in' this
feller before?"

They did not.

"They's something queer about him," muttered the deputy.

"He may be word-shy," proffered a wit, "but he sure ain't gun-shy!"

"When he looked at me," said the deputy, more to himself than to the
others, "it seemed to me like they was a swirl of yaller come into his
eyes. Made me feel like some one had sneaked up behind me with a knife."

In his thoughtfulness his eyes wandered, and wandering, they fell upon
the notice of the reward for the capture, dead or alive, of Daniel
Barry, about five feet nine or ten, slender, with black hair and brown
eyes.

"My God!" cried the deputy.

But then he relaxed against the counter.

"It ain't possible," he murmured.

"What ain't possible?"

"However, I'm goin' to go and hang around. Gents, I got a crazy idea."

He had no sooner started toward the door than he seemed to gain surety
out of the motion.

"It's him!" he cried. He turned toward the others, white of face. "Come
on, all of you! It's him! Barry!"

But in the meantime Harry had gone on swiftly to the office of the
sheriff with "Joe Cumber." Behind him swirled the curious crowd and for
their benefit he asked his questions loudly.

"Partner, that was sure a pretty play you made. I've seen 'em all
try out to crack them balls, but I never seen none do it the way you
did--with your gun in the leather at the start. What part of the country
might you be from?"

The other answered gently: "Why, from over yonder."

"The T O outfit, eh?"

"Beyond that."

"Up in the Gray Mountains? That so! I s'pose you been on trails like
this before?"

"Nothin' to talk about."

There might have been a double meaning in this remark, and Harry looked
twice to make sure that there was no guile.

"Well, here we are." He threw open a door which revealed a bald-headed
clerk seated at a desk in a little bare room. "Billy, here's a gent that
cracked it the first whack and started his gun from the leather, by God.
He--"

"Jest kindly close the door, Harry," said Billy. "Step in, partner.
Gimme your name?"

The door closed on the discomfited Harry, and "Joe Cumber" stood
close to it, apparently driven to shrinking into the wall in his
embarrassment, but while he stood there his hand fumbled behind him and
turned the key in the lock, and then extracted it.

"My name's Joe Cumber."

"Joe Cumber,"--this while inscribing it.

"Age?"

"About thirty-two, maybe."

"Don't you know?"

"I