he ran up the steps and
disappeared.

Pan backed slowly, step by step. He was coming out of his clamped
obsession. His movement was now that of a man gripped by terror. In
reality Pan could have faced any peril, any horror, any physical
rending of flesh far more easily than this girl who had ruined him.

She had left the stage and she stood alone. She spoke his name. In
the single low word he divined fear. How long had she been that dog's
wife? When had she married him? Yesterday, or the day before--a week,
what did it matter?

"_You--you_!" he burst out helplessly in the grip of deadly hate and
agony. He hated her then--hated her beauty--and the betrayal of her
fear for him. What was life to him now? Oh, the insupportable
bitterness!

"Go back to my mother," he ordered harshly, and averted his face.

Then he seemed to forget her. He saw Blinky close to him, deeply
shaken, yet composed and grim. He heard the movement of many feet, the
stamping of hoofs.

"All aboard for Salt Lake," called the stage driver. Smith the agent
passed Pan with more mailbags. The strain all about him had broken.

"Pard," Pan said, laying a hand on Blinky. "Go with her--take her to
my mother.... And leave me alone."

"No, by Gawd!" replied Blinky sullenly. "You forget this heah is my
deal too. There's Louise.... An' Lucy took her bag an' hurried away.
There, she's runnin' past the Yellow Mine."

"Blink, did she hear what I said to Hardman about Louise?" asked Pan
bitterly.

"Reckon not. She'd keeled over aboot then. I shore kept my eye on
her. An' I tell you, pard--"

"Never mind," interrupted Pan. "What's the difference? Hellsfire!
Whisky! Let's get a drink. It's whisky I want."

"Shore. I told you thet a while back. Come on, pard. It's red-eye
fer us!"

They crossed to the corner saloon, a low dive kept by a Chinaman and
frequented by Mexicans and Indians. These poured out pellmell as the
cowboys jangled up to the bar. Jard Hardman's outfit coming to town
had prepared the way for this.

"Howdy," was Blinky's greeting to the black bottle that was thumped
upon the counter. "You look mighty natural ... heah's to Panhandle
Smith!"

Pan drank. The fiery liquor burned down to meet and coalesce round
that gnawing knot in his internals. It augmented while it soothed. It
burned as it cooled. It inflamed, but did not intoxicate.

"Pard, heah's to the old Cimarron," said Blinky, as they drank ag