happened. She stiffened immediately, however, and
lay, straining at the dread paralysis that had gripped her; for she saw
Harlan standing at her side, looking down into her face, his own set in a
grim smile.

She must have fainted again, for it seemed to her that a long period of
time elapsed until she again became conscious of her surroundings. Harlan
had moved off a little, though he was still watching her with the grimly
humorous expression.

She sat up, staring wildly at him; then shrank back, getting as far away
from him as she could.

"You!" she gasped, "You! Didn't I----"

He interrupted her, drawling his words a little:

"The guy you shot was Lawson. You bored him a heap. I've toted him
downstairs. He's plenty dead. It was plumb good shootin'--for a woman."

His words shocked her to action, and she got up and walked around the
foot of the bed, from where she could see the spot where the intruder
must have fallen after she had shot him. A dark stain showed on the floor
where the man had lain, and the sight of it sent her a step backward, so
that she struck the foot of the bed. She caught at the bed and grasped
one of the posts, holding tightly to it while she looked Harlan over with
dreading, incredulous eyes.

"It--it wasn't _you_!" she demanded. "Are you sure?"

He smiled and said, slowly and consolingly: "I reckon if you'd shot _me_
I'd be knowin' it. Don't take it so hard, ma'am. Why, if a man goes to
breakin' into a woman's room that way he sure ain't fit to go on livin'
in a world where there _is_ a woman."

"It was Lawson--you say? Meeder Lawson--the Rancho Seco foreman? I
thought--why, I thought it was you!"

"I'm thankin' you, ma'am," he said, ironically. "But if you'll just stick
your head out of that window, you'll see it was Lawson, right enough.
He's layin' right below the window."

She did as bidden, and she saw Lawson lying on the ground beneath the
window, flat on his back, his face turned upward with the radiant
moonlight shining full upon his wide-open, staring eyes.

Barbara glanced swiftly, and then drew back into the room, shuddering.

Harlan stood, silently regarding her, while she walked again to the bed
and sat upon it, staring out into the flood of moonlight, her face
ghastly, her hands hanging limply at her sides.

She had killed a man. And though there was justification for the deed,
she could not fight down the shivering horror that had seized her, the
overpowering an