. There were no turnings.
That was all that mattered. These children of his would faithfully
keep on their way to the end. He knew these things without thinking,
and the knowledge left him indifferent. His only concern now was the
gold. It was in the cart, and it must reach Spawn City. To that his
honor was pledged.

The reins slipped through his fingers. He stirred uneasily. Then his
eyes opened again. For a moment his sagging lips closed. He was
summoning all his failing strength. He clutched the reins in one hand,
and with the other knotted them about his wrist. Then, with a gasp,
his left hand dropped from his task, while his right arm was held
outstretched by the strain of the pulling horses upon the reins.

There was now no longer any demand for further effort, and the
drooping body lolled over against the side of the cart as though the
man were seeking his rest. His head hung away at a helpless angle,
and his legs straggled. And thus the speeding team raced clear of the
mountain world and plunged through the darkness to the prairie
beyond.

* * * * *

The moon rose in all its cold splendor. The stars dimmed before its
frigid smile. The black vault of the heavens lit with a silvery sheen,
embracing the prairie world beneath its bejeweled pall.

The sea of grass lay shadowed in the moonlit dusk. But, in sharp
relief, a white ribbon-like trail split it from end to end, like
some forlorn creature with white outspread arms yearning in
desolation--yearning for the bustle and rush of busy life which it is
denied, yearning to be relieved from so desperate a solitude.

The vastness and silence dwarfs even thought. The things which are
great, which have significance, which have meaning to the human mind
are lost in such a world. Life itself becomes infinitesimal.

There is something moving in a tiny ebullition of dust along the white
trail. It looks so small. It moves so slowly, crawling, seemingly, at
a snail's pace. It is almost microscopical in the vastness.

Yet it is only these things by comparison. It is neither small, nor is
it traveling at a snail's pace. It is a cart drawn by six horses,
racing as though pursued by all the demons of the nether world.

And in the driving-seat is a curious, stiffly swaying figure. It is
strangely inanimate. Yet it suggests something that no ordinary human
figure could suggest. It is in its huddled attitude, its ghastly face,
its s