, a more than willing helper.

In two issues the Leaping Horse _Courier_ had dared greatly,
castigating the morality of the city, and the Elysian Fields in
particular, under "scare" headlines. For two days the public found no
other topic of conversation, and the "shooting" looked like serving
them indefinitely. They had been waiting for this thing to happen.
They had been given all they desired to the full. A hundred witnesses
placed themselves at the disposal of the Mounted Police, and at least
seventy-five per cent of them were more than willing to incriminate Pap
Shaunbaum if opportunity served.

Nor was John Kars idle during that time. His attorneys saw a good deal
of him, and, as a result, a campaign to track down the instigator of
this shooting was inaugurated. And that instigator was, without a
shadow of doubt,--Pap Shaunbaum.

Kars saw nothing of Bill during those two days of his preoccupation.
But the second morning provided him with food for serious reflection.
It was a brief note which reached him at noon. It was an urgent demand
that he should take no definite action through his legal advisers,
should take no action at all, in fact, until he, Bill, had seen him,
and conveyed to him the results of the investigation. He would
endeavor to see him that night.

Kars studied the position carefully. But he committed himself to no
change of plans. He simply left the position as it stood for the
moment, and reserved judgment.

It was late at night when Bill made his appearance. Kars was waiting
in his apartment with what patience he could. He had spent a busy day
on his own mining affairs, which usually had the effect of wearying
him. For the last two or three years the commercial aspect of his
mining interests came very nearly boring him. It was only the sheer
necessity of the thing which drove him to the offices of the various
corporations he controlled.

But the sight of his friend banished every other consideration from his
mind. The shooting of Alec Mowbray dominated him, just as, for the
present, it dominated the little world of Leaping Horse.

He thrust a deep chair forward in eager welcome, and looked on with
grave, searching eyes while the doctor flung himself into it with a
deep, unaffected sigh of weariness.

"Guess I haven't had a minute, John," he said. "Those police fellers
are drivers. Say, we always reckon they're a bright crowd. You need
to see 'em at work to get a right no