, lounged against the pilot-house
smoking innumerable cigarettes, which he rolled from squares of
newspaper, his keen eyes apparently scanning every foot of their slow
way; but when night fell, at last, and the bank faded from sight, he
tossed the last butt overboard, smiled grimly into the darkness, and
went below.

CHAPTER XVIII

RUNNION FINDS THE SINGING PEOPLE

"No Creek" Lee came into the trading-post on the following morning, and
found Gale attending store as if nothing unusual had occurred.

"Say! What's this about you and Stark? I hear you had a horrible
run-in, and that you split him up the back like a quail."

"We had a row," admitted the trader. "It's been a long time working
out, and last night it came to a head."

"Lord-ee! And to think of Ben Stark's bein' licked! Why, the whole
camp's talkin' about it! They say he emptied two six-shooters at you,
but you kept a-comin', and when you did get to him you just carved your
initials on him like he was a bass-wood tree. Say, John, he's a goner,
sure."

"Do you mean he's--passing out?"

"Oh no! I reckon he'll get well, from what I hear, though he won't let
nobody come near him except old Doc; but he's lost a battle, and that
ends him. Don't you savvy? Whenever a killer quits second best, it
breaks his hoodoo. Why, there's been men laying for him these twenty
years, from here to the Rio Grande, and every feller he ever bested
will hear of this and begin to grease his holster; then the first
shave-tail desperado that meets him will spit in his eye, just to make
a name for himself. No, sir! He's a spent shell. He's got to fight all
his battles over again, and this time the other feller will open the
ball. Oh, I've seen it happen before. You killed him last night, just
as sure as if you'd hung up his hide to dry, and he knows it."

"I'm a peaceable man," said Gale, on the defensive. "I had to do it."

"I know! I know! There was witnesses--this dress-maker at the fort seen
it, so I hear."

The other acquiesced silently.

"Well! Well! Ben Stark licked! I can't get over that. It must 'a' been
somethin' powerful strong to make you do it, John." It was as close to
a question as the miner dared come, although he was avid with
curiosity, and, like the entire town, was in a fret to know what lay
back of this midnight encounter, concerning which the most exaggerated
rumors were rife. These stories grew the more grotesque and ridiculous
the longer the tr