! Because you can't set down to a meal without both your
hands and feet agoing and one ear laid back, you call us old because we
chew slow. But you're right. Jim and I are getting kind of gray around
the ears."

"Well, you fellas can fight it out. I came over to say that them rurales
got their hoss. But one of 'em let it slip, in Mexican, that they
weren't through yet."

"So?" said Pat. "Well, you go ahead and feed the stock. We'll be over to
the house poco tiempo."

Waring and the collector entered the cantina. For a long time they sat
in silence, gazing at the peculiar half-lights as the sun drew down.
Finally the collector turned to Waring.

"Has the game gone stale, Jim?"

Waring nodded. "I'm through. I am going to settle down. I've had my
share of trouble."

"Here, too," said the collector. "I've put by enough to get a little
place up north--cattle--and take it easy. That's why I stuck it out down
here. Had any word from your folks recent?"

"Not for ten years."

"And that boy trailing with you?"

"Oh, he's just a kid I picked up in Sonora. No, my own boy is straight
American, if he's living now."

"You might stop by at Stacey, on the Santa Fe," said the collector
casually. "There's some folks running a hotel up there that you used to
know."

Waring thanked him with a glance. "We don't need a drink and the sun is
down. Where do you eat?"

"We'll get Jack to rustle some grub. You and the boy can bunk in the
office. I'll take care of your horse."

"Thanks, Pat. But you spoke of going north. I wouldn't if I were you.
They'll get you."

"I had thought of that. But I'm going to take that same chance. I'm
plumb sick of the border."

"If they do--" And Waring rose.

The collector's hard-lined face softened for an instant. He thrust out
his bony hand. "I'll leave that to you, Jim."

And that night, because each was a gunman unsurpassed in his grim
profession, they laughed and talked about things trivial, leaving the
deeper currents undisturbed. And the assistant collector, eating with
them in the adobe back of the office, wondered that two such men found
nothing more serious to talk about than the breeding of horses and the
growing of garden truck.

Late that night the assistant awoke to find that the collector was not
in bed. He rose and stalked to the window. Across from the adobe he saw
the grim face of the collector framed in the office window. He was
smoking a cigar and gazing toward the sout