that long moment of suspense Knell's body gradually
stiffened, and at last the quivering ceased. He crouched. His eyes had a
soul-piercing fire.

Duane watched them. He waited. He caught the thought--the breaking of
Knell's muscle-bound rigidity. Then he drew.

Through the smoke of his gun he saw two red spurts of flame. Knell's
bullets thudded into the ceiling. He fell with a scream like a wild
thing in agony.

Duane did not see Knell die. He watched Poggin. And Poggin, like a
stricken and astounded man, looked down upon his prostrate comrade.

Fletcher ran at Duane with hands aloft.

"Hit the trail, you liar, or you'll hev to kill me!" he yelled.

With hands still up, he shouldered and bodied Duane out of the room.

Duane leaped on his horse, spurred, and plunged away.

CHAPTER XXIII

Duane returned to Fairdale and camped in the mesquite till the
twenty-third of the month. The few days seemed endless. All he could
think of was that the hour in which he must disgrace Ray Longstreth was
slowly but inexorably coming. In that waiting time he learned what
love was and also duty. When the day at last dawned he rode like one
possessed down the rough slope, hurdling the stones and crashing through
the brush, with a sound in his ears that was not all the rush of the
wind. Something dragged at him.

Apparently one side of his mind was unalterably fixed, while the other
was a hurrying conglomeration of flashes of thought, reception of
sensations. He could not get calmness. By and by, almost involuntarily,
he hurried faster on. Action seemed to make his state less oppressive;
it eased the weight. But the farther he went on the harder it was to
continue. Had he turned his back upon love, happiness, perhaps on life
itself?

There seemed no use to go on farther until he was absolutely sure of
himself. Duane received a clear warning thought that such work as seemed
haunting and driving him could never be carried out in the mood under
which he labored. He hung on to that thought. Several times he slowed
up, then stopped, only to go on again. At length, as he mounted a low
ridge, Fairdale lay bright and green before him not far away, and the
sight was a conclusive check. There were mesquites on the ridge, and
Duane sought the shade beneath them. It was the noon-hour, with hot,
glary sun and no wind. Here Duane had to have out his fight. Duane was
utterly unlike himself; he could not bring the old self back; he was
not