, at different times, out of more than
one troublesome affair, either by sheer force of arms, or through his
resourceful cunning.

These men were followed by a younger man riding with a very young
woman. De Spain knew none of the front-rank men, but he knew well Nan
Morgan and her dancing partner.

They were talking together, and Nan seemed from her manner at odds
with her companion. He appeared to be trying to laugh the situation
off when he caught sight of de Spain pausing for them to pass. Gale's
face lighted as he set eyes on him, and he spoke quickly to Nan. De
Spain could not at first hear his words, but he needed no ears to
interpret his laugh and the expression on his face. Nan, persistently
importuned, looked around. She saw de Spain, much closer, it would
seem, than she had expected to see a man looking directly at her, and
her eyes rested on him only a moment. The substance of her cousin's
words she apparently had not caught, and he repeated them in a louder
voice: "There's your handsome Medicine Bend gunman!"

Nan, glancing again toward de Spain, seemed aware that he heard. She
looked away. De Spain tightened up with a rage. The blood rushed to
his face, the sarcasm struck in. If the birthmark could have deepened
with humiliation it would have done so at the instant of the cold
inspection of the girl's pretty eyes. But he cared less for Nan's
inspection, cold as it was, than for the jibe of her satisfied cousin.
Not content, Gale, calling ahead to the others, invited their
attention to the man on the street corner. De Spain felt minded to
hurl an insult at them in a body. It would have been four to
one--rather awkward odds even if they were mounted--and there was a
woman. But he only stood still, returning their inspection as
insolently as silence could. Each face was faithfully photographed and
filed in his memory, and his steady gaze followed them until they
rode down the hill and clattered jauntily out on the swaying
suspension bridge that still crosses the Rat River at Grant Street,
and connects the whole south country--the Spanish Sinks, the Thief
River gold-fields, the saw-toothed Superstition Range, Morgan's Gap,
and Music Mountain with Sleepy Cat and the railroad.

De Spain, walking down Grant Street, watched the party disappear among
the hills across the river. The encounter had stirred him. He already
hated the Morgans, at least all except the blue-eyed girl, and she, it
was not difficult to d