ust
be." He shook his head and nodded it by turns. Then, with full-blown
importance, he sat again, and wrote a paper, his coroner's certificate.
Next door, in Albany County, these vouchers brought their face value of
five dollars to the holder; but on Drybone's neutral soil the saloons
would always pay four for them, and it was rare that any jury-man could
withstand the temptation of four immediate dollars. This one gratefully
received his paper, and, cherishing it like a bird in the hand, he with
his colleagues bore it where they might wait for duty and slake their
thirst.

In the silent room sat Lin McLean, his body coming to life more readily
than his shaken spirit. Barker, seeing that the cow-puncher meant
to watch until the end, brought the whiskey to him. Slaghammer drew
documents from his pocket to fill the time, but was soon in slumber over
them. In all precincts of the quadrangle Drybone was keeping it up late.
The fiddle, the occasional shouts, and the crack of the billiard-balls
travelled clear and far through the vast darkness outside. Presently
steps unsteadily drew near, and round the corner of the door a voice,
plaintive and diffident, said, "Judge, ain't she most pretty near
ready?"

"Wake up, Judge!" said Barker. "Your jury has gone dry again."

The man appeared round the door--a handsome, dishevelled fellow--with
hat in hand, balancing himself with respectful anxiety. Thus was a
second voucher made out, and the messenger strayed back happy to his
friends. Barker and McLean sat wakeful, and Slaghammer fell at once
to napping. From time to time he was roused by new messengers, each
arriving more unsteady than the last, until every juryman had got his
fee and no more messengers came. The coroner slept undisturbed in
his chair. McLean and Barker sat. On the bed the mass, with its pink
ribbons, breathed and breathed, while moths flew round the lamp, tapping
and falling with light sounds. So did the heart of the darkness wear
itself away, and through the stone-cold air the dawn began to filter and
expand.

Barker rose, bent over the bed, and then stood. Seeing him, McLean stood
also.

"Judge," said Barker, quietly, "you may call them now." And with careful
steps the judge got himself out of the room to summon his jury.

For a short while the cow-puncher stood looking down upon the woman. She
lay lumped in her gaudiness, the ribbons darkly stained by the laudanum;
but into the stolid, bold features de