but as I told her I watched her face, and saw the sign I wanted--the
white girl had clutched at her like she had at me, and she couldn't
give her up, so I made a dicker with her old man. It took all the
money I had to buy that squaw, but I knew the kiddie must have a
woman's care; and the three of us started out soon after, alone, and
broke, and aimless--and we've been going ever since.

"That's the heart of the story, Lieutenant, and that's how I started
to drift. Since then we three have never rested. I left them once in
Idaho and went back to Mesa, riding all the way, mostly by night,
but Bennett was gone. He'd run down mighty fast after Merridy died,
so I heard, growing sullen and uglier day by day--and I reckon I was
the only one who knew why--till he had a killing in his place. It
was unprovoked, and instead of stopping to face it out the yellow in
him rose to the surface and he left before sunup, as I had left,
making a clean getaway, too, for there was no such hullabaloo raised
about killing a man as there was about--the other. So my trip was
all for nothing.

"I was used to disappointment by now, so I took it quiet and went
back to Alluna and the little one, knowing that some day we two men
would meet. You see, I figured that God had framed a cold hand for
me, but He would surely give me a pair before the game closed. Of
course, never having seen Bennett, I was handicapped, and, added to
that, he changed his name, so the search was mighty slow and blind,
but I knew the day would come. And it would have come only for--
this.

"There isn't much more to tell. I did what most men would have done,
I reckon, because I was just average in every way. I took Alluna,