is way?"

"Made a plumb circle," chuckled Gregg. "Rode like a fool not carin'
where I hit out for, and the end of it was that it was dark before I'd
had sense to watch where the sun went down."

"Kind of cheerful, ain't you?" cut in Ronicky Joe, and his voice was as
dry as the crisping leaves in an autumn wind.

"They ain't any call for me to wear crepe yet," answered Gregg. "Worst
fool thing I ever done was to cut and run for it. The old Captain will
tell you gents that Blondy went for his gun first--had it clean out of
the leather before I touched mine."

He paused, and the silence of those dark figures sank in upon him.

"I got to warn you," said Pete Glass, "that what you say now can be used
again you later on before the jury."

"My God, boys," burst out Vic, "d'you think I'm a plain, low-down,
murderin' snake? Harry, ain't you got a word for me? Are you like the
rest of 'em?"

No voice answered.

"Harry," said Ronicky, "why don't you speak to him?"

It was a brutal thing to do, but Ronicky was never a gentle sort in
his best moments; he scratched a match and held it so that under the
spluttering light Gregg found himself staring into the face of Harry
Fisher. And he could not turn his eyes away until the match burned
down to Ronicky's finger tip and then dropped in a streak of red to the
ground.

Then the sheriff spoke cold and hard.

"Partner," he said, "in the old days, maybe your line of talk would do
some good, but not now. You picked that fight with Blondy. You knew you
was faster on the draw and Hansen didn't have a chance. He was the worst
shot in Alder and everybody in Alder knew it. You picked that fight and
you killed your man, and you're goin' to hang for it."

Another hush; no murmur of assent or dissent.

"But they's one way out for you, Gregg, and I'm layin' it clear. We
wanted you bad, and we got you; but they's another man we want a lot
worse. A pile! Gregg, take me where I can find the gent what done for
Harry Fisher and you'll never stand up in front of a jury. You got my
word on that."

Chapter XII. The Crisis

Those mountains above the Barry cabin were, as he told Vic Gregg,
inaccessible to men on horseback except by one path, yet there was a
single class of travelers who roamed at will through far more difficult
ground than this. Speaking in general, where a man can go a burro can
go, and where a burro can go he usually manages to carry his pack. He
crawls up a raged dow