Pearce's red face turned white. He stood still as a stone, with his
gaze fixed in fascinated fear upon Cleve's gun.

A paralyzing surprise appeared to hold the group.

"Can you prove what you said?" asked Cleve, low and hard.

Joan knew that if Pearce did have the proof which would implicate
her he would never live to tell it.

"Cleve--I don't--know nothin'," choked out Pearce. "I jest figgered
--it was a woman!"

Cleve slowly lowered the gun and stepped back. Evidently that
satisfied him. But Joan had an intuitive feeling that Pearce lied.

"You want to be careful how you talk about me," said Cleve.

Kells purled out a suspended breath and he flung the sweat from his
brow. There was about him, perhaps more than the others, a dark
realization of how close the call had been for Pearce.

"Jim, you're not drunk?"

"No."

"But you're sore?"

"Sure I'm sore. Pearce put me in bad with you, didn't he?"