that no human being was between him and the horizon. He turned again toward the woman. He felt an overpowering desire to look on her face.

For years there had been no women in his world but the abandoned creatures who sought shelter in the resorts of Beer City in No-Man's Land--these, and the squaws of the reservations, and occasionally a white terrified face among the wagon-trains. As a boy, before running away from home in the Middle West, he had known a different order of beings, and some instinct told him that this woman belonged to the class of his childhood's association. There was imperative need of his hurrying to the mountain, lest, at any moment, a roving band of Indians discover the abandoned wagon; besides this, he was very hungry since his rest, and the wagon was stocked with provisions; nevertheless, to look on the face of the dead was his absorbing desire.

But it was not easy for him to yield to his curiosity, despite his life of crime. Something about the majestic repose of that form seemed to add awe to the mystery of sex; and he crouched staring at the cloth which no breath stirred save the breath of evening.

He believed, now, the story that Henry Gledware had reiterated in accents of abject terror. Surely this was the "last wagon" in that train which Red Kimball had attacked the morning before. Impossible as it had seemed to the highwaymen, Gledware must have been warned of the attack in time to turn about and lash his horses out of danger of discovery. At this spot, Gledware had cut loose the horses, mounted one with his stepdaughter, leaving the other to go at will. This, then, was the mother of that child whose arm had lain in warm confidence about his neck. On hands and knees, Willock crept to the other mattress and lifted the margin of the large white cloth.

His hand moved stealthily, slowly. Catching sight of something that faintly gleamed at the collar of the dress, he hesitated; his determination to examine the countenance was as firm as ever, but his impulse to put it off as long as possible was even stronger. He bent down to look closer at the ornament; it was a round breastpin of onyx and pearl set in a heavy rim of gold. The warm wind, tempered by approaching night to a grateful balminess, stirred the cloth between his fingers. He stared as if lost in profound meditation. That pin resembled one his mother used to wear; and, somehow, the soothing touch of the wind reminded him of her hand on his forehead. He might have gone back home, if she had not died long ago. Now, in spite of the many years that had passed over her grave, the memory of her came as strong, as sweet, as instinct with the fullness of life, as, if he were suddenly wafted back into boyhood.

He did not lift the cloth, after all, but having replaced it gently, he searched the wagon for a spade. It was found in the box fastened to the end of the wagon, and with the spade, in the gathering darkness, he dug a grave near the mountainside. Between the strokes of the blade he sent searching glances over the prairie and along the sloping ridges of the overlooking range, but there were no witnesses of his work save the coyotes that prowled like gray shadows across the sands. When the grave was ready he carried thither in his giant's arms the body of the woman on the mattress, and laid it thus to rest. When the sand was smoothed over the place, he carried thither quantities of heavy stones, and broken blocks of granite, to preserve the body from wild beasts.

It was dark when the heap of stones had been arranged in the form of a low pyramid, but though he had not tasted food for twenty-four hours, he lingered beside the grave, his head bent as if still struggling with those unwonted memories of the long ago. At last, as if forced by a mysterious power against which he could no longer resist, he sank upon his knees.

"O God," he prayed aloud, "take care of the little girl."

He waited, but no more words would come--no other thought. He rose, feeling strangely elated, as if some great good fortune had suddenly come into his possession. It had been like this when the sleeping child lay in his arms; he could almost feel her little cheek against his bosom, and hear the soft music of her breathing.

He went back to the wagon and sat on the tongue, still oblivious to any possible danger of surprise. He spoke aloud, for company:

"She wouldn't have wanted me to look at her--she couldn't have looked natural. Glad I didn't. Great Scott! but that was a first-rate prayer! Wouldn't have thought after thirty years I could have done so well. And it was all there, everything was in them words! If she knew what I was doing, she couldn't have asked nothing more, for I reckon she wouldn't expect a man like ME to ask no favors for that white-livered cowardly second-husband of hers. I put in all my plea for the little girl. Dinged if I understand how I come to be so intelligent and handy at what's all new business to me! I just says, 'O God, take care of the little girl,'--just them words." He rose with an air of great content and went around to the front in search of provisions. Presently he spoke aloud:

"And as I ain't asked nothing for myself since I run off from home I guess God won't mind putting the little girl on my expense- account."

CHAPTER V A NEW ROBINSON CRUSOE

It came over him with disconcerting suddenness that he had lost a great deal of time, and that every moment spent in the covered wagon was fraught with imminent danger. It was not in his mind that the hand of highwaymen might discover his hiding-place. Knowing them as he did, he was sure they would not come so far from their haunts or from the Sante Fe train in pursuit of him. But the Indians roamed the Panhandle, as much at home there as in their reservations--and here they were much more dangerous. Had no savage eye discerned that wagon during the brilliant August day? Might it be that even while he slept at the feet of the dead woman, a feathered head had slipped under the canvas side, a red face had bent over him?

It was a disquieting fancy. Willock told himself that, had such been the case, his scalp-lock would not still adorn his own person; for all that, he was eager to be gone. Instead of eating in the wagon, he wrapped up some food in a bread-cloth, placed this with a few other articles in a tarpaulin--among them, powder and shot-- and, having lifted the keg of water to one shoulder, and the rope-bound tarpaulin to the other, he left the wagon with a loaded gun in his hand.

Twilight had faded to starlight and the mountain range stood blackly defined against the glittering stars. It was easy to find his way, for on the level sands there were no impediments, and when the mountain was reached, a low divide offered him easy passage up the ascent. For the most part the slopes were gradual and in steeper places, ledges of granite, somewhat like giant stairs, assisted him to the highest ridge. From this vantage-point he could see the level plain stretching away on the farther side; he could count the ridges running parallel to the one on which he had paused, and note the troughs between, which never descended to the level ground to deserve the name of valleys. Looking down upon this tortured mass of granite, he seemed gazing over a petrified sea that, in the fury of a storm, had been caught at the highest dashing of its waves, and fixed in threatening motion which throughout the ages would remain as calm and secure as the level waste that stretched from the abrupt walls in every direction.

On that first ridge he paused but a moment, lest his figure be outlined against the night for the keen gaze of some hidden foe. Steadying the keg with one hand and holding his gun alert, he descended into the first trough and climbed to the next ridge, meaning to traverse the mile of broken surface, thus setting a granite wall between him and the telltale wagon. The second ridge was not so high as the outer wall, and he paused here, feeling more secure. The ground was fairly level for perhaps fifty yards before its descent to the next rolling depression where the shadows lay in unrelieved gloom. On the crest, about him, the dim light defined broken boulders and great blocks of granite in grotesque forms, some suggesting fantastic monsters, others, in sharp-cut or rounded forms seemingly dressed by Cyclopean chisels.

The fugitive was not interested in the dimly defined shapes about him; his attention had been attracted by a crevice in the smooth rock ledge at his feet. This ledge, barren of vegetation, and as level as a slab of rough marble, showed a long black line like a crack in a stone pavement. At the man's feet the crevice was perhaps two feet wide, but as it stretched toward the west it narrowed gradually, and disappeared under a mass of disorganized stones, as a mere slit in the surface.

Presently he set the keg and the tarpaulin-ball on the ground, not to rest his shoulders, but in order to sink on his knees beside the crevice. He put his face down over it, listening, peering, but making no discovery. Then he unwound the lariat from about his waist, tied it to the rope that had been a halter, and having fastened a stone to one end, lowered it into the black space. The length of the lariat slipped through his fingers and the rope was following when suddenly the rock found lodgment at the bottom. On making this discovery he drew up the lariat, opened the cloth containing the food, and began to eat rapidly and with evident excitement. He did not fail to watch on all sides as he enjoyed his long delayed meal, and while he ate and thus watched, he thought rapidly. When the first cravings of appetite were partly satisfied, he left his baker's bread and bacon on a stone, tied up the rest of the food in its cloth, rolled this in the tarpaulin, and lowered it by means of the lariat into the crevice. Then, having tied the end of the rope to the gun-barrel, he placed the gun across the crevice and swung himself down into the gloom.

The walls of the crevice were so close together that he was able to steady his knees against them, but as he neared the bottom they widened perceptibly. His first act on setting foot to the stone flooring was to open the tarpaulin, draw forth a candle and a box of matches, and strike a light. The chamber of granite in which he stood was indeed narrow, but full of interest and romance. The floor was about the same width in all its length, wide enough for Willock, tall as he was, to stretch across the passage. It extended perhaps a hundred feet into the heart of the rock, showing the same smooth walls on either side. The ceiling, however, was varied, as the outward examination had promised. Overhead the stars were seen at ease through the two feet of space at the top; but as he carried his candle forward, this opening decreased, to be succeeded presently by a roof, at first of jumbled stones crushed together by outward weight, then of a smooth red surface extending to the end.