he. 'I'll be arrested and tried and
probably convicted.' 'No, you won't,' says I. 'You go back with me and
get Emerson Mead out of this scrape and I'll give you my word of
honor you won't be arrested.' 'But what can I say?' he says. 'How can
I explain?' 'Hell!' says I. 'Explain nothin'! Tell your father as much
or as little as you like, and if Colonel Whittaker walks down Main
street with his head up and his mouth shut I reckon nobody's goin' to
ask him any impudent questions. If you want any help yourself you've
got Nick Ellhorn and Emerson Mead and Tommy Tuttle behind you, and if
you think them three couldn't send the devil himself sashayin' down
the Rio Grande you'd better not say so to yours truly. If you don't
want to stay there, take Amada and get out, and if your father won't
set you up somewheres we three will see that you have what you need.
And whatever he does we'll give you a thousand apiece anyway.'

"'I wish I dared!' says he. 'Will Whittaker,' says I, 'Amada Garcia
started out to come to you with only four dollars in her pocket, and
she walked in the night nearly all the way to Plumas, and then she
nearly died givin' premature birth to your child, because she had
tried to find you.' With that he jumped up and grabbed my arm and
could hardly speak, for I hadn't told him about any of that business
before.

"'She isn't dead,' says I, 'but you may thank Miss Delarue that she
isn't. The child was born dead. But do you think, after all that,
you-all can do any less than go back and marry her again, with a
priest and a ring and a white dress and all the rest of it? Do you
think, after that, you-all can do any less than pretend you're a man,
and ever face yourself in the glass again without smashin' it?'

"He dropped back in his chair with his face in his hands and cried,
actually cried. But I sure reckon he was shook up pretty sudden by
what I told him about Amada. I didn't say any more, but I just made up
my mind that if he hung back after that I'd tie my Chiny pig tail
around his neck and yank him back to Plumas like a yellow dog at the
end of a string.

"After a little while he said he'd go. I knew he meant it, but I was
so almighty afraid he'd go back on it if he got thinkin' about his
father and skip on me that I didn't let him out of my sight while he
was awake, and at night I tied his arm fast to mine with my pig tail.

"Well, when we finally got to Plumas I just concluded Emerson's neck
wasn't in d