had also boarded the
train at Marlin Town with a group of settlement school children bound
for trachoma treatment in Lexington thought that it held an unusual
magnetism.

Simplicity and courage were written in the sober eyes; responsibility
and self-knowledge were stamped on the firm mouth-line and jaw-angle.

Joe, who had once come to Frankfort to seek Boone's aid in curbing the
violence of Gregory wrath, was going through the capital now on another
mission, and he made no effort to conceal his heaviness of heart. He was
taking a fellow-man to die, and though the duty lay as clear-writ as
when it had called him into rifle fire from the fugitive's barricade, it
was no longer so easy to obey.

From time to time the condemned man leaned forward and talked, and Joe
bent with as considerate an attention as though he were listening to a
dignitary. Sometimes he smiled in answer to a forced jest; sometimes to
a more sincere and less brazen effort he nodded grave response. One
would have said that the two were friends, and against the approaches of
the morbidly curious Joe interposed an aloofness as repellent as
bayonets. What were they, he thought, but men anxious to see the wheels
turn in a head that was soon to wear a cap with electrodes fitting
against shaven temples?

From across the car Happy Spradling watched the mingled strength and
gentleness of the law's servant, and felt that she would like to know
this neighbour, whom, as it happened, she had never met.

The girl was going home, a few days after that, on the same train that
carried the returning sheriff--this time travelling alone--and coming to
her seat somewhat diffidently, he held out a book.

"If you'll excuse me for introducing myself," he said, "I'll give you
this. You left it in your seat when you got off the train coming down."

Happy smiled, and, since they were, after all, neighbours, talked with
him for the rest of the journey. Though it had been a long while since
her heart had admitted a flutter at the glances or speeches of a man,
the young woman found herself awakening to the discovery that she was
still young. He asked if he might come to see her, and often after that
his horse stood hitched at the settlement school. When one night a few
months later he smiled his grave smile and said, "I've come to bid you
farewell; I'm going away tomorrow," she acknowledged a sudden sharpness
of pang.

"Where?" she demanded. And he answered:

"Over there