsive to me."

Again a little silence intervened. "I hate to think of your posies perishing for lack of care," he said, with gentle sadness. "If I can, I'll ride over once in a while and see that they get some water."

His words exerted a magical power. She began to weaken in resolution. It was not an easy thing to sever the connection which had been so strangely established between herself and this good friend, who seemed each moment to be less the simple mountaineer she had once believed him to be. Western he was, forthright and rough hewn, but he had shown himself a man in every emergency—a candid, strong man. Her throat filled with emotion, but she walked beside him in silence.

He had another care on his mind. "You'd better let me round up your household goods," he suggested.

"Oh no. Let them go; they're not worth the effort."

He insisted. "I don't like to think of any one else having them. It made me hot just to see that girl playing your guitar. I'll have 'em all brought down and stored somewhere. You may want 'em some time."

She was rather glad to find they had reached the door of Carmody's office and that further confidences were impossible, for she was discovering herself to be each moment deeper in his debt and correspondingly less able to withstand his wistful, shy demand.

Mrs. Carmody, a short, fat, excited person, met them in the hall with a cackle of alarm. "I'm awfully glad you've come," she exclaimed. "Your father has been taken with a cramp or something."

Helen paled with apprehension of disaster, for she knew that her father had been keenly suffering all the morning. "Here I am, daddy," she cheerily called, as she entered the room. "It's all right. The inquest is over and we are free to go."

Kauffman, who was lying on a couch in a corner of the office, turned his face and bravely smiled. "I'm glad," he weakly replied. "I was afraid they would call me to the stand again."

Kneeling at his side, she studied his face with anxious care. "Are you worse, daddy? Has your pain increased?"

"Yes, Nellie, it is worse. I fear I am to be very ill."

She took his hand in hers, a pang of remorseful pity wrenching her heart. "Don't say that, daddy," she gently chided. "Keep your good courage." She looked up at the ranger, who stood near with troubled brow. "Mr. Hanscom, will you please find Dr. Carmody and tell him my father needs him?"

With a quick word of assurance he hurried away, and the girl, bending to the care of her stepfather, suffered from a full realization of the fact that he had been brought to this condition by the strength of his devotion to her. "For my sake he exiled himself, for me he has been assaulted, wounded, arrested"—and, looking down upon him in the light of her recovered sense of values, she became very humble.

"Dear old daddy," she wailed, "it's all my fault. What can I do to make amends? You've sacrificed so much for me."

Sick as he was, the old man did his best to comfort her, but she was still sitting on the floor, with head bowed in troubled thought, when Hanscom and Carmody hurried in. Her relief, made manifest by the instant movement with which she gave way to him, was almost childlike.

"Oh, Doctor, I'm glad to see you!" she cried out. "I was afraid your legal duties might keep you."

"Luckily my legal duties are over," he replied, quickly, "and I'm glad of it. I hope I never'll have another such case."

A brief examination convinced him that the sick man should be put to bed, and he suggested the Palace Hotel, which stood but a few doors away.

"He can't travel to-day," he added, knowing that Helen had planned to take the train.

Kauffman insisted on going. "I can walk," he said, firmly. "I feel a little dizzy, but I'll be all right in the coach."

Hanscom was at his side, supporting him. "You'd better wait a day," he said, gently; and Helen understood and sided with him.

Together they helped the sick man to the door and into the doctor's car, and in a few minutes Kauffman was stretched upon a good bed in a pleasant room. With a deep sigh of relief he laid his head upon the soft pillow.

"I am glad not to entrain to-day," he said. "To-morrow will be better for us all."

"Never mind about to-morrow," said Hanscom. "You rest as easy as you can."

Helen followed Carmody into the hall. "Tell me the truth," she demanded. "Is he injured internally?"

"It's hard to say what his injuries are," he cautiously replied. "He's badly bruised and feverish, but it may be nothing serious. However, he can't travel for a few days, that's certain."

She was not entirely reassured by his reply, and her voice was bitterly accusing as she said: "If he should die, I would never forgive myself. He came here on my account."

"There's no immediate danger. He seems strong and will probably throw this fever off in a few hours, but he must be kept quiet and cheerful."

There was a rebuke in his final words, and she accepted it as such. "I'll do the best I can, Doctor," she replied, and returned to her duty.

Hanscom, divining some part of the passion of self-accusation into which the girl had been thrown, eagerly asked, "Is there something more I can do?"

"If you will have our bags brought, I shall be grateful. We may not be able to leave for several days."

"I'll attend to them at once, but"—he looked aside as if afraid of revealing something—"I may be called away during the afternoon on business, and if I am, don't think I'm neglecting you."

"How long will you be gone?"

"I can't tell—for a day or two, perhaps."

The thought of his going gave her a sharp pang of prospective loneliness. "I know you must return to your work," she said, slowly, "but I shall feel very helpless without you," and the voicing of her dependence upon him added definiteness and power to her regret.

He hastened to say: "I won't go if I can possibly help it, be sure of that; but something has come up which may make it necessary for me to—to take a trip. I'll return as soon as I can. I'll hurry away now and bring your baggage; that much I can surely do," and he went out, leaving her greatly troubled by something unexplained in the manner of his going.

Stopping at Carmody's, Hanscom again thanked him for his kindness and warned him not to say one word to Helen about his fight with Abe nor about the warrant that was hanging over him.

"She has enough to worry about as it is," he said; "and if they get me, as they will, I want you to look after her and let me know how she gets on."

Carmody did not attempt to minimize the seriousness of the opposition. "Abe can make a whole lot of trouble for you, in one way and another, and even if you shake him off, you're in for a settlement with old Cuneo, who will reach here to-night. As near as I can discover, he's one of those pop-eyed foreigners who'd just as soon use a knife as not, and Abe will do his best to spur him into jumping you."

"Well, looks like he'll have hard work reaching me, for, unless somebody goes my bail, I'm likely to be safe in the 'cooler' when he gets here."

Carmody had been decidedly friendly all through this troublesome week, and here was a good place for him to say, "I'll go your bail, Hans," but he didn't—he couldn't. He was poor and not very secure in his position, so he let Hanscom go out, and took up his own work with a feeling that he was playing a poor part in a rough game.

The news of Kauffman's illness reached kindly Mrs. Brinkley and moved her to call upon Helen, to offer her services, and in the midst of her polite condolences she said: "Mr. Hanscom's arrest must have infuriated you. It did me."

Helen turned a startled glance upon her visitor. "I didn't know he was arrested."

"Didn't you? Well, he is," said Mrs. Brinkley.

"Why; that can't be true! He was here less than an hour ago."

"He's just been arrested for assaulting Kitsong."

Helen, still unable to believe in this calamity, stammered: "But I don't understand. When did he—When was Kitsong—assaulted?"

"Last night," replied her visitor, with relish, "and you were the cause of it—in a way."

"I?"

"So the story goes. It seems Abe got nasty about you, and Mr. Hanscom resented it. They had a fight and Abe was hurt. Unless somebody bails him out the poor ranger will have to go to jail."

The memory of the ranger's last look completed Helen's understanding of the situation, and she listened abstractedly while her visitor rattled on:

"Of course, the judge can't do anything, much as he likes Mr. Hanscom, and I really don't see who is to go on his bond. He hasn't any relatives here."

At this point Helen raised her head and interrupted her guest's commiserating comment. "Yes, you can do something for me. I wish you would ask Mr. Willing, the vice-president of the First National Bank, to come over here. I want to consult him on a most important business matter, and I cannot leave my father. Will you do this?"

"Certainly, with pleasure. I was hoping to be of use," said Mrs. Brinkley, and she went away greatly wondering what this strange young woman could possibly want of Mr. Willing.

Helen, with eyes fixed on her father's still form, went over every look and word the ranger had uttered and understood at last that the "little trip" he feared was a sentence to the county jail. She was still in profound thought when Mr. Willing was announced. He was a neat, small man, whose position in the bank was largely social. Being a friend of Mrs. Brinkley, and keenly interested in the reports of Helen's romantic appearance in the courtroom, he came to her door in smiling and elaborate courtliness.

Helen coldly checked his gallant advances. "Mr. Willing," she said, with business-like brevity, "I have an account with the Walnut Hills Trust Company, of Cincinnati, and I want a part of that money transferred, by telegraph, to my credit in your bank. Can it be done?"

"It is possible—yes."

"I need these funds at once. I must have them. Will you please wire Mr. Paul Lyford, president of the company, and have five thousand dollars transferred to my credit in your bank?"

Mr. Willing was cautious. He took the name and address. "I will see what can be done," he said, non-committally. "Is there anything else I can do?"

"Yes, I have just heard that Mr. Hanscom has been arrested. If this is true I want him bailed out as soon as possible. I don't know how these things are done, but I want to go on his bond. He should have a lawyer also. He has fallen into this trouble entirely on my account, and I cannot permit him to suffer. He must be defended."

"I'll do what I can," responded Willing, "but, of course, the matter of release, on bail, lies with the judge."

"What judge?"

"Probably Judge Brinkley."

"I am glad of that. Mr. Hanscom knows Judge Brinkley. As soon as you hear from Mr. Lyford let me know, please."

Meanwhile Hanscom had been stopped while bringing the valises to the hotel and was now in Throop's care. Each hour seemed to involve the ranger deeper, ever deeper, in his slough of troubles, for it was reported that Cuneo had 'phoned in from the Cambria power-dam saying he would reach the town in two hours, and one who had talked with him said the receiver burned his ear, so hot was the sheepman's wrath.

Helen, greatly troubled, in an agony of impatience awaited Willing's return, and the housekeeper of the hotel, who came to offer her advice, did not help to tranquillity.

"It's a good thing the ranger's locked up," she said, "for old Cuneo, father of the girl, is in town and on the ranger's trail with blood in his eye."

Of course the eager gossip did not know that the ranger and this handsome girl were something more than acquaintances, hence she felt free to enlarge upon and embroider each scrap of rumor, after the fashion of her kind, and Helen had great difficulty in concealing her increasing anxiety and self-accusation.

"Don't say any of these things in my father's hearing," she sharply urged. "He must be kept free from excitement."

It was a singular, a most revealing experience for Helen to find that her deepening care for her stepfather and a grave sense of responsibility toward Hanscom were bringing out decision and determination in her own character. She increased in vigor and perception. "They shall not persecute this man because he is poor and alone," she declared, recalling with keen sense of pity his frank statement that all his property consisted of a couple of ponies, a saddle, and a typewriter.

She could not leave her father till a nurse came, and, as there was no telephone in her room, she could only wait—wait and think, and in this thinking she gave large space to the forester. Her apathy, her bitterness were both gone. She was no longer the recluse. The mood which had made her a hermit now seemed both futile and morbid—and yet she was not ready to return to her friends and relatives in the East. That life she had also put away. "What if I were to make a new home—somewhere in the West?" she said, and in this speculation the worshipful face of the ranger came clear before her eyes.

She was restless and aching with inaction when a hall-boy announced the return of Mr. Willing, and, stepping into the hall, she discovered an entirely different Mr. Willing. He was no longer gallant; he was quietly respectful. With congratulatory word he handed to her two telegrams, one addressed to her, the other to the bank. One was from the president of the Walnut Hills Trust Company. It read: "Place five thousand dollars to Miss McLaren's credit. See that she wants for nothing. Report if she needs help. Her family is greatly alarmed. Any information concerning her will be deeply appreciated. Ask her to report at once."

The other was to Helen from Mr. Lyford, whom she had known for many years. As she read her face flushed and her eyes misted; then a glowing tide of power, a sense of security, swept over her.

"After all, I am alive and young and rightful owner of this money," she said to herself. "I will claim it and use it for some good purpose, and at this moment, what better purpose than to see that a brave, good man shall not lie in prison?" And, thanking the banker for his aid, she added: "If Mr. Rawlins, the supervisor, is still in town, I wish you would find him and ask him to come to me; tell him I want to see him immediately."

Willing took occasion, as he went through the hotel office down-stairs, to call the proprietor aside and say: "Anything Miss McLaren wants you'd better supply. She's able to pay."

The landlord, who had shared the general suspicion abroad in the community, stared. "Are you sure of that? I was just wondering about these folks. They have the reputation of being as poor as Job's off ox."

"You needn't worry. The girl has a balance in our bank of several thousand dollars."

"You don't tell me!" exclaimed the landlord.

Willing went on, smoothly: "Better give her the parlor and put an extension 'phone in for her use. She needs a trained nurse, but I'll attend to that if you'll see to the 'phone."

In theory, we all despise money; in fact, we find it of wondrous potency. Behold this hotelkeeper mentally taking his feet from his desk and removing his hat when he learned that one of these hermits had unlimited credit at the bank. Mr. Willing's cashier was also deeply impressed and puzzled.

"What did such a girl mean by living away up there with that Shellfish gang of rustlers and counterfeiters? What's the idea?" he asked, irritably. "She certainly has acted like a fly-by-night up to this time."

"Well, she's established herself now. Her connections are first class," Willing rejoined. "Here's another telegram from Louisville asking full information concerning Miss McLaren and Arnold Kauffman. They don't stop at expense. Evidently they have all been in the dark about the girl's whereabouts and want the facts. Some story to put into a telegram, but I'll do my best."

"Don't scare 'em," cautioned Knight. "Say she's all right and surrounded by friends."

Willing took his turn at smiling. "Didn't look that way this morning, did it? But she's all right now—except that she's terribly wrought up over Hanscom's predicament."

"Well, no wonder. As near as I can figger, he's stood by her like a brother-in-law, and the least she can do is to stick around and help him out."

Conditions between Helen and the ranger were now precisely reversed. It was she who was eagerly trying to save him from the prison cell. She was alarmed, also, by the prediction made by the housekeeper that if the ranger were released on bail he would only be out of the frying-pan into the fire, for old Cuneo would surely meet him and demand satisfaction.

"Perhaps if I were to see Cuneo," she thought, "I could persuade him that Mr. Hanscom had no wish to involve Margarita—that her arrest was only, in a way, incidental to Busby's capture."

She said nothing of this resolution, but sent a note to Throop, requesting him to let Rawlins know that she was ready to bail Hanscom. "It will be a great injustice if he is held on my account."

Throop replied in person, for he liked Helen and was eager to do Hanscom a favor. "Yes," he said, "Hans is in jail, but not in a cell, and I think Rawlins will succeed in reaching the judge and so get out the writ this afternoon."

"Is there not some way for me to help? How much bail is needed?"

"Well, all depends on the judge. The charge the Kitsongs bring is pretty serious. They call it assault with a deadly weapon, and I'll have to testify that Hans was armed when I came into the scrap—and yet Simpson says he left the hotel without his gun—Simpson declares Hanscom said: 'I'm safer without it. I might fly mad and hurt somebody with it!' As I say, I didn't see the beginning of the battle, but when I broke into it, 'peared to me more like a dozen armed men were attacking Hans. They had him jammed up against the wall. He was fighting mad—I must admit that, and later he had a gun. Where he got it, I don't know. However, that shouldn't count against him, for he was only defending himself as any citizen has a right to do."

"Surely the judge will take that into account?"

"He will; but you see the witnesses are mostly all Abe's friends. And then Hans did begin it—he admits he jolted Abe. However, the case will come up before Brinkley, and he's friendly. He'll do all he can."