ly false. White never took any one into his business
secrets, least of all Greyson for whom he had deep contempt. "But I
don't call that clean to us-all, Jed. We don't want strangers to catch
Burke; we don't want them to--to string him up or shoot him full of
holes; what we-all want is to force White to hand him over to justice,
give him a fair trial, and then send him to one of them prison traps to
eat his soul out behind bars. Jed--just you shut your eyes and _see_
Burke Lawson behind bars--eating sop from a pan, drinking prison
water--just you call that picture up."

Jed endeavoured to do so and it grew upon his imagination.

"We-all wants to trail him," Greyson continued, "we don't want to give
him a free passage to Kingdom-Come by rope or shot--we-all want prison
for Lawson, prison!"

As Jed was the one most concerned, this edict went abroad by mountain
wireless.

"Catch him alive!" Friend and foe were alert.

"And when all's fixed and done--when Burke's trapped," Greyson said,
"what you going to do--for me, Jed?"

This was a startling, new development.

"I didn't reckon yo' war doin' this--fur pay!" Jed faltered. Then
Greyson came forth:

"No pay, Jed. Gawd knows I do my duty as I see it. But being keen about
duty, I see more than one duty. When you catch and cage Lawson, Jed, I
want to be something closer to you than a friend."

"Closer than--" Jed gasped.

"And duty drives me to confess to you, Jed, that the happiness of a lady
is at stake."

Jed merely gaped now. Visions of Nella-Rose made him giddy and
speechless.

"The day you put Lawson in jail, Jed, that day I'll give you the hand of
my daughter. She loves you; she has confessed! You shall come here and
share--everything! The hour that Burke is convicted--Marg is yours!"

"Marg!" The word came on a gasp.

"Not a word!" Greyson waved his hand in a princely way--this gesture was
an heirloom from his ancestry. "I understand your feelings--I've seen
what has been going on--but naturally I want my daughter to marry one
worthy of her. You shall have my Marg when you have proven yourself!
I've misjudged you, Jed, but this will wipe away old scores."

With a sickening sense of being absorbed, Jed sank into black silence.
If Marg wanted him and old Greyson was helping her, there was no hope!
Blood and desire would conquer every time; every mountaineer recognized
that!

And so things were seething under a surface of deadly calm, when
Truedale, b