sun
had set. Every object, however, was clearly defined in the first glow
of the long August twilight, and it needed but a glance to recall the
events that had brought him to seek shelter and slumber beside the dead
woman. He sat up suddenly, staring from under his long black hair as
it fell about his eyes. Accustomed as he was to deeds of violence, even
to the sight of men weltering in their life's blood, he was strangely
moved by that rigid form with the thin arms folded over the breast, by
that white cloth concealing face and hair. A long keen examination of
the prairie assured him that no human being was between him and the
horizon. He turned again toward the woman. He felt an overpowering
desire to look on her face.

For years there had been no women in his world but the abandoned
creatures who sought shelter in the resorts of Beer City in No-Man's
Land--these, and the squaws of the reservations, and occasionally a
white terrified face among the wagon-trains. As a boy, before running
away from home in the Middle West, he had known a different order of
beings, and some instinct told him that this woman belonged to the
class of his childhood's association. There was imperative need of his
hurrying to the mountain, lest, at any moment, a roving band of Indians
discover the abandoned wagon; besides this, he was very hungry since
his rest, and the wagon was stocked with provisions; nevertheless, to
look on the face of the dead was his absorbing desire.

But it was not easy for him to yield to his curiosity, despite his life
of crime. Something about the majestic repose of that form seemed to
add awe to the mystery of sex; and he crouched staring at the cloth
which no breath stirred save the breath of evening.

He believed, now, the story that Henry Gledware had reiterated in
accents of abject terror. Surely this was the "last wagon" in that
train which Red Kimball had attacked the morning before. Impossible as
it had seemed to the highwaymen, Gledware must have been warned of the
attack in time to turn about and lash his horses out of danger of
discovery. At this spot, Gledware had cut loose the horses, mounted one
with his stepdaughter, leaving the other to go at will. This, then,
was the mother of that child whose arm had lain in warm confidence
about his neck. On hands and knees, Willock crept to the other mattress
and lifted the margin of the large white cloth.

His hand moved stealthily, slowly. Cat