I don't know ez they waz wuth it," he added in gloomy retrospect; "but I've got to get rid of 'em, I reckon, somehow, afore I work over to Deadman's Gulch again." The young girl's eyes brightened timidly with a feminine mingling of imaginative awe and personal, pitying interest.

He was, after all, so young and amiable looking for such hardships and adventures.

And with all this, he--this Indian fighter--was a little afraid of HER! "Then that's why you carry that knife and six-shooter ?" she said.

"But you won't want 'em now, here in the settlement." "That's ez mebbe," said the stranger darkly.

He paused, and then suddenly, as if recklessly accepting a dangerous risk, unbuckled his revolver and handed it abstractedly to the young girl.