rayed by the Scotch writer captured his fancy. It
delighted him to tempt her into discussions that told him by suggestion
something of what she thought and was.

They were in animated debate when the door opened to admit somebody
else. He had stepped in so quietly that he stood there a little while
without being observed, smiling down at them with triumphant malice
behind the mask he wore. Perhaps it was the black visor that was
responsible for the Mephisto effect, since it hid all the face but the
leering eyes. These, narrowed to slits, swept the room and came back to
its occupants. He was a tall man and well-knit, dressed incongruously in
up-to-date riding breeches and boots, in combination with the usual gray
shirt, knotted kerchief and wide-brimmed felt hat of the horseman of the
plains. The dust of the desert lay thick on him, without in the least
obscuring a certain ribald elegance, a distinction of wickedness
that rested upon him as his due. To this result his debonair manner
contributed, though it carried with it no suggestion of weakness. To the
girl who looked up and found him there he looked indescribably sinister.

She half rose to her feet, dilated eyes fixed on him.

"Good evenin'. I came to make sure y'u got safe home, Miss Messiter," he
said.

The eyes of the two men clashed, the sheepman's stern and unyielding,
his cousin's lit with the devil of triumph. But out of the faces of both
men looked the inevitable conflict, the declaration of war that never
ends till death.

"I've been a heap anxious about y'u--couldn't sleep for worrying. So I
saddled up and rode in to find out if y'u were all right and to inquire
how Cousin Ned was getting along."

The sheepman, not deigning to move an inch from his position, looked in
silence his steady contempt.

"This conversation sounds a whole lot like a monologue up to date," he
continued. "Now, maybe y'u don't know y'u have the honor of entertaining
the King of the Bighorn." The man's brown hand brushed the mask from his
eyes and he bowed with mocking deference. "Miss Messiter, allow me to
introduce myself again--Ned Bannister, train robber, rustler, kidnapper
and general bad man. But I ain't told y'u the worst yet. I'm cousin to a
sheepherder' and that's the lowest thing that walks."

He limped forward a few steps and sat down. "Thank you, I believe I will
stay a while since y'u both ask me so urgent. It isn't often I meet with
a welcome so hearty and strai