and
you've seen him on the street. Lady, you sure know Bill Gregg, and what
do you think of him?"

"I think--"

"Is he a square sort of gent?"

"Y-yes."

"The kind you'd trust?"

"Yes, but--"

"Is he the kind that would stick to the girl he loved and take care of
her, through thick and thin?"

"You mustn't talk like this," said Caroline Smith, but her voice
trembled, and her eyes told him to go on.

"I'm going back and tell Bill Gregg that, down in your heart, you love
him just about the same as he loves you!"

"Oh," she asked, "would you say a thing like that? It isn't a bit true."

"I'm afraid that's the way I see it. When I tell him that, you can lay
to it that old Bill will let loose all holds and start for you, and, if
they's ten brick walls and twenty gunmen in between, it won't make no
difference. He'll find you, or die trying."

Before he finished she was clinging to his arm.

"If you tell him, you'll be doing a murder, Ronicky Doone. What he'll
face will be worse than twenty gunmen."

"The gent that smiles, eh?"

"Yes, John Mark. No, no, I didn't mean--"

"But you did, and I knew it, too. It's John Mark that's between you and
Bill. I seen you in the street, when you were talking to poor Bill, look
back over your shoulder at that devil standing in the window of this
house."

"Don't call him that!"

"D'you know of one drop of kindness in his nature, lady?"

"Are we quite alone?"

"Not a soul around."

"Then he is a devil, and, being a devil, no ordinary man has a chance
against him--not a chance, Ronicky Doone. I don't know what you did in
the house, but I think you must have outfaced him in some way. Well, for
that you'll pay, be sure! And you'll pay with your life, Ronicky. Every
minute, now, you're in danger of your life. You'll keep on being in
danger, until he feels that he has squared his account with you. Don't
you see that if I let Bill Gregg come near me--"

"Then Bill will be in danger of this same wolf of a man, eh? And, in
spite of the fact that you like Bill--"

"Ah, yes, I do!"

"That you love him, in fact."

"Why shouldn't I tell you?" demanded the girl, breaking down suddenly.
"I do love him, and I can never see him to tell him, because I dread
John Mark."

"Rest easy," said Ronicky, "you'll see Bill, or else he'll die trying to
get to you."

"If you're his friend--"

"I'd rather see him dead than living the rest of his life, plumb
unhappy."

She shook her