bleared eyes of the man.

"He wants them--murdered!" she said.

But her tone, her look conveyed nothing to the man who had been her
step-father. He went on ignoring the interruption completely.

"He means to get them. He set it up to me to locate 'em last summer
while you were on the river. It was a tough trip, but I beat all I
needed out of the hides of an outfit of the Shaunekuk, and I got the
location of their post all right. Gee!" He laughed drunkenly. "Oh, yes,
I got all the word I need, an' I guess there ain't a soul but me knows
it. Well, I'm going along up north this opening, and I'm going to finish
the job, and when it's done, and Lorson's handed the cash-pappy over,
and it's set deep in my dip, why, then I'll pass him all he needs. He
can get all I know--then. It's a cinch that hundred thou----"

"Who are the folks Lorson means to murder? Do I know them? Have I----?"

The man shook his head. The change in the girl's tone was lost upon him.

"Guess not. I'd say no one knows 'em except Tough Alroy and Lorson.
They're an outfit carrying on a trade under the name of Brand--Marcel
Brand----"

The bench under the girl's moccasined foot crashed to the ground.
Instantly she was stooping over it.

When Keeko finally looked up the bench was under her foot again,
balanced as before, and she was smiling. She was pale under the weather
tanning of her face. That was all. Her mouth was set, and sharp lines
were drawn about it. But she smiled. Oh, how she smiled.

Her lips parted. Her parching tongue moved in a vain effort to moisten
them. She cleared her throat which was dry--dry as a lime kiln. When she
spoke it was with effort, and her voice had lost its usual quality.

"Marcel--Marcel Brand," she said. "It--it sounds foreign. Maybe it's
French-Canadian."

The man shrugged. The nationality of the name did not concern him. He
was not even thinking of the murder for which he was to receive a price.
It was of the girl he was thinking with all the animal there was in him.
The alcohol he had consumed was driving him to let go all control.

"Don't know. Can't say," he said indifferently. "It don't matter two
cents to me. It's the dollars when I've done and what they'll buy me.
Say, kid--" he drew a long breath like a man preparing for a
plunge--"what's the matter with us two making out together? I'll be able
to buy you----"

"You're my step-father!" Keeko's eyes lit curiously.

"Step-father?" The man laughed as