t-bound train. Nice sort of guy he is. What's the
good of being rich, if you can't be decent Some men are born low. They
always find their level, no matter what's done for them, and Marchand's
level is the ditch."

"Gautry's tavern--that joint!" exclaimed Osterhaut with repulsion.

"Well, that ranchman, Dennis What's-his-name, is looking for him, and
Felix can't go home or to the usual places. I dunno why he comes back at
all till this Dennis feller gits out."

"Doesn't make any bones about it, does he? Dennis Doane's the name,
ain't it? Marchand spoiled his wife-run away with her up along the Wind
River, eh?" asked Osterhaut.

Jowett nodded: "Yes, that's it, and Mr. Dennis Doane ain't careful;
that's the trouble. He's looking for Marchand, and blabbing what he
means to do when he finds him. That ain't good for Dennis. If he kills
Marchand, it's murder, and even if the lawyers plead unwritten law, and
he ain't hung, and his wife ain't a widow, you can't have much married
life in gaol. It don't do you any good to be punished for punishing
someone else. Jonas George Almighty--look! Look, Osterhaut!"

Jowett's hand was pointing towards the Catholic church, from a window of
which smoke was rolling. "There's going to be something to do there. It
ain't a false alarm, Snorty."

"Well, this engine'll do anything you ask it," rejoined Osterhaut.
"When did you have a fire last, Billy?" he shouted to the driver of the
engine, as the horses' feet caught the dusty road of Manitou.

"Six months," was the reply, "but she's working smooth as music. She's
as good as anything 'twixt here and the Atlantic."

"It ain't time for Winter fires. I wonder what set it going," said
Jowett, shaking his head ominously. "Something wrong with the furnace,
I s'pose," returned Osterhaut. "Probably trying the first heatup of the
Fall."

Osterhaut was right. No one had set the church on fire. The sexton
had lighted the furnace for the first time to test it for the Winter's
working, but had not stayed to see the result. There was a defect in the
furnace, the place had caught fire, and some of the wooden flooring had
been burnt before the aged Monseigneur Lourde discovered it. It was he
who had given the alarm and had rescued the silver altar-vessels from
the sacristy.

Manitou offered brute force, physical energy, native athletics, muscle
and brawn; but it was of no avail. Five hundred men, with five hundred
buckets of water would have had no