Page:Edison Marshall--The voice of the pack.djvu/304

286 them?" Cranston asked. His lips drew up in a smile, but there was no smile in the tone of his words.

"You 're right," Dan told him, and he stepped nearer. "Not only for that, Cranston. We 're face to face at last—hands to hands. I 've got a knife in my pocket, but I'm not even going to bring it out. It's hands to hands—you and I—until everything's square between us."

"Perhaps you 've forgotten that day on the ridge?" Cranston asked. "You have n't any woman to save you this time."

"I remember the day, and that's part of the debt. The thing you did yesterday is part of it too. It's all to be settled at last, Cranston, and I don't believe I could spare you if you went to your knees before me. You 've got a clearing out by the fire—big as a prize ring. We 'll go out there—side by side. And hands to hands we 'll settle all these debts we have between us—with no rules of fighting and no mercy in the end!"

They measured each other with their eyes. Once more Cranston's gaze stole to his rifle, but lunging out, Dan kicked it three feet farther into the shadows of the lean-to. Dan saw the dark face drawn with passion, the hands clenching, the shoulder muscles growing into