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 about it for a good many minutes. He seemed to be considering something, his hand on the leather in a touch like a caress.

"Here's a gun, Texas, that a friend of mine used to pack, the best man I ever knew, and the best friend I ever had. He died with it on him, and his widder give it to me. Just feel the weight of that gun, will you?"

"It is a man's gun, sir," said Texas, drawing it from the holster with hand that told it was no stranger to such an operation.

"That gun belonged to Ed McCoy, Sallie McCoy's father. He died with it on him; the man that killed him never give him a show to use it."

"Miss Sallie is an orphan, then?"

"Half orphant; her mother's livin'. They've got the best house in Cottonwood, and the purtiest place, but that's all they have got. Yes, sir, Sallie she needed the money them fellers beat her out of to-day; it'd 'a' been like a rain in a drouth to them. I don't suppose anything else but the need of it'd 'a' drove Sallie to go out there in public and take a hand in that ropin'. She's a lady, that girl, is, from the heels up."

"It's a scan'lous shame that she was beaten out of it! Do you suppose she'd accept—"

"I s'pose she'd claw a mile of hide off of your