ked quickly back to the town.

It took a certain amount of resolution to turn the handle of the
sinister-looking door, and the group of men lounging in the
smoking-room, and turning upon her inquisitive glances as she entered,
might even then have daunted her, had not her eye fallen upon a dejected
bunch of whitish hair in one corner.

As she stepped into the room, a white tail disengaged itself from the
round hairy bundle, and began pathetically to beat the floor, while two
very beautiful and beseeching eyes were fixed upon her face. Had she
still been irresolute this mute appeal would have been irresistible, and
suddenly feeling as bold as a lion she stepped up to the desk where the
city marshal was throned, and demanded a license for the white dog. The
two great silver dollars which she drew from her purse looked very large
to the widow Tarbell, yet it was with a feeling of exultation that she
paid them as ransom for the white dog. In return for the money she
received a small, round piece of metal with a hole bored through it,
bearing a certain mystic legend which was to act as a talisman to the
wearer. Her name and address were duly entered on the books. Then her
agitated little beneficiary was untied from the chair leg, the rope
which bound him was put into her hands, and with a polite courtesy Mrs.
Tarbell turned to go.

By a sudden impulse one of the rough-looking men got up from his chair,
and, taking his hat off, opened the door. A light flush crossed the
little woman's cheek as she accepted the attention, and then the two
small figures, the black and the white, passed out into the delicious
Colorado sunshine.

"She looked 'most too small to handle that big door," said the tall
fellow, apologetically, as he re-established his wide sombrero on the
back of his head, and, resuming his seat, tilted his chair once more
against the wall. The other men smoked on in silence. No one felt
inclined to chaff this shamefaced Bayard. Mrs. Tarbell, meanwhile, led
her willing captive along, delighting in his cheerful aspect and
expressive tail. He was dirty, to be sure, and he was presumably hungry.
Who could tell what hardships he had suffered before falling into the
brutal hands of the law? She stopped to buy her dinner, to which she
added five cents' worth of dog's-meat, but the milliner's door was
passed coldly by. The old straw would have to serve her another season.

Before they had gone two blocks, Mrs. Nancy had n