rie, save when he had been obliged to go in to Askatoon and had taken her with him, dumb and passive. She had been a prisoner, tied to the stirrups of her captor; and he had berated h

had the key in his pocket. Li Choo was not a stern jailer, however. Mazarine had not been gone three minutes before the Chinaman had touch with Louise. He did more; he threw up into the open window of her room a screw-driver, with which she took the old-fashioned do

h gurgling in his throat, only to find the door locked; for Li Choo had promptly restored it to it

that, as the room had windows on all three sides, Louise must have escaped while he made his supposed sentry- go, slip-slopping round the house. Mazarine showed what he thought

ies, standing where Li Choo had stood, immobile, blinking and passive like Li Choo, their hands lost in the long sleeves of their coats, their pigtail

ude gave Mazarine appreh

sformed by some helli

his being seemed to st

ensation of

you come here?" he asked

o. We come see Li Cho

n impas

ute ago," answered

. As he went, he was conscious of low, cackling laughter, but when he turned

the loft, or in his own attic room; and the half-breed, Rada, declared she had not seen him. He could not be at the stables, for they were too far away to be reached in the time; and there were no s

ey after? It did not matter for the moment. What he wanted was Louise, his bad child-wife, who had broken from her cage and flown from him. Where would she go? Where, but to Slow Down Ranch? Where, but

, that he was in a net of dark deception. Even the two Chinamen, mysteriously coming and go

ttle black-bound Bible once belonging to his great- grandfather. He had thumbed it well in past years, searching it for passages of violence and denunciation. Now holy superstition seized him in the midst of the work of the de

him young again, renewed in him youth and the joys of youth. Take her away, the flower that smelled so sweet and luscious, the thing that he had held so often to his lips and to his breast? Take away what was his, by every holy right, because i

child come to them-their ghosts would seek him out. They would sit at his table, and taunt him with his vanished Louise, asking him if he thought she was anything m

an angel? Where had she gone? Where would she go

et, when he heard a voice call him. It was full of the devil's laughter. It was the voice of Burlingame, the

ed Burlingame, as he cante

w Down

disaster had passed, and he guessed at once the cause of it; for Burlingame had t

sed with his services as a lawyer, and had blocked the way to that intimacy which he had hoped to establish with Tralee and its mistress. Besides, his pride as a professional man had been hurt, and he had been deprived

m come by the Lark River Trail into Askatoon as I left, and a lady was with him. He booked this morning for the sleeper of the express going East to-night; so, if I were you, I'd

s that in his voice which did not belong to the Courts of the Lord. Malice, though veiled, showed in

im? You're sure she was with hi

ed Burlingame suggestively, "but you can form your own

e evidence about that night on the prairie? I could have got you a verdict and damages. Yes, I could have got you plenty of damages. He's rich

away tonight," the old man said, a loo

know you. It isn't the love of God in your heart, because you'll never forgive her; but you'll bring her back to the

s horse and cantered away. A little time afterwards, however, he turned and looked toward Askatoon, and he sa

the sleeper was for one only, and that one was his mother, you old hippopotamus. . . . But I wonder wher

e's sides, and galloped back towards Askatoon. He wante