house, with your wife away, but you wouldn't--down in your
secret soul you'd feel that I was--was tainted."

"Forgive me, Dixie, darling," he cried. "My blood's in my head; I'm
dazed and dazzled by you, little girl; but you know best. I wouldn't do
a thing you didn't approve of for all the world."

She released his hands with a little, satisfied laugh, and stepped back
toward the gate. "Well, I got what I wanted," she said, frankly. "I've
been more in the clutch of Old Harry since you went over there than I
ever was in all my born days. All day yesterday and to-day I've brooded
and brooded and had evil thoughts, till--well, I'd have gone plumb out
o' my mind if I hadn't come straight to you. I may as well tell the
truth; I don't want a lie, even a little, tiny one, to smut the
confidence between us. Alfred, Joe wasn't worrying so--so _very_ much. I
was attending to that job. What I said about him was to pump you dry and
make you ease my mind. I feel better. I can sleep now. Oh,
Alfred--Alfred--good-night!"

He threw out his hands impulsively, but she had evaded them, and, with
lowered head, was scudding across the grass toward the light in the
cottage.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

The bar in the Oklahoma village kept by Dick Wrinkle was in the centre
of the place. It was a narrow, one-story shanty built of undressed
boards, the roof of which sloped from the front to the rear. It was
devoid of the conventional door-screen, the rough, unpainted shutter,
with its padlock and chain, swinging back against the inner wall.

It was early in the morning. The proprietor, a fat, partially bald man
of forty years, without a coat, his shirt-sleeves rolled above his
elbows, was sweeping into the cracks of the floor the tobacco-quids,
stubs of cigars, and remnants of matches left by his carousing customers
the night before. He had just tossed his broom into a corner of the room
and was looking out of the door when a dust-laden, travel-worn
individual with a familiar look slouched around a corner and said:

"Hello, Dick! Don't you know a fellow?"

"By gum!" Wrinkle cried. "Where the hell did you blow from?"

"Georgia--from back home, Dick. Just got here on the night mail-stage.
Gosh, what a ride! My windpipe is lined with dust. Quick! Gimme
something to wash it out. Three men on the stage, and not a drop in the
bunch. I'm burning up."

"By gum!--by gum!" Wrinkle muttered, as he slid behind the counter and
set out a long bottle