inking this, I picked up the box on which I
had been sitting and prepared to make the best fight I could. It was a
good deal of relief, therefore, when the door opened just wide enough
for a man to put in his head, and I heard the sheriff's voice say,
softly--

"Hi, Gordon!"

I was at the door in an instant, and asked--

"What's up?"

"They're gettin' the fellers together, and sayin' that yer shot a
woman in the hold-up."

"It's an infernal lie," I said.

"Sounds that way to me," assented the sheriff; "but two-thirds of the
boys are drunk, and it's a long time since they've had any fun."

"Well," I said, as calmly as I could, "are you going to stand by me?"

"I would, Mr. Gordon," he replied, "if there was any good, but there
ain't time to get a posse, and what's one Winchester against a mob of
cowboys like them?"

"If you'll lend me your gun," I said, "I'll show just what it is
worth, without troubling you."

"I'll do better than that," offered the sheriff, "and that's what I'm
here for. Just sneak, while there's time."

"You mean--?" I exclaimed.

"That's it. I'm goin' away, and I'll leave the door unlocked. If yer
get clear let me know yer address, and later, if I want yer, I'll send
yer word." He took a grip on my fingers that numbed them as if they
had been caught in an air-brake, and disappeared.

I slipped out after the sheriff without loss of time. That there
wasn't much to spare was shown by a crowd with some torches down the
street, collected in front of a saloon. They were making a good deal
of noise, even for the West; evidently the flame was being fanned. Not
wasting time, I struck for the railroad, because I knew the geography
of that best, but still more because I wanted to get to the station.
It was a big risk to go there, but it was one I was willing to take
for the object I had in view, and, since I had to take it, it was
safest to get through with the job before the discovery was made that
I was no longer in jail.

It didn't take me three minutes to reach the station. The whole place
was black as a coal-dumper, except for the slices of light which shone
through the cracks of the curtained windows in the specials, the dim
light of the lamp in the station, and the glow of the row of saloons
two hundred feet away. I was afraid, however, that there might be a
spy lurking somewhere, for it was likely that Camp would hope to get
some clue of the letters by keeping a watch on the station a