The wounded man had sunk down again, but was regarding with drowsy satisfaction a leaden bullet he was holding between his finger and thumb.
"This yer shot, Mr.Ford," he said in a slow voice, whose weakness was only indicated by its extreme deliberation, "never kem from the gun I gave ye--and was never fired by you." He paused and then added with his old dull abstraction, "It's a long time since I've run agin anythin' that makes me feel more--kam." In Mr.McKinstry's weak condition the master did not dare to make Johnny's revelation known to him, and contented himself by simply pressing his hand, but the next moment the wounded man resumed,-- "That ball jest fits Seth's navy revolver--and the hound hes made tracks outer the country." "But what motive could he have in attacking YOU at such a time ?" asked the master.
"He reckoned that either I'd kill you and so he'd got shut of us both in that way, without it being noticed; or if I missed you, the others would hang YOU--ez they kalkilated to--for killing ME! The idea kem to him when he overheard you hintin' you wouldn't return my fire." A shuddering conviction that McKinstry had divined the real truth passed over the master.

In the impulse of the moment he again would have corroborated it by revealing Johnny's story, but a glance at the growing feverishness of the wounded man checked his utterance.

"Don't talk of it now," he said hurriedly.

"Enough for me to know that you acquit ME.

I am here now only to beg you to compose yourself until the doctor comes back--as you seemed to be alone, and Mrs.McKinstry"-- he stopped in awkward embarrassment.
A singular confusion overspread the invalid's face.