an for me?" I asked.

Dorgan made hard work of this, though it was evident that he was trying
his best. His description would have fitted any one of a round million
of American women, I suppose; yet out of it I thought I could draw some
faint touches of familiarity. The stumbling description, coupled with
Barton's assertion that Agatha Geddis was living in Colorado, fitted
together only too well.

"Did you hear what she said to the man?" I inquired, and my mouth was
dry.

"On'y a bit of it. She says, says she: 'Who is that man wit' a French
beard--the young man in his shirt-sleeves?' The felly she t'rowed this
into was one o' the kid-gloves, and he didn't know. So he went to
Shelton, who was showin' the crowd around on the job. When he comes
back, he tells her your name is Jim Bertrand, and that you makes a
noise like the camp paymaster."

"Well?" I prompted. "Go on."

"She laughs when he says that. 'Jim Bertrand, is it?' says she. 'Will
you do me a favor, Mister Jullybird'--'r some such name. 'Go and ask
that young man how did he leave all the folks in Glendale. I want to
see him jump,' says she. He didn't do it because at that same minute
yous was walkin' down the track to flag Benson's ingine."

The bolt had fallen. The woman could have been no other than Agatha
Geddis. Once more I stood in critical danger of losing all that I had
gained. There was only one faint hope, and that was that she had not
heard of the broken parole. I had to go to the water jug in the
Commissary and get a drink before I could thank Dorgan for telling me.

"'Tis nothin'," he said shortly. Then, after a protracted pause: "What
can she do to yous, pally?"

"She can send me up for two years; and then some--for the penalties."

Again a silence intervened.

"'Twas in the back part o' my head to take a chance and ditch that
damn' special when she was comin' back down the gulch," said Dorgan, at
length, as coolly as if he were merely telling me that his pipe had
gone out. "But if I'd done it, it would have been just my crooked luck
to 'a' killed everybody on it but that woman. What'll ye be doin'?"

"Nothing at present. We shall finish here in a week or so more, and
then I'll see."

That ended it. After Dorgan had got another match for his pipe, I let
him out at the side door of the commissary, and he went his way across
to the sleeping shacks on the other side of the tracks.

Two weeks later it was this story o