caught the dead man's pistol from the floor and fired, seemingly
with one movement. Then he sprang up, still firing as fast as the
trigger could move. From the door came answer, shot for shot, and the
car was filled with the stifling odor of burnt powder. A woman screamed
hysterically.

Then a puff of cool, prairie breeze came in through the shattered window
behind Thurston, and the smoke-cloud lifted like a curtain blown upward
in the wind. The tawny-haired young fellow was walking coolly down the
aisle, the smoking revolver pointing like an accusing finger toward the
outlaw who lay stretched upon his face, his fingers twitching.

Outside, rifles were crackling like corn in a giant popper. Presently
it slackened to an occasional shot. A brakeman, followed by two coatless
mail-clerks with Winchesters, ran down the length of the train calling
out that there was no danger. The thud of their running feet, and the
wholesome mingling of their shouting struck sharply in the silence after
the shooting. One of the men swung up on the steps of the day coach and
came in.

"Hello, Park," he cried to the tawny haired boy. "Got one, did yuh?
That's good. We did, too got him alive. Think uh the nerve uh that
Wagner bunch! to go up against a train in broad daylight. Made an easy
getaway, too, except the feller we gloomed in the express car. How's
this one? Dead?"

"No. I reckon he'll get well enough to stretch a rope; he killed a man,
in here." He motioned toward the huddled figure in the aisle. They came
together, lifted the dead man and carried him away to the baggage car.
A brakeman came with a cloth and wiped up the red pool, and Thurston
pressed his lips tightly together and turned away his head; he could not
remember when the sight of anything had made him so deathly sick. Once
he glanced slyly at the girl opposite, and saw that she was very white
under her tan, and that the hands in her lap were clasped tightly and
yet shook. But she met his eyes squarely, and Thurston did not look at
her again; he did not like the expression of her mouth.

News of the holdup had been telegraphed ahead, and all Shellanne--which
was not much of a crowd--gathered at the station to meet the train and
congratulate the heroes. Thurston alighted almost shamefacedly into the
midst of the loud-voiced commotion. While he was looking uncertainly
about him, wondering where to go and what to do, a voice he knew hailed
him with drawling welcome.

"H