Bismarck nearing at last! Since dawn, Lounsbury's head had been poked from a window of the forward car. Now, he followed it with a wedge of shoulder, and muttered a fervent "Thank God!" His face was blackened by the breath of the engine, his hair was roughed by the tugging wind. So that he bore not a trace of the past month's careful grooming. Outside of Chicago, he had shed his Eastern garb for blue flannel shirt, dark breeches, and tall boots. Again he was a frontiersman.

A brakeman entered to call out the final stop. Cramped bulks, here and there, slowly unwound their sleepy lengths and gazed around. A slim recruit in a front seat, who was outward-bound to fight Indians, wakened with a protesting oath. Other occupants of the car grudgingly put away their card packs, but cheerfully clapped on their hats. A long, hot journey was done.

But Lounsbury, when he drew in his head and shoulder, delayed his preparations to alight. He reached down to a boot-leg and fished out a letter, one paragraph of which he carefully re-read.

"As I say, if you look for that rascal, you'll find the right man. He was here, for Charley saw him. 'Who was it?' I asked the Indian. What do you think he did—he crossed his fingers on his nose!"Lounsbury took a deep breath. "It's likely," he said aloud. "It don't take courage to kill a cripple."

The wheels were yet turning when Lounsbury swung off. His looped belt had been buckled on, and once more his revolver hung handily upon his thigh. As he tossed his satchel to the ticket-agent, he gave the ".45" a swift look over. Then, with the expression that the Clark outfit respected showing through the grime of the train, he started on a tour of saloons.

In a square-fronted groggery, his hunt ended. An assortment of adventurers packed the place—mule-skinners, soldiers, gamblers, settlers. Among them was a sprinkle of women. He pushed his way through the crowd until he reached the bar. There, officiating in pink shirt-sleeves, was the "Babe."

A moment Lounsbury faced him in silence, his cheeks puffing and his chest swelling in an effort at self-control. Then, dropping his hand to the ".45," he gave a jerk of the head. "Come out," he ordered.

The "Babe's" squint eyes made separate inspections of the room. He was in the act of pouring from a bottle to a glass. Now, as he held them before him, they tinkled together.

His customer backed away to the door, where it was cooler. The women cluttered at the farther bar-end. The other loungers rotated to a position behind Lounsbury, and waited, all a-grin.

He came loafing out, the sweat standing in huge beads upon his nose. Lounsbury advanced to him, playing a tattoo along the bar with his left hand."'Babe,'" he said quietly, "the train goes back Chicago-way in the morning."

The other blinked and gulped. "W'y, w'y——" he began.

"You take it," continued Lounsbury. "Your family's getting darned unpopular here."

The "Babe's" diverging orbs popped from his face and again played from side to side.

"Y-e-e-s," drawled Lounsbury. He ripped open the other's vest. Two pistols were displayed, snuggling head to head. He plucked them out and kicked them across the room. "The morning train," he repeated. "So long."

"Babe" gave a weak nod. Lounsbury walked out. "Howdy, boys, howdy," he said pleasantly as he went. The admiring crowd returned his salute, and rotated back to the bar.

He wasted no further time, but hurried to his store, a saddle-roofed building farther along the street. Before it paced a Fort Lincoln officer. Lounsbury stopped him for news.

"You ought to be chuck full of it," returned the officer, pumping the storekeeper's arm; "just in from New York."

"The redskins?"

"Daytime sortie on us yesterday."

"Pretty sassy. How about Brannon?"

"Nothing since old Lancaster——"

"I heard that—Fraser wrote me." Lounsbury gritted his teeth.

"And our poor Custer?"

"Ah, poor Custer! The East's talking about nothing else.""Awful! awful!" The officer turned away to hide the twitching of his face.

"Going to Lincoln now?" asked Lounsbury.

"Not right away."

"Then, I'm off."

"For Lincoln?"

"No, for Brannon."

"Brannon! Alone? Lounsbury! Why, the Indians——"

"I'm going, just the same." He hailed a neighbour to bargain for a cayuse of reputed wind and speed. In another half-hour he was ready.

He rode as light as possible. Behind the cantle, rolled in a poncho, he tied some hardtack, jerked beef, and brandy. His revolver was reinforced by a Henry, which he carried in a holster under his leg. For the ".45," he took fifty rounds. A second fifty, designed for the rifle, occupied the loops of his belt. Thus armed and provisioned, he jogged out of town.

Good fortune made the journey almost uneventful. He saw but one Indian, who loped into sight from a wooded bottom, and turned tail when Lounsbury levelled his gun. Twice only did he come upon signs of savages. Toward the middle of the first night, he passed a pile of glowing embers, where food had been cooked and eaten; and fifty miles lower down, the next afternoon, as he dismounted at a rivulet, the cayuse shied from an antelope kid that had dragged itself to the water for a last drink. There was an arrow through its neck, and the little body was still limber.

Just before dawn, the second morning, he turned with the river, crossed the coulÉe, and reined upon the yellowing bend. To his left, a black dot, stood the shack. Three smaller dots were near it—Simon and the mule team. South, on the opposite bank, were the low, whitewashed buildings of Fort Brannon. He bared his dust-powdered head in thanksgiving.

The cayuse was warm and dripping. He rode to Shanty Town, loosened the cinch, and led the animal up and down before the deserted huts. When it stopped blowing and reached for grass, he picketed it on a lariat north of The Trooper's Delight. Then he descended to the landing. The light was growing. Already he had been seen from the post. On his hallooing, a small boat shoved off toward him, dancing its way against the current. Old Michael was not in it, only his citizen helpers. Fearing their tittle-tattle, Lounsbury curbed his impatience to ask about the shack. Landed, he made for the "Bach" quarters on the Line.

Fraser was not up. To his "Come in," Lounsbury entered. They shook hands without a word, and the storekeeper sat down on the edge of the bed.

After a while, the lieutenant reached out to put a hand on the other's knee.

"Lounsbury," he said, "I feel like a criminal. But I never dreamed anything would go wrong if I kept track of Matthews."

"Why, we both thought that, Fraser. You're not to blame any more than I am."

"Oh, if I'd only——"

"But we can't spend any time kicking ourselves. After this there mustn't be a loophole. Besides watching Matthews, we must——""Matthews isn't here."

"What!"

"Kicked out. We don't know where he is." Rapidly, Fraser related the story of Simon's gallantry.

There was another piece of news of lesser importance: An Indian girl named Brown Mink was seriously ill. Her wigwam had been moved to the western curve of the stockade, where the ground was clear, and been changed from tepee-shape to the form of a walled wickie-up. Mrs. Cummings, touched with pity, had sent her a comfortable bed, while Captain Oliver, touched no less, and pleased by the good-humour of his prisoners, had ordered that, during the daily search of the enclosure, the tent of the sick girl be left entirely undisturbed.

The young officer omitted to tell of his share in the interpreter's departure, and was distracted over an accident that had befallen him. On visiting his wild pets the previous evening, he had found that a box containing reptiles had been broken open, somehow, and that all his rattlesnakes were gone!

With the first call for the trumpeters, Lounsbury routed the sutler in a quest for breakfast. Then, once more he sought the river. There was no waiting for men to row him. He found the small boat, headed for the beach below Shanty Town, mounted the cayuse, and climbed the steep road to the prairie. Before him, on a green stretch between river and shack, he saw Dallas.

She was cutting grass in that same swale across which, a month before, had been tracked the deep-planted, laboured footprints. As she mowed, she moved forward slowly, the bent snathe describing a regular half-circle, the long, curved blade clearing a fragrant path. Her hat was off, and lay at a distance behind her, where it floated, boat-like, on some blue-stem tops. Still farther behind was Simon, cropping industriously, and keeping a furtive watch upon his mistress out of the corner of one fiery brown eye.

Lounsbury spurred his horse to a run. She saw him coming, but not knowing him, kept her scythe on the swing. When he had covered the greater part of the way, however, she stopped work, retreated to her hat, and put it on. Then, from beside it, she picked up the Sharps.

He saw that, and his jaw squared. The blood darkened his face, too, as if the sight shamed him. He spurred faster, reined so sharply that the horse slid upon its fetlocks, and swung off.

"Dallas!" he cried. It was not a greeting, but a plea.

The moment was one long dreamed of, yearned for. A woman less genuine might have met it without a show of feeling. She—outspoken and simple—could not. Her eyes swam. Dropping the gun, she clasped his hand greedily.

"I knew you'd get back quick as you could," she said, choking.

For a long moment they stood thus, hand-in-hand, looking at each other. She saw that he was changed. The glint of merriment was gone from his eyes. His forehead bore new lines. His mouth had lost its boyishness. With her, the past four weeks had also left their mark. The old look of high purpose was on her face. But she was older and graver, and wore the new expression that Oliver had seen.She spoke first. "Your mother?" she faltered inquiringly, and withdrew a step.

"My mother—is gone," he said slowly. Then, after a pause, "I came right after that; didn't stop to settle things. I can go back to the States later. But if I'd been here sooner—it mightn't 'a' happened——"

She checked him gently. "Now, you got enough to worry you without us. We wouldn't go to the Fort or Bismarck. And that was the whole trouble." To excuse her father, and to take the blame herself, she told him of the refusal of David Bond's money, and of Mrs. Cummings' slight.

"You see," she explained earnestly, by way of putting the best possible colour to the latter episode, "you see, they think over there that we're trash. So they're bound to let us alone. It ain't that they haven't good manners——"

It was Lounsbury's turn to interrupt. He was tramping about. "Manners!" he said violently; "manners! what's manners to do with it? There's a lot that's good manners—and cursed bad heart!"

She took up the scythe, brought a whetstone from the depths of a pocket and ran it down the blade thoughtfully.

"I'm going to look into this whole business from first to last," he went on more quietly. "I'll spend the next few days investigating. You got my letter?"

"We went to Clark's for you, and got it there." She added that she had feared Braden, and spoke of his slack courtesy.

"Oh, well," he said, partly in apology for the real-estate agent, "if a man out here don't take off his hat to a girl, that means nothing."

"It wasn't the hat," she answered, and described Braden's further conduct.

Lounsbury blazed up again. "I'll see about that, too," he declared. "He must be another sample of imported manners."

They heard the cheery grinding of a coffee-mill. As if struck by a thought, she looked toward the shack.

"It's about time for me to go in," she said, a little flurried. Then, "Won't—won't you come, too, and take a snack with us? Marylyn'd like to see you."

"Marylyn!" He had read her meaning. "Why, Dallas, you don't meant to say that you—that she still——"

"Yes," very low.

"Well,"—Lounsbury was determined now,—"there's got to be some kind of an understanding. I told you how I felt, and you ran away from me. You shan't do it this time. I'll go to the house, and I'll tell Marylyn just how things are. I will."

"Oh, my baby sister!" she murmured.

Instantly, he was all gentleness. "No—no, I won't tell her," he said. "But I'm sick and tired of being tied this way, hand and foot. It was your father first. And now this again—Dallas!"

She could not answer him.

"I won't tell her. I'll wait till—till you do. But, you see that I can't go to the house. And I suppose I oughtn't to stay here any longer, for her to see. But I'm coming back here to-night—at taps."She shook her head. "Marylyn would be alone," she said hastily. "So—so I can't."

"You will, I know you will. She'll be asleep."

"No—no——"

"At taps, Dallas." He touched the hand that held the scythe upright. She thought all at once how worn he was, and white. Another moment, he had mounted and was cantering off.

Left alone, she dreaded going into breakfast, expecting a hurt silence, or passionate protests, perhaps tears. And she tried to find it in her heart to blame Lounsbury for not accompanying her.

But Marylyn welcomed her with a question or two, exclaimed sorrowfully at the news of Lounsbury's mother, and, when the elder girl explained that the storekeeper had been too busy to come to the shack, returned a faint smile.

"The brave baby!" thought Dallas.

But Marylyn was puzzling over Lounsbury's true reason for staying away—now when their father was not there to object. He had told Dallas he was busy. That, however, was only a pretext. Finally she concluded that Fraser, in spite of his promise, had made a confidant of the storekeeper, and that the latter had seen the hopelessness of his affection for her.

"I'm glad," she said to herself. "Now, I won't have to tell him."

Lounsbury pursued a feverish investigation that day, and found no one who cared to quibble with him. From the captain, never jealous of his dignity, to the roly-poly sutler, there was a very outrush of facts. As they came, he received them with pitchfork sharpness, examined them and tossed them aside, which led a wag to remark that the storekeeper was kin to Simon. Yet, when "retreat" sounded, he admitted himself hedged in by indisputable testimony. Lancaster's death was beyond easy solving. If Matthews were guilty, he was not the principal, only an accessory, to the crime. Nevertheless, could the storekeeper have come face to face with the interpreter that day, scores would have been settled.

To Dallas, laying the blue-stem of the swale, the hours of the morning went slowly. Yet how warm and golden they seemed! how tuneful the birds! how cottony-white the clouds that flecked the sky! how pleasant the long, hushing sound of the scythe! And all the while, she thrilled with expectancy, and the minutes hung upon each other, as if loath to pass.

The very keenness of her joy brought a swift revulsion. At dinner, with Marylyn sitting across from her, she began to see more clearly. She realised she had been dreaming; that for her there was only self-denial. She ate nothing, but drank her dipper thirstily, as if to wash away a parch in her throat. Back in the swale again, the scythe was swung less steadily, but with more strength, so that its sharp tip often hacked up the ground. She pulled her hat over her eyes, forbore glancing toward the fort—and fought. A thousand times she vowed she would not meet Lounsbury that night. To give herself a better whip-hand, she called up pictures of Marylyn—Marylyn, the baby, all dimples and lisping demands for "Dals!" Marylyn, the child, slender, yellow-haired, pale; Marylyn, entering womanhood, still dependent, and, in her frailty, her pensiveness, more dear than ever before.

Then, with the sun beating upon her, with her temples streaming and throbbing under the heat and the strain, Dallas' spirit began to flag. Had she not always borne a hard load? suffered discomforts? There were the women of the post—they knew little toil or privation. The brunt of her mother's loss, her father's taking, had fallen upon her. Was she always to have only sorrow? Now, when happiness came her way—a happiness that another might not have—must she be denied it? Disheartened, dizzy, she left the swale for the shade of the nearest trees.

It was the hottest part of the day, and the life of the prairie seemed at a standstill. No breeze stirred the high cottonwoods; the corn blades were quiet; the birds, song-less; the frogs, hid. Resting on the fading green, looking out upon the silent reaches, she grew calm. Then she remembered her sister's confession. Again, in fancy, she was leaning down in the light of a winter fire, looking into a tear-stained face. She felt humiliation for her own weakness, and for thoughts disloyal to Marylyn.

"When I see him again, I'll make him promise to come and visit her," she said. "Oh, he must! he must!" At last, renewed in spirit, she returned bravely to her work.

But the afternoon was not without its tormenting thoughts. And she, who feared no physical danger, quailed before a temptation that was overwhelming.

When the shack pointed a stubby finger toward the east, and the mules, with Simon in tag, came trailing home from their grazing, Marylyn called her. Near the door, there wafted out the good smell of corn-pone and roasting fowl. She drew up the well-bucket, hand over hand, and washed in its generous leak.

Within, the night wind was changing and sweetening the air. As the younger girl bustled about, the elder put on a fresher dress, and smoothed and plaited her hair. Again, that strange elation! She was almost glad.

"Supper!" sang out Marylyn.

Dallas started consciously. She was standing at a window, holding before her the broken bit of looking-glass.