riedly. "What do you think Al would want----"

"Don't she see him shoot Fred Thurman? By golly, I'm scared for that
girl, Loney!"

Lone stared at him. "He wouldn't dare!"

"A coward is a brave man when you scare him bad enough," Swan stated
flatly. "I'm careful always when I corner a coward."

"Al ain't a coward. You've got him wrong."

"Maybe, but he kills like a coward would kill, and he's scared he will
be caught. Warfield, he's scared, too. You watch him, Lone.

"Now I tell you what I do. Yack, he picks up the trail from here to
where you can follow easy. We know two places where he didn't go with
her, and from here is two more trails he could take. But one goes to
the main road, and he don't take that one, I bet you. I think he takes
that girl up Spirit Canyon, maybe. It's woods and wild country in a
few miles, and plenty of places to hide, and good chances for getting
out over the top of the divide.

"I'm going to my cabin, and you don't say anything when I leave.
Warfield, he don't want the damn Swede hanging around. So you go with
them, Loney. This is to what you call a showdown."

"We'll want the dog," Lone told him, but Swan shook his head. Hawkins
and Warfield had come from the house and were approaching the stable.
Swan looked at Lone, and Lone went forward to meet them.

"The Swede followed along on the ridge, and he didn't see anything," he
volunteered, before Warfield could question him. "We might put his dog
on the trail and see which way she went from here."

Warfield thought that a good idea. He was so sure that Lorraine must
be somewhere within a mile or two of the place that he seemed to think
the search was practically over when Jack, nosing out the trail of Al
Woodruff, went trotting toward Spirit Canyon.

"Took the wrong turn after she left the corrals here," Warfield
commented relievedly. "She wouldn't get far, up this way."

"There's the track of two horses," Hawkins said abruptly. "That there
is the girl's horse, all right--there's a hind shoe missing. We saw
where her horse had cast a shoe, coming over Juniper Ridge. But
there's another horse track."

Lone bit his lip. It was the other horse that Jack had been trailing
so long. "There was a loose horse hanging around Thurman's place," he
said casually. "It's him, tagging along, I reckon."

"Oh," said Hawkins. "That accounts for it."

CHAPTER XIX

SWAN CALLS FOR HELP

Past the field where the