jumped me--I threw him off and he fell in the
sluice-box--backward--I tried to save him--I did--that's straight."
Smaltz kept rolling his head back and forth in an oil-soaked spot where
a grease cup leaked. Bruce's knee was grinding into his ribs and chest
and his fingers were tightening on his throat.

Bruce raised himself a little and looked down at Smaltz. As he stared at
the smudged, bleeding face and into the yellow-brown eyes with their
dilated pupils, the rage in his own gave place to a kind of intense
curiosity, the scrutiny one gives to a repulsive and venomous insect or
reptile he has captured. He was trying to impress upon his own mind the
incredible fact that this human being, lying helpless beneath him,
watching him with questioning fear, had ruined him without the least
personal malice--had robbed him of all he had strained, and worked, and
fought for, for pay! It seemed like a preposterous, illogical dream; yet
there he lay, alive, real, his face less than two feet from his own.

Finally, Bruce took his knee from his chest and got up. Smaltz pulled
himself to his feet and stood uncertainly.

"Well--I suppose it's jail." There was sullen resignation in his voice.

Bruce stopped the machinery without answering. Then he folded his arms
and leaned his broad shoulders against the rough boards of the
power-house while, eying Smaltz, he considered. A year ago he would have
killed him--he would have killed him begging on his knees, but taking a
human life either makes a man callous or sobers him and the remorse
which had followed the tragedy in the cabin was a sensation Bruce never
wanted to experience again.

Penitentiaries were made for men like Smaltz--but in a country of long
and difficult distances, with the lax courts and laws indifferently
enforced, to put Smaltz where he belonged was not so simple as it might
sound. It required time and money; Bruce had neither to spare.

It was so still in the power-house that the ticking of the dollar watch
hanging on a nail sounded like a clock. Smaltz shifted feet nervously.
At last Bruce walked to the work-bench and took a carpenter's pencil
from a box and sharpened it. He smoothed out some wrapping paper then
motioned Smaltz to sit down.

"I want you to write what you told me--exactly--word for word. Write it
in duplicate and sign your name."

Consternation overspread Smaltz's face. A verbal confession to save
himself from being electrocuted was one thing,