gly, "I hear you've been having your
safe cracked."

Something in the half-breed's voice made the trader wish he had not
shoved back that revolver. It would not do to reach for it now. McFann's
hands were empty, but he was lightning in getting them to his guns.

The trader's lips seemed more than usually dry and cracked. His voice
wheezed at the first word, as he answered.

"Yes, Jim, I was robbed," he said. Then he added, propitiatingly: "But
I've got a new safe. Ain't she a beauty?"

"She sure is," replied McFann, though he did not take his eyes off
Talpers. "Got your name on, and everything. Let's open her up, and see
what a real safe looks like inside."

Talpers turned without question and began fumbling at the combination.
His hands trembled, and once he dropped them at his side. As he did so
McFann's hands moved almost imperceptibly. Their movement was toward the
half-breed's hips, and Talpers brought his own hands quickly back to the
combination. The tumblers fell, and the trader swung the door open.

"Purtier 'n a new pair of boots," approved the half-breed, as a brave
array of books and inner drawers came in view. "Now them inside boxes.
The one with the thousand-dollar bill in it."

"Why, what's gittin' into you, Jim?" almost whined Talpers. "You know I
ain't got any thousand-dollar bill."

"Don't lie to me," snapped the half-breed, a harsh note coming into his
voice. "You've made your talk about a thousand-dollar bill. I want to
see it--that's all."

Slowly Talpers unlocked the inner strong box and took therefrom a roll
of money.

"There it is," he said, handing it to McFann. A thousand-dollar bill was
on the outside of the roll.

"I ain't going to ask where you got that," said McFann steadily,
"because you'd lie to me. But I know. You took it from that man on the
hill. You told me you'd jest found him there when I come on you prowling
around his body. You said you didn't take anything from him, and I was
fool enough to believe you. But you didn't get these thousand-dollar
bills anywhere else. You double-crossed me, and if things got too warm
for you, you was going to saw everything off on me. Easy enough when I
was hiding out there in the sagebrush, living on what you wanted to send
out to me. I've done all this bootlegging work for you, and I covered up
for you in court, about this murder, all because I thought you was on
the square. And all the time you had took your pickings from this man on