us yesterday to save his skin. Maybe he was wise, at that."

"Blake is dead."

The big man exclaimed in astonishment. "Dead! How?"

Angus told him. Also he told why he himself had hunted Blake. Gavin
French uttered a deep malediction.

"If I had known this," he said, "he would never have come with us. I
think I would have handled him myself. But I don't suppose you believe
that."

"Yes," Angus returned. "You are a man, and he never was."

Gavin French eyed him for a moment. "I guess you're right--about him,
anyway," he said. "He got what was coming to him. Well, that leaves
me--and Kathleen." He shook his head moodily. "I tell you straight,
Mackay, that I'm not going to be taken. I've stood you up, but I don't
know what I'm going to do with you. If you'll give me your word to go
back to your bunch and give me that much start, you may pick up your gun
and go."

"Will you answer me one question straight?" Angus asked.

"Anything you like," the big man promised. "It won't make much
difference now."

"Gavin French, did you kill my father?"

The big man started violently. "Did I--What makes you ask that?"

"You promised me a straight answer. But Braden said so--before he died."

Gavin French did not reply immediately. "Braden was a rotten liar all
his life," he said at last. "But I promised you a straight answer, and I
keep my word. Yes, I killed your father--at least, I suppose that's what
it comes to."

Angus drew a long breath. Its hissing intake was clear in the silence.

"You suppose!" he said. "My father was not armed. Do you think I will
let you go, gun or no gun. One of us stays on this summit, Gavin
French!"

"In your place I would say just that," Gavin admitted. "But I am going
to tell you how it happened; and then I am going to let you take up your
gun and do what you like. And just remember that if I wanted to lie I
would have done it in the first place."

He paused a moment frowning at Angus.

"The day your father was shot," he began, "I was on the range looking
for horses, and I had my rifle. In the afternoon I was riding up the
long coulee by Cat Creek when I heard a shot ahead, and in a few minutes
I came upon a steer staggering along. Then he rolled over and lay
kicking. I got off my horse and saw your brand on him, and that he had
been shot. Just then your father came tearing up the coulee. He saw me
beside the dead steer, my rifle in my hand, and naturally he thought I
had done the ki