his eyes now. There was a stern setting of his strong jaws. He
glanced swiftly at Bill, who had moved to the window. Then his eyes
came back to the mechanical smile on Murray's face.

"Alec's out," he said. "He was shot up in the dance hall at the
Elysian Fields. It happened the night of the day you pulled out. He
ran foul of a 'gunman' who'd been set on his trail. He did the
'gunman' up. But he was done up, too. It's one of the things made us
come along up to you right away."

John Kars made his announcement without an unnecessary word, without
seeking for a moment to lessen any effect which the news might have on
this man. He felt there was no need for any nicety.

The effect of his announcement was hardly such as he might have
expected. There was a sort of amazed incredulity in Murray's dark eyes
and his words came haltingly.

"Shot up? But--but--you're fooling. You--you must be. God!
You--must be!"

Kars shrugged.

"I tell you Alec is dead. Shot up." There was a hard ring in his
voice that robbed his words of any doubt.

"God!" Then came a low, almost muttered expression of pity. "The poor
darn women-folk."

The last vestige of Murray's mechanical smile had gone. An expression
of deep horror had deadened the curious light in his eyes. He sat
nerveless in his chair, and his bulk seemed to have become flabby with
loss of vitality. Bill was watching the scene from the window.

"Yes. It's going to be terrible--for them."

Kars spoke with a force which helped disguise his real emotions. By a
great effort Murray pulled himself together.

"It's--it's Shaunbaum," he said. Then he went on as though to himself:
"It's over--that woman. And I warned him. Gee, I warned him for all I
knew! Josh Wiseman was right. Oh, the crazy kid!"

Kars, looking on, remembered that this man had lied when he had said
that he had urged Alec to quit his follies. He remembered that he had
given Alec money, his money, to help him the further to wallow in the
muck of Leaping Horse. He remembered these things as he gazed upon an
outward display of grief, and listened to words of regrets which
otherwise must have carried complete conviction.

He saw no necessity to add anything. And in a moment Murray had
started into an attitude of fierce resentment, and crashed his fleshy
fist down upon the pages of the ledger before him.

"I warned him," he cried fiercely, his burning eyes fixed on the
emotionless fac