ort on her behalf, his never-failing loyalty and
courage, were things which to her, in her misery, were the most
blessed of all blessings. She wanted home--home. And in that one
bitter cry of her heart was expressed the awakening of her real
womanhood.

But it had come too late--too late. There was no home now for her but
the home of this man. There was no husband for her, only the illicit
love of this man. Her children--she could only obtain them by a theft.
And as this last thought came to her she remembered who it was who
must commit the theft.

The thought brought a fresh terror. How would he accomplish his end?
Had not Scipio tacitly refused to yield up her children? Then
how--how? She shivered. She knew the means James would readily,
probably only too gladly, adopt. Her husband, the little harmless man
who had always loved her, would be swept aside like anyone else who
stood in the way. James would shoot him down as he had shot Conroy
down; even, she fancied, he would shoot him down for the wanton
amusement of destroying his life.

Oh no, no! It was too horrible. He was her husband, the first man she
had ever cared for. She thought of all they had been to each other.
Her mind sped swiftly over past scenes which had so long been
forgotten. She remembered his gentleness, his kindly thought for her,
his self-effacement where her personal comforts were in question, his
devotion both to herself and her children. Every detail of their
disastrous married life sped swiftly before her straining mental
vision, leaving the man standing out something greater than a hero to
her yearning heart. And she had flung it all away in a moment of
passion. She had blinded herself in the arrogance of her woman's
vanity. Gone, gone. And now she was the mistress of a common
assassin.

So she lashed herself with the torture of repentance and regret as the
darkness fell. She did not stir from her post. The damp of the mist
was unnoticed, the chill of the air. She was waiting for that return
which was to claim her to an earthly hell, than which she could
conceive no greater--waiting like the condemned prisoner, numb,
helpless, fearful lest the end should come unobserved.

The ranch wardens waited, too. The man cursed his charge with all the
hatred of an evil nature, as the damp penetrated to his mean bones.
The dog, too, grew restless, but where his master was, there was his
place. He had long since learned that--to his cost.

The ni