could look directly into his face, she saw that he was only a boy, not
more than two or three years older than herself. For the first time she
remembered the sooty figure which had stood in the door of the
blacksmith shop. The white face against the tawny smoke of the shop;
that had attracted her eyes before. It was the same white face now, but
subtly changed. A force exuded from him; indeed, he seemed neither
young nor old.

She heard him speaking in a voice not louder than a whisper, rapid,
distinct.

"When you came through the town you waked me up like a whiplash," he was
saying. "When you left I kept thinking about you. Then along came a
trouble. I killed a man. A posse started after me. It's on my heels, but
I had to see you again. Do you understand?"

A ghost of color was going up her throat, staining her cheeks.

"I had to see you," he repeated. "It's my last chance. Tomorrow they
may get me. Two hours from now they may have me salted away with lead.
But before I kick out I had to have one more look at you. So I swung out
of my road and came straight to this house. I came up the stairs. I went
into a room down the hall and made a man tell me where to find you."

There was a flash in the eyes of the girl like the wink of sun on a bit
of quartz on a far-away hillside, but it cut into the speech of Andrew
Lanning. "He told you where to find me?" she asked in a voice no louder
than the swift, low voice of Andy. But what a world of scorn!

"He had a gun shoved into the hollow of his throat," said Andy. "He had