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 pressed it in those words, pressing Dunham cordially to come in when it got lively and welt the planks.

Few people came up as far as MacKinnon's hotel, as it was on the outer boundary of activities, the first house one came to on arriving, the last one he sought when his load got too heavy to carry around. It would be hours before unsteady feet began to thread the wavering planks toward MacKinnon's door. But one man would come there presently, Dunham knew, sauntering insolently, to learn if his order had been obeyed.

Dunham was not greatly disturbed over the issue of the adventure before him; he did not march up and down in feverish anticipation, nor fret himself with unpleasant conjectures. He was engaged chiefly with thought of the impositions they had attempted to put on him in that town, bitterly resentful of the persistent, mocking misunderstanding that seemed to follow him. It was as if the shadow of his past days of poverty and oppression had taken wing like a swift bird and arrived at Pawnee Bend with him.

He was too wise, he knew too much about a gun and the chances of unexpected variation, to lay any plans for action ahead of the moment Ford Kellogg should confront him. By a moongleam he read his watch. Seven minutes to nine; and the girl called Zora was coming out of MacKinnon's door.

Strange that he hadn't seen her go in. She must have come while he was on his way to that spot, and now she was heading in that direction, going to the depot to wait for her father's train. He walked to the other side of the broad street, to avoid startling her in case