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 throwin' around. What did you say about an appointment with a man?"

"I'm due to meet a man in a few minutes," he replied, hoping she could be got rid of before Kellogg came out of that door.

"Well then, carry this thing over to the depot for me—it's got ammunition in it for my kid brothers, they shoot away an awful lot. I'll wait for the train, and you can come back and keep your engagement, if it's a very important one."

Dunham thought that would be a good way to clear the ground of her hampering presence. He calculated he'd have time to deposit her and the heavy sack in the depot and get back before the hour was up. He glanced back at the hotel as she led the way toward the depot, wondering if MacKinnon was trying to argue Kellogg out of it, resentful of any interference that might cast a doubt on his courage. Zora Moore, hurrying on ahead, stumbled with a scrambling noise on the loose shoulder of ballast at the ends of the railroad ties, and fell.

Dunham picked her up with deprecatory exclamation. She leaned on him heavily, with suppressed groans, bending as if she'd taken a serious bump.

"Are you hurt much?" Bill inquired anxiously.

She stood half doubled over, making that whistling sound expressive of acute suffering common to lads when they have outgrown the crying age.

"Gee! I think I busted something," she said.

"I'm sorry," said Bill, with no more consoling effect than that expression generally has on people with