and presently he went down on his
knees--gently, gently, then--he rolled over!

His driver jumped to the ground. It was all he knew except he heard
Bud weeping as he knelt on the ground where the old horse lay, and
saying: "_Great hoss--great hoss!_"

Then he remembered saying: "Now, Bud, don't cry--if he does die,
won't it be glorious, to die in harness, giving his life for
others--Cap'n Tom--Shiloh? Think of it, Bud, to die at the wire, his
race won, his work finished, the crown his! O Bud, who would not
love to go like Ben Butler?"

But he could not talk any more, for he saw Jack Bracken spring
forward, and then the gleam of a whiskey flask gleamed above Ben
Butler's fluttering nostrils and Jack's terrible gruff voice said:
"Wait till he's dead fust. Stand back, give him air," and his great
hat fluttered like a windmill as he fanned the gasping nostrils of
the struggling horse.

The old man turned with an hysterical sob in his throat that was half
a shout of joy.

Travis stood by him watching the struggles of the old horse for
breath.

"Well, I've killed him," he said, laconically.

There was a grip like a vise on his shoulders. He turned and looked
into the eyes of the old man and saw a tragic light there he had
never seen before.

"Don't--for God's sake don't, Richard Travis, don't tempt me here,
wait till I pray, till this devil goes out of my heart."

And then in his terrible, steel-gripping way, he pulled Richard
Travis, with a sudden jerk up against his own pulsing heart, as if
the owner of The Gaffs had been a child, burying his great hardened
fingers in the man's arm and fairly hissing in a whisper these words:
"If he dies--Richard Travis--remember he died for you ... it tuck
both yo' mares to kill him--no--no--don't start--don't turn pale ...
you are safe ... I made Col'nel Troup give me his word ... he'd not
expose you ... if Ben Butler won an' he saved his money. I knew what
it 'ud mean ... that last heat ... that it 'ud kill him ... but I
drove it to save you ... to keep Troup from exposin' yo' ... I've got
his word. An' then I was sure ... as I live, I knew that God will
touch you yet ... an' his touch will be as quickening fire to the
dead honor that is in you.... Go! Richard Travis.... Go ... don't
tempt me agin...."

He remembered later feeling very queer because he held so much gold
in a bag, and it was his. Then he became painfully acute to the funny
thing that happened, so funny tha