The time had gone by when a hired hand could easily acquire a bunch of cattle and start in for himself--and yet, though he had little beyond his saddle and a couple of horses, he was in Marmion to look upon the face of the girl who had helped him to keep "square" and clean in a land where dishonesty and vice were common as sage brush.

He had sworn never to set foot in Rock River again, and no one but Jack knew of his visit to Marmion.
Now that he was actually in the town where Mary lived he was puzzled to know how to proceed.

He had wit enough to know that in Marmion a girl could not receive visits from a strange young man and escape the fire of infuriate gossip.

He feared to expose her to such comment, and yet, having traveled six hundred miles to see her, he was not to be deterred by any other considerations, especially by any affecting himself.
He knew something, but not all, of the evil fame his name conveyed to the citizens in his native state.

As "Harry Excell, _alias_ Black Mose," he had figured in the great newspapers of Chicago, and Denver, and Omaha.