it raised its head and snorted nervously. And
instantly Buck was alive to the creature's anxiety. He understood the
quick glancing from side to side, and the halting of that changing
step which is always a sign of fear.

Ahead the trail completed the letter S it had begun. They were nearing
the final curve to the right. Buck searched the distance for the cause
of Caesar's apprehension. And all unconsciously his mind went back to
the winging of the crows overhead and the sound of their harsh voices.
He spurred the creature sharply, and steadied him down.

They reached the final bend and passed round it, and in a moment Buck
had an answer to the questions in his mind. It was a terrible
spectacle that greeted his eyes as he reined his horse in and brought
him to an abrupt halt. He had reached the battle-ground where death
had claimed its toll of human passion. There, swiftly, almost
silently, two men had fought out their rivalry for a woman's favor--a
favor given to neither.

It needed little enough imagination to read the facts. All the
ingredients of the swift-moving drama were there before his eyes--the
combatants stretched out in the sand of the trail, with staring eyes
and dropping jaws, gazing up at the brilliant vault of the heavens,
whither, may be, their savage spirits had fled; the woman crouching
down at the roadside with face buried upon outstretched arms, her
slight body heaving with hysterical sobs; the horses, horses he knew
well enough by sight, lost to the tragedy amidst the more succulent
roots of the parching grass beneath the shadow of overhanging trees.

One glance at the combatants told Buck all he wanted to know. They
were dead. He had been too long upon the western trail to doubt the
signs he beheld. His duty and inclination were with the living. In a
moment he was out of the saddle and at Joan's side, raising her from
her position of grief and misery in arms as gentle as they were
strong.

He had no real understanding of the necessities of the moment. All he
knew, all he desired, was to afford the girl that help and protection
he felt she needed. His first thought was to keep her from a further
sight of what had occurred. So he held her in his arms, limp and
yielding, for one uncertain moment. Then, for the second time in his
life, he bore her off toward her home.

But now his feelings were of a totally different nature. There was
neither ecstasy nor dreaming. He was anxious and beset. As h