o considered they
had administered justice, who felt no more qualms concerning the dead
man than if his body had been the carcass of a slaughtered steer.

"Waiting for the rest of the boys to come up," said Brandon. "We'll hit
the trail home to-night. Bourke wants to identify the body, boys."

Sandy looked down at the contorted, blackened face, and his
disappointment at having been forestalled, sedimented down. The
gambler's features had not been made placid by death; they still held
much of the horror of the last moments of that relentless chase, his
horse failing under him, foreknowledge of sudden death and then the
whistling ropes, the jerk into eternity...! It was a thing to be
forgotten, a nightmare that had nothing to do with the new day ahead.

"It's Plimsoll," said Sandy shortly. "I'm ridin' back to Three Star. I
found him hangin' to a tree. Good night, hombres." He left them standing
about their quarry and turned the willing mare toward home. Peace
settled down on him under the stars that were fading, the moon below the
hills when he rode into the home corral.

A figure was perched upon the fence, waiting. It was Molly, and she
leaped down almost into his arms as he sprang from the mare. In the gray
dawn her face seemed drawn and weary. There were the blue shadows under
the eyes that he remembered seeing there the time they had ridden over
the Pass of the Goats. She came close to him, her hands up against his
chest.

"You're safe, Sandy. Safe!"

"I was too late," he said. "Brandon's men had been ahead of me."

"I'm so glad, Sandy. Your hands are clean of his blood. They are my
hands, now, Sandy."

He swept her up to him, kissing her mouth and eyes, the eager pressure
of her lips returning all with full measure. A streak of rose glowed in
the east behind the amethyst peaks. Her face reflected it like a mirror.
The tired lines were gone as he set her down.

"How long have you been waiting, Molly?"

"Ever since I got back. I slipped out of the house when the rest had
gone to bed. If you hadn't come back, Sandy, I should have died."

"I don't have to go back east," she said presently. They had left the
corral and were under the big cottonwoods by Patrick Casey's grave. "Do
I?"

"I don't reckon you can, even if you wanted to," answered Sandy. "I
forgot to tell you, Molly, that you're bu'sted, so far's the mine is
concerned. Listen."

She laughed when he finished speaking.

"Is that all?" She patted