e child, while she begged him in the baby's name not to go, not
to bring blood upon her; but he plucked her arms from around him and
went out, closing the door softly.

When he had gone Mrs. McGill stood motionless, her eyes closed, her
palms pressed over her ears as if to shut out a sound she dreaded.

Barclay was dealing "bank" in one of the saloons when McGill entered and
came toward him down the full length of the room. They recognized each
other as their eyes met, and the former sat back stiffly in his chair,
feeling that the dead had risen. What he saw written in the face of the
bearded man drove the blood from his cheeks, for it was something he had
dreaded in his dreams. He knew himself to be cornered, and fear set his
nerves to jumping so uncontrollably that when he snatched the Colt's
from its drawer and fired blindly, he missed. The place was crowded, and
it broke into a frightful confusion at the first shot.

None of those present told the same tale of what immediately followed,
but the stories agreed in this, that John Daniels neither hesitated nor
quickened his approach, although Barclay emptied his gun so swiftly that
the echoes blended, then snapped it on a spent cartridge as the two
clinched. Curious ones later searched out the bullet-marks in wall and
ceiling which showed beyond doubt the nervous panic under which the
gambler had gone to pieces, and so long as the building stood they
remained objects of great interest.

Now McGill--or Daniels, as he was known to the onlookers--never went
armed, having yet to feel the need of other weapons than his hands. He
tore the gun from his victim's grasp, then mauled him with it so
fearfully that men shouted at him and hid their faces. Meanwhile he was
speaking, growling something into Barclay's ears. No one understood what
it was he said until the confusion died and they heard these words:

"--And you'll go with my brand on you where everybody 'll read it and
know you're a rat."

Next he did something that a great many had heard of but few, even of
the old-timers, had witnessed. He gun-branded his enemy. Barclay was
little more than a pulp by this time; he lay face up across the
faro-table with McGill's fingers at his throat. They thought the older
man was about to brain him, but instead he turned the revolver in his
hand and drew the thin, sharp-edged sight across Barclay's forehead from
temple to temple, then from forelock to bridge of nose. A stream of