Since the door of his prison opened to allow him to escape into the West he had encountered no doubts, had endured no remorse, and had felt but little fear.

All that he did was forthright, manly, single-purposed, and unhesitating.
Now all seemed changed.

His horses, his guns, the joys of free spaces, were met by a counter allurement which was the voice of a woman.

Strong as he was, stern as he looked, he was still a boy in certain ways, and this mental tumult, so new and strange to him, wearied him almost to tears.

It was a fatigue, an ache which he could not shake off, and when he returned to the hotel he had settled nothing and was ready to flee from it all without one backward look.