.

"Then Fitz--he was plumb mad--tried to bite Mac Strann. And then Mac let
go of him and set his hands on the throat of Fitz. It happened like a
flash--I'm here to swear that I could hear the bones crunch. And then
Fitz's mouth sagged open and his eyes rolled up to the ceiling, and Mac
Strann threw him down on the floor. Just like that! Damn him! And then
he stood over poor dead Fitz and kicked him in those busted ribs and
turned over to the bar and says to me: 'Gimme!'

"Like a damned beast! He wanted to drink right there with his dead man
beside him. And what was worse, I had to give him the bottle. There was
a sort of haze in front of my eyes. I wanted to pump that devil full of
lead, but I knowed it was plain suicide to try it.

"So there he stood and ups with a glass that was brimmin' full, and
downs it at a swallow--gurglin'--like a hog! Fatty, how long will it be
before there's an end to Mac Strann?"

But Fatty Matthews shrugged his thick shoulders and poured himself
another drink.

"There ain't a hope for Jerry Strann?" cut in Buck Daniels.

"Not one in a million," coughed Fatty, disposing of another formidable
potion.

"And when Jerry dies, Mac starts for this Barry?"

"Who's been tellin' you?" queried O'Brien dryly. "Maybe you been readin'
minds, stranger?"

Buck Daniels regarded the bartender with a mild and steadfast interest.
He was smiling with the utmost good-humour, but there was that about him
which made big O'Brien flush and look down to his array of glasses
behind the bar.

"I been wondering," went on Daniels, "if Mac Strann mightn't come out
with Barry about the way Jerry did. Ain't it possible?"

"No," replied Fatty Matthews with calm decision. "It ain't possible.
Well, I'm due back in my bear cage. Y'ought to look in on me, O'Brien,
and see the mountain-lion dyin' and the grizzly lookin' on."

"Will it last long?" queried O'Brien.

"Somewhere's about this evening."

Here Daniels started violently and closed his hand hard around his
whiskey glass which he had not yet raised towards his lips.

"Are you sure of that, marshal?" he asked. "If Jerry's held on this long
ain't there a chance that he'll hold on longer? Can you date him up for
to-night as sure as that?"

"I can," said the deputy marshal. "It ain't hard when you seen as many
go west as I've seen. It ain't harder than it is to tell when the sand
will be out of an hour glass. When they begin going down the last hill
it ain