My words are only crawling for lack of wings; my brain's like ashes when it needs to be live fire. I have no brains or words to talk of what I've seen, and I reckon I'm a lot incompetent. The men who wrote the Bible ought to be turned loose on this earth again to make another book. Then folks who have not seen might understand such places as the Painted Desert, the Rock City, and the Grand CaÑon of the Colorado.

What with delays in packing and driving I had to track Curly for maybe thirty miles before I caught her up at Clay Flat by the edge of the forest. Her horse was dead, and she sat beside him, her stone-white face set cold, staring straight ahead. Below us lay the Painted Desert, so wide that the further edge was lost in mist. We rode down to the trickle of water at the bottom, then up the further side, and all the rock lay in belts red as flame, yellow as gold, purple as violets, which seemed to shine of their own light, burning us. The men who stop in that country mostly go mad, the which is natural. Beyond we came out on a mesa of naked rock and sand-drifts, where we found a pool between high cliffs, splashed through it, and maybe a dozen miles beyond found after nightfall a few plants of grass. We had covered a hundred and ten miles at a tearing pace that day, changing horses, robber fashion, at every halt we made.

Next morning we met up with small bunches of Navajo Indians, a strange breed of people, dressed up in their private brown skins, with great plenty of turquoise necklace, silver harness, and a wisp of breech clout, riding with bows and arrows to hunt rabbits. They handed a few arrows after us; but their ponies could not run, so we quit their company.

Then we came to the City of Rocks, flaming red, and high as mountains; their thousand-foot walls sheer to the desert, all carved in needle spires, towers, castles, palaces. The street was six miles wide, I reckon, and we rode along it maybe fifty miles, like crawling flies in the sand.

Beyond the city we curved around by a gap in the desert, a sort of crack half a mile deep, with a river along the bottom. It swung about like a snake, getting deeper and deeper; but we kept to the level desert, until we reached a little side caÑon, where there was feed and water. We resaddled there, taking Curly's buckskin and my pet horse Sam. The rest of our bunch we turned down into that pasture, and left them, riding on along the rim rock.

Just after sundown we came abrupt to what looked like the end of the world, a gulf so deep that we couldn't see to the bottom. That mighty gash in the earth is six hundred miles in length, it's usually ten miles wide; it's more than a sheer mile deep, and full of mountain ranges all shaped like gigantic buildings. Dead weary as I was from riding more than two hundred miles in forty-eight hours, I forgot about being tired when I saw that place, the most tremendous thing in the whole earth, the Grand CaÑon of the Colorado.

There was no rest for us, but seven miles of such a break-neck trail as I'd never imagined possible, for it overhung black death from start to finish, looping round the face of outrageous cliffs which seemed to have no bottom. Midnight was past before we got to camp beside the river, flung off the harness, turned the horses loose, and dropped in our tracks to sleep.

A gunshot roused me, and starting broad awake I heard the echoes crashing from wall to wall.

"It's only me," said Curly, "signalling."

Dark banks of fog were driving over our heads, and I shivered with the dawn cold. Then I looked up, and more than a mile in the air saw scarlet cliffs ablaze in the sunlight. The river rolled beside our camp, wide as the Thames in London, grey water so thick that splashes of it harden into mud. A gunshot answered from the further bank, then Curly gave the cougar war-howl. The yelp of a wolf came back.

"Both boats," said Curly, "are on this side of the river—something gawn wrong. Cook breakfast while I cross."

She took a little crazy boat and towed it upstream, scrambling over boulders a quarter-mile or so. From there she pulled the boat across the great grey sluice, fetching the other bank after a half-mile drift downstream. There was a strong backwater along that further bank, and she pulled easy, drifting past the camp up to a rocky headland. The man who had answered the signals was waiting there to throw his saddle into the boat, and follow, leading two horses so they could swim behind. By the time they crossed again I had our two horses to camp, and breakfast waiting.

It was not until after he fed, and he laid in provisions generous, that this robber—his name was Pieface—had a word to say. He took no more notice of me than if I was dead, and when he talked with Curly he sat close beside her whispering. I hearing nothing; but allow I thought a heap, for this man's face was bad, the very look of him was poison. My gun was plenty ready while I watched.

"Chalkeye," says Curly out aloud, but her eyes were set on this ladrone all the while. "This Pieface says that ten of our boys were sent down to wait for the ransom. They were camped at Clay Flat, you remember?"

"I ain't much forgetful," says I, for this meant that all the cowards had deserted! We had seen no men at Clay Flat.

"The chief," says Curly, "is right on his ear, and sends this Pieface to find out what's wrong at Clay Flat."

When this Pieface person had hit the trail, we took both boats across the river and swam our horses. From the far bank our way turned sharp to the left into the side CaÑon of Dirty Devil Creek. There we rode along some miles in the water, so as to leave no trail; then, quitting the bottom, turned sharp back up a ledge, threading the face of the cliffs. The heat was blinding; it seemed as if we were being baked alive, and even my tanned hide broke out in blisters. Curly allowed this cliff was over six thousand feet high, and the trail kept circling round red buttresses, flanks of broken rock, to one sheer cape where nothing lay below us but blue space. Then we swung into a little arroyo with trickling water, shady trees, and a gentle glade until we reached the summit. At the rim rock a robber halted us, until Curly pushed her hat-brim up, showing her face. She answered for me, and we rode on through level pine woods. I noticed horse tracks scattering everywhere, but no trail whatever; and then even the horse-tracks petered out. I looked back, and there was not a sign to show the way we had come. For the first mile we headed towards where the sun would set, now we swung around on a long curve until we pointed north-east. I might just as well have been blindfold.

"Curly," I asked, "is this Main Street?"

"I reckon," she laughed. "Could you find the way back?"

Once before she had told me that no trails led to the stronghold.

Then away to the left I saw a big corral, with a dust of horses inside, and men sitting round on the top rail, maybe a dozen of them. Beyond it lay a streak of open water, and right in front loomed a house, set in the standing woods, where one could hardly see a hundred paces. It was a ranche house of the usual breed, log-built, low-pitched, banked up around with earth as high as the loopholes, and at each end against the gable stood a dry stone chimney. Two or three men stood in the doorway smoking, and but for the fact that they packed their guns when at home, they looked like the usual cowboys. The dogs were plenty exuberant, but Curly might have been out shooting rabbits for all the fuss that these men made about her coming.

We unsaddled and set our horses loose.

"Wall, Curly," asked one of the robbers, "got any liquor along?"

"Nary a smell."

Then McCalmont came round the end of the house, dusty after some argument with a broncho, trailing his rope while he coiled it.

"So, home at last," says he, shaking a paw with me right hearty. "Wall, I'm sure pleased at you, Curly."

"Come to repawt," says Curly, mighty cool, but I saw that her eyes were ranging around for Jim. An olla of water hung from the eave by the door, and McCalmont passed the dipper to me first. Then while Curly drank he introduced me to Crazy Hoss, Black Stanley, and his brother Dave, who made out that they were glad to see me, though their looks said different.

Then the Captain asked me in, and we followed Curly through the mess-house door. The log walls were hung with antlers, skins lay on the floor before the big hearth at the end, and down the middle, with benches on either side, ran the long table with its oilcloth cover, the tinware set out for supper, and netting to keep off flies. That cow camp looked good to me, home-like and soothing. Off to the left of the messroom opened a little lean-to house—McCalmont's den—with a cubby hole beyond it for Curly. We found her sitting on the bunk, gun and spurs unbuckled, and holding her legs out for the old man to pull off her shaps. I unharnessed myself, and he fed me a cigar, bidding me to settle in a cow-hide chair. I felt right to home then.

"Dad," says Curly abrupt, "whar's my Jim?"

"What, you ain't met him?" says McCalmont. "He's gone to look for you."

Curly went pale under the tan, and gulped. "How long?" she asked.

"Oh, quite a time. Why, child, what's scart you? Perhaps he's with my boys at Painted Desert."

"Daddy, I've brought bad news."

"I reckon"—McCalmont spoke very low—"I been thar before a few times, and yet we've worried along. Lie down, so you'll get mo' rest."

He sat on the edge of the bunk, his hand on hers, as she lay loosing out bit by bit the story of the ransom lost, the Federal Government on the warpath, ten good men deserted. He was all crouched up when she finished, the stub of a cigarette burning his fingers, and he looked very old.

I went to get the newspapers which I'd kept in my warbags for him, and when I came back he turned loose a volley of questions, searching me to the bones until he had all the truth.

"Well, well," he said at last, with a queer smile, "these yere official parties seem to be takin' quite an interest, eh? I thank you, seh, and I'm full satisfied." Then he stood up. "You must be kinder hungry, Misteh Davies. Spose you jest interview my cook. I think that you and him has met before, and won't need introducin'. My son and I will join you presently."

I strayed out through the messroom and found the kitchen beyond. Sure enough the cook and I were acquainted, although I had not expected to see this particular person in shirt and overalls, and his bare arms white with flour. He was plenty absorbed too, dipping balls of chopped meat into a pan full of mess.

"How air you, seh?"

He shied right off his feet and turned to face me, looking as guilty as a caught fox.

"I guessed as much," he gasped; "all blackguards are bound to flock together here."

"Glad to meet you, Mr. Ryan," says I.

Then he collected himself for war. "State your business, and get right out of here. I'm engaged!"

"I'm engaged likewise"—I sat down on a box, and a dog came fawning to me—"wharas this dog is polite, and sets an example. He's plumb full of decorum and depawtment."

I hardly know what possessed me. Ryan's looks perhaps, or the way he guarded those meat balls. I grabbed the nearest, and fed it to the dog so quick that Ryan had only time enough to give himself dead away.

"Leave that dawg alone!" says I. He quit resisting me then, backed to the log wall, and stood glaring.

"I've noticed," says I, "in dawgs that the smaller the dawg, the larger the bark. I knew one onced so small that he hadn't room to hold his bark—and the recoil tharfrom threw him back three dawg lengths. You seem to suffer a whole lot from yo' recoil, Mr. Ryan."

"I guess," he said in his harsh Yankee twang, "that you're a low-down coward—torturing me because you know I'm helpless."

"That dawg," says I, "is acting sort of queer, eh? As to my being a coward, Mr. Ryan, you'll remember the last time we met I came buttin' along to yo' hotel in Grave City commenting on yo' proceedings with a straight tongue, and guns to back the same."

"Come to the point," says he.

"Now this yere is what I'm trailin's up to, seh, that I bears neither guns nor malice, calls no names, bridles my tongue severe, treats you with plenty and gentle inquiries, whar do you keep yo' manners?"

"Where you keep your honesty," says he, sort of sarcastic. "You know I can't escape, so I've got to listen. Talk, my good man, and when you're through you can go."

The town scout still had his office manners, a lot contemptuous. He climbed up on top of his vanity—like a frog on a ladder—to call me "my good man." And yet I had tamed him enough for business.

"I take notice," says I, "that on the shelf above yo' haid there's a tin of rough-on-rats. This condiment is maybe unusual in meat balls, and it seems to affect yo' dawg some poignant, with wiggles and froth on the jaws. He's swelling up, too. I likewise remarks that thar's enough of these high-flavored meat balls to go through McCalmont and all his riders. May I politely ask how long you been cook for this ranche?"

"Mind your own business."

"Which is to further test these same delicacies by trying a meat ball on you."

He grabbed a long butcher-knife from the table.

"Try it," says he.

"Maybe I'd better call in Captain McCalmont. Shall I shout for him?"

Ryan dropped the knife.

"What do you want to know?"

"How long you have been cook?"

"Since yesterday. I've been helping a man named Pieface."

"Why did he quit?"

"Got a note by carrier pigeon. He was in charge of McCalmont's pigeons."

"You found the note after he left?"

"Yes."

"Hand it over."

He said bad words.

"I notice," says I, "that the meat ball has finished with yo' dawg."

He took a slip of paper from his hip-pocket.

"No ransom," I read. "Warn the boys."

"Were the boys warned?"

"No."

"The news made you sort of desperate?"

"They'll kill me when they know!"

"So you took precautions first?"

"Why do you torture me?"

"Prefer a meat-ball?"

"Go on, sir."

"I might be induced to hide away these delicacies. Also this"—I kicked the dog's carcass—"in fact to help you some. You could bury the past, and resign yo' post as cook."

"The news will come out, and I'll be murdered anyway. What's the good?"

"There being no ransom," says I, "the use for you here ain't much conspicuous. As a cook you're precarious, too. Suppose I get you turned loose?"

"I'll pay one hundred thousand dollars the day you set me free in the nearest town."

How could I tell the poor brute that he had not a dollar left in the whole world?

"Two hundred thousand," says he, "and that's my last word."

A man came to the door behind me, which opened on the yard. There hung a long iron crowbar, bent up in the form of a triangle. The man began to beat this with a horseshoe, and the sound would carry maybe a quarter-mile.

"Name your own terms," says Ryan. "Come, name your price!"

"You does me too much honour," says I, for how could I tell him the facts?

"What do I care for your honour?" Ryan had played like a sneaking coyote before, but now he talked out like a man. "I've bought better men than you with a hundred dollars, and now I'm going to insult you with hard cash. Your price, you thief!"

The sound of the gong must have been a gathering signal, for men were straying in from the corrals, and there was soon a tramping of feet and buff of talk from the messroom at my back.

"D'ye think," says Ryan, "that I'd be under any obligations to such as you? I ask no favours. I only try to make it worth your while to do what's right for once. Come, have you any manhood in you? I appeal to your manhood to save me. Oh, turn your back, you hound!"

I ran to my saddle in the yard, opened my warbags, grabbed out a pad of paper and fountain-pen, then pushed my way through the growing crowd about the messroom doors, until I won back to the kitchen.

"Ryan," says I, "set down on that meat block, and write down what I say in yo' own words."

"What new treachery is this?" he asked.

"If you want to live," I answered, "you'd best get a move on, and write."

The row in the messroom made it hard for him to hear, so I drew up close.

"Memorandum," says I, and he began to scribble; "date it 'Robbers' Roost, Utah.'"

"But this is California!"

"Write what I say, 'October 13th, 1900.'"

Michael Ryan confessed on oath how he had aided and abetted George Ryan in a plot to destroy Balshannon. He confessed to perjury at the Ryan inquest, naming the witnesses and the amounts he paid to each. He released the Holy Cross estate from all claims on the ground of debt, restoring the same to Jim. He swore that Jim, Curly, and I were not among the brigands who captured him, and he believed all three of us to be innocent.

As to these facts, I had to convince him with a meat ball, but in the end he signed.

Then I got in a brace of independent robbers to sign as witnesses, so the thing looked mighty legal and satisfying. Meanwhile in the messroom I could hear McCalmont calling his wolves to order, and my witnesses went away to hear his talk.

"Ryan," says I, sitting down beside him, "you know the points of the compass?"

"I guess."

"I'm going to explain the trail to the nearest settlement; see here." So I began to scribble out a map showing the lie of the CaÑons, the route to where we had left the boats, the signs to guide him beyond. "When you see this big butte towering high on the right——" I looked up, and found he was not listening, for he pointed his ears to the messroom where McCalmont talked.

"Yo're due to understand," the Captain was saying, "that this yere Ryan made a letter which he sent to his wife. He showed me the letter, and it was sure fine scholarship, telling her plain and clear how to scare up his ransom at once, how to deliver the same, and not make crooked plays to get us trapped. Mrs. Ryan she got the letter all right, but then some low-lived swab stole it away from her, and sold it to the N' York Megaphone."

Ryan let out a sudden cry.

"That's what's the matter," says McCalmont, "and all the private part of the letter got into print; whar Ryan confesses how he acted foul to pore young Jim du Chesnay. He confesses to perjury and bribing witnesses, an' sech-like acts of rotten treachery, which the general public havin' entrusted millions of money to this Ryan to hold and invest the same, ain't pleased when they larns his private manners and customs, or how his manhood proves itself up when tested. The public thinks it's been too trustful in confiding big wealth to a felon who is due to be gaoled for his sins and gathered into the penitentiary."

"Escape," says I to Ryan, "or you ain't got five minutes to live."

"Escape!" says he—"to penitentiary! Oh, Kathleen, Kathleen!" He covered his face with his hands, while McCalmont went on—

"So you see, boys, that the public closes down on this Ryan, and grabs theyr money, and jumps from under sudden, stampeding before the crash. This pore swab we got in the kitchen, which he cayn't even cook, ain't a millionaire any mo', but a bankrupt, due to get five years' grief for his acts, which is plumb felonious."

It seemed as if all the robbers were stunned with the news, for they made no move or sound. Only poor Ryan groaned, and I felt sick, because I knew it was too late for him even to run.

"Boys," says McCalmont, "this news is bad medicine for we-all, 'cause we done attracted too much attention, we made ourselves plenty conspicuous, and the United States has awoke to a smell of robbers. The nation has got a move on at last, and it's coming up again on us on every side to put our fires out. Ten of our men has deserted, and likewise the Pieface animal, so there'll be plenty guides to lead the attack on this place. I reckon our trails are blocked, our water-holes are held, our time is pretty near expired in this world. I tharfore propose that we divide up what plunder we got in store—the same being considerable—and all share alike, and after that we scatter as best we can. Those of us who win out of this trap is due to live, and those who don't will get a sure good fight."

I heard a voice call out, "Who brung this news?"

"The man who risked his life to bring this news is my friend Chalkeye Davies."

At that I whirled right in through the crowd in the messroom and won to McCalmont's side.

"I got to speak," says I.

The Captain grabbed my hand. "Boys, will you hear him?" he called.

"Spit it out!" says Crazy Hoss. "Yo're a sure enough man, and we'll hear."

"Boys," says I, "if you hold it good to have this warning in time to save yo' lives, I has to say that Curly McCalmont done it. He acted faithful when ten men and a swab deserted you complete, and Curly is shorely braver than any man I ever seen in this world. I speaks for Curly and me, and for the Captain, when I says that it's a hull lot pitiful to see the way this Ryan person has acted straight to own up the wrong he done, and played his cyards honest in the matter of ransom. We asks you to spare the life of this yere Ryan."

Crazy Hoss reared up swift to open war against me.

"I'll spare him!" he shouted. "I'll spare him a gunload of lead! What's yo' game, stranger? Show down yo' hand, and let's see this hull crooked lay-out. I stood at the loophole thar to watch yo' play, I seen you workin over this yere prisoner until he's plumb subdued, and offering bribes. You catch him with a can full of wolf-bait pizen, preparin' the same for our supper; you feed his meat ball to his dawg, which dies on the floor between you; you threatens to stuff another down Ryan's throat; then you makes him good talk till he signs a paper, and now you arises here to recite his virtues, playin' to save his life. Show down yo' game!"

By this time I was facing a matter of twenty revolvers, all a-quiver to drive holes through my poor old hide. Some yelled that Ryan had bribed me, some that I was projecting the death of the whole gang by Ryan's poison.

I threw up my hand, showing the peace sign quick.

"After you!" I called, always willing to oblige—"after you. Shoot first, and hear me afterwards, eh? That's right, boys. You see, I pack no gun, 'cause I'm yo' guest."

The guns were put away.

"You've heard," says I, "from Misteh Crazy Hoss how I subdued this Ryan and got a quittance for Jim du Chesnay from the charge of murder. I'm his guardian, boys. Furthermore, you heard from Misteh Crazy Hoss a plumb truthful account of how I saved this whole crowd from being wolf-bait fed to us for our supper—the same being considered unwholesome. Now, as to this pore little felon, he put up the only play he knew to save hisself from being murdered. He ain't a lion to fight with teeth, or a man to distribute gunfire on his enemies; but his back's to the wall and he puts up the best little fight he knows about. He, bein' a sure snake, uses poison, whereat, having drawn his fangs, I takes his side, and begs the critter's life. I want to have him for a curio to put in my collection, and I offers ten cents for the same—which is more'n he's worth."

"Boys," said McCalmont, "if this yere Chalkeye didn't allus take the weaker side, he'd be a rich man still, instead of an outlaw herdin' with our gang as his last refuge."

The robbers seemed to like me some better now, and a feeling of popularity began to glow on my skin.

"But," says McCalmont, "in the matter of this yere snake, he acts plumb erroneous. If the snake escapes to give evidence, he can identify the entire gang, Chalkeye included. Go—kill that snake!"

Crazy Hoss rushed to the kitchen. "Gawn!" he yelled. "Escaped! So this is yo' game, Mr. Chalkeye!"

"Kill him! kill him!"

"Halt!" McCalmont faced the rush against me—outroared the shouting. "Back, or I fire! Back, you curs! Deal with this business afterwards—we want the snake first! Whar's them smell-dawgs? Here, Powder! Powder! Here, you Rip; come on, lil' dawg! Crazy Hoss, you put on them dawgs to the scent, track down this Ryan, and kill him. Then come back."

The dogs were put on Ryan's trail. "Go, get 'im, Rip! Sick 'im, Powder! Tear 'im and eat 'im! Come along, boys!" So the whole crowd poured away to track Ryan.

McCalmont grabbed me by the arm to hold me back.

"You fool," he hissed through his teeth, "come on—there's not a moment to lose—or them wolves will get you! Curly! Curly, come out, you, and fetch Chalkeye's gun. Chalkeye, you come quick."

Curly came running from the little hind room with our guns, while McCalmont rushed me to the kitchen. "Here," he said, "hold this sack for grub!"

"Not them meat balls," says I; "meat balls is out of season."

"All right," he laughed, pitching a half-sack of flour into the bag which I held, then a side of bacon, and such other truck as was handy. "Curly, you knows whar to take this man?"

"Come along," says Curly. And I followed tame, with the sack on my shoulder until we gained the woods.

"Back!" says Curly sudden, and dodged for cover, while I dropped flat behind a fallen tree. Looking from under, I saw Ryan come surging past in front of us, screeching like all possessed, the smell-dogs at his tail, and the robbers swarming close behind.

"A near thing that," says Curly, when they had passed; "creep through under the log."

I crept through with my sack, and she followed.

"Lie low," she said; "we're hidden here from the ranche until we can run some more. Get out yo' gun."

They say that we white men, using our right hands mostly, is strongest on that side, and apt to bear to the left when we don't take note how we run. Anyway, Ryan, instead of circling south, had circled to the left and lost himself, then, when he found he was hunted, went off his head complete. He was back in the yard now, close beside the house, where McCalmont headed him off with a shot from the door, while the robbers spread out half circling. They laughed and shouted.

"My turn first!" says Crazy Hoss.

"Take his off ear, Crazy!"

The shot took Ryan's right ear; then Spotty fired, lopping off the left. The poor brute tried to bolt, but a bullet swung him around. He lifted his hands for mercy, but the next shot smashed his wrist. He screamed, and a bullet caught his teeth. Curly was yelling now, but nobody noticed, for Ryan was down on his knees, and his face was being ripped to pieces. Then I saw McCalmont fire, and one of his dogs dropped dead. He fired again, and killed the other hound. He had saved me from being tracked.

"Quit firing!" he shouted, and the robbers threatened him. "Now," he yelled at them, "who wants to talk war agin my friend Davies and me?"

"Come away," says Curly; and I crept after her.

A man's legs are naturally forked to fit onto a horse, and mine have never been broke to walking afoot. Fact is my legs act resentful when I walk, making me waddle all the same as a duck; which it humbles me to think of, because that Curly person loaded a sack on my withers, and herded me along like a pack mule until I felt no better than a spavined, groaning wreck. We must have gone afoot more than two whole miles before we came out at last on the edge of the Grand CaÑon.

At this place, right in under the rim rock, there was a hidden cavern—a fine big place when you got down there, but a scary climb to reach. Half-way down the rock ladder I grabbed a root, which turned out to be a young rattlesnake, and was so surprised that I pretty near took flight. Curly saved me that time from being an angel—which leads me to remark that there's lots of people better adapted to that holy vocation than me.

It was dark when we got to the cavern, but next morning I saw that it was a sure fine hiding-place, the floor being covered with a whole village of old stone houses. There are thousands of cliff villages like this in the caÑon country, made by some breed of Indians long gone dead, but this one had special conveniences, because you could spit from the outer wall into sheer eternity. Seeing how the robbers were warped in their judgments of me, and the authorities likewise prejudiced, my health required plenty seclusion then. We stayed in that hole for a week.

Curly was restive, quitting me at night to range the woods and visit the ranche, collecting everything useful which was small enough and loose enough to pull. She got four horses into a hidden pasture, with saddles for the same, and chuck to feed us when we should hit the trail. The plunder was good, but the news she brought smelt bad of coming trouble, for the robbers stayed to quarrel over their shares of past thievings. When they broke to scatter, the trails were all blocked with troops, and then they were herded back into the ranche. On the fourth day I had to make Curly prisoner, while from noon to dusk the battle raged at the stronghold, and she wanted to go and die at her father's side. All that night and the day that followed I kept the poor girl quiet with my gun, then when the darkness came I let her free.

I don't like to think of what happened next, because I reckon that if I wash my outside I ought likewise to keep my inside clean and tidy with nice thoughts. Getting our horses, Curly and I rode back to Robbers' Roost, pulling up at the edge of the clearing just as the new moon lifted above the pines. The stench of death, black ruins, white ashes, dark patches where blood had dried upon the dust, everywhere broken corpses—coyotes creeping to cover, eagles flapping heavily away—my soul felt small and humble in that place. Black it was and silver under the moon, with something moving slow from corpse to corpse in search—a live man counting the dead. Something in the way he moved reminded me I must have known that man, but the little partner called to him all at once—

"Jim!" Her voice went low and clear across the silence. "Jim!"