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 any faction in Cottonwood, nor of arranging himself against the law, farcical as it might be.

It was a question with him what to do, indeed. His money would soon waste away, even at the very moderate rate for lodging and board which Malvina had made in his case. Something would have to be set going shortly.

He could not leave there to seek employment, for he had passed his word to Winch. That appointment was an obligation. To run away from it would be equal to the repudiation of debt. It would follow a man, and cling to him like a taint; he never could lift up his head in honorable company again.

So there he would stay until Dee Winch came, and this matter was finished for all time. There would be no other way of easing the strain of listening, as wearing on a man to bear as a contracted muscle for which there was no relief. One way or another their meeting in the streets of Cottonwood would end this thing.

He was resentful in his mental attitude toward Winch. A man had no right arbitrarily to throw another under the necessity of defending his life on any such groundless pretext. It appeared to him that it was a forced excuse for Winch to ease for another week or month the blood thirst that had fallen on him like some unholy disease. He did