Night had caught them there in the deserted settlement, and Landor had given the word to halt, to wait. Now, far to the east, apparently from the breast of Mother Earth herself, the face of the full harvest moon, red as frosted maple leaves through the heated air, slowly rising, lit up the level country softly as by early twilight. Lingeringly, almost reluctantly, Landor got into his saddle. Just to his left, impassive as the night, well to the front of the company as he had been that mortal dragging day, sat Scotchman McPherson. Not once since that early morning scene at Fort Yankton had he spoken a word, not once had he been addressed, had another man shown consciousness of his presence. A pariah, he had so far kept them company; a pariah, he now awaited the end. A moment, fair in his seat, Landor paused; then that which the watchers had expected for hours came to pass. Deliberately he crossed over, drew rein beside the other man.

"McPherson," he said, "this morning I called you coward. That you are not such you have proven, you are proving now. For this reason I ask your pardon. For this reason as well, I give you warning. What we will find—where we are going, I do not doubt, now. I do not believe you doubt. For it I hold you responsible. You had best turn back before belief becomes certainty." Unnaturally precise, cold as November raindrops came the words, the sentences. Deadly in meaning was the pause that followed. "I repeat, you had best turn back."

For a long half minute, face to face there in the moonlight, Landor waited; but no answer came. Just perceptibly he shifted in his place.

"I may forget, give my promise of the morning the lie. Do you understand?"

"Yes, I understand."

Another half minute, ghastly in its significance, passed; then without a word Landor turned. "You have heard, men," he said, "and may God be my judge."

The full moon was well in the sky, showing clear every detail in that scene of desolation, when they arrived. Patter, patter, patter sounded their hoof-beats in the distance. More and more loud they grew, muffled yet penetrating in the silence of night, always augmenting in volume. Out of the shadows figures came dimly into view, taking form against the background of constellations. The straining of leather, the music of steel in bit and buckle, the soft swish of the sun-dried grass proclaimed them very near; then across the trampled corn patch, into the open where had stood the shanty, where now was a thin grey layer of ashes, came the riders, and drew rein; their weary mounts crowding each other in fear at something they saw. Like a storm cloud they came; like the roll of thunder following was the oath which sprang to the lips of every rider save one. Good men they were, God-fearing men; yet they swore like pirates, like humans when ordinary speech is not adequate. In the pause but one man acted, and none intervened to prevent what he did. Out into the open, away from the others, rode Scotchman McPherson; halted, his hand on the holster at his hip. For a second, and a second only, he sat so, the white moonlight drawing clear every line of his grizzled face, his stocky figure. Then deliberately his hand lifted, before him there appeared a sudden blaze of fire, upon the silence there broke a single revolver report, from beneath his lifeless bulk the horse he rode broke free, gave one bound, by instinct halted, trembling in every muscle; then over all, the quick and the dead, returned silence: silence absolute as that of the grave.

How long those twenty men sat there, gazing at that mute, motionless figure on the ground not one could have told. Death was no stranger to them. For years it had lurked behind every chance shrub they passed, in the depths of every ravine, in the darkness of night, from every tangle of rank prairie grass in broad daylight. To it from long familiarity they had become callous; but death such as this, deliberate, cold-blooded, self-inflicted—it awed them while it fascinated, held them silent, passive.

"In God's name!" Again it was Landor who roused them, Landor with his hand on the holster at his hip, Landor who sat staring as one who doubts his own sight. "Am I sane, men? Look, there to your right!"

They looked. They rubbed their eyes and looked again.

"Well, I'll be damned," voiced Crosby; and no man had ever heard him express surprise before. To the north, from the edge of the tall surrounding grass, moving slowly, yet without a trace of hesitation or of fear, coming straight toward them across the trampled earth, were two tiny human figures, hand in hand. No wonder they who saw stared; no wonder they doubted their eyes. One, the figure to the right, was plump and uncertain of step and all in white; white which in the moonlight and against the black earth seemed ghostly. The other was slim and certain of movement and dark—dark as a copper brown Indian boy, naked as when he came on earth. On they came, the brown figure leading, the white following trustfully, until they were quite up to the watchers, halted, still hand in hand.

"How," said a voice, a piping childish voice.

Like rustics at a spectacle the men stared, turned mystified faces each to each, and stared anew. All save one. Off from his horse sprang Landor, caught the bundle of white in his arms.

"Baby Rowland! Baby Bess! And you,"—he was staring the other from head to toe, the distance was short,—"who are you?"

"Uncle Billy," interrupting, ignoring, the tiny bit of femininity nestled close, "Uncle Billy, where's papa and mamma! I want them."

Closer and closer the big bachelor arms clasped their burden; unashamed, there with the others watching him, he kissed her.

"Never mind now, Kiddie. Tell me how you came here, and who this is with you."

About the great neck crept two arms, clinging tightly.

"He just came, Uncle Billy. I was calling for papa. Papa put me to sleep and forgot me. The boy heard me and took me out. I was afraid at first, but—but he's a nice boy, only he won't talk and—and—" The narrative halted, the tousled head buried itself joyously. "Oh, I'm so glad you came, Uncle Billy!"

In silence Landor's eyes made the circle of interested watching faces, returned to the winsome brown face so near his own.

"Aren't you hungry, Kid?" he ventured.

On his shoulder the dark poll shook a negative.

"No. We had corn to eat. The boy roasted it. He made a big fire. He's a nice boy, only—only he won't say anything."

Again Landor's eyes made the circle, halted at the intrepid brown waif who, that first word of greeting spoken, had silently stared him back.

"You're sure you don't know anything more, baby? You didn't hear anything until the boy came?"

"No, Uncle Billy. I was asleep. When I woke up it was dark, and I was hungry and—and—" At last it had come: the spattering, turbulent tear storm. Her small body shook, her arms clasped tighter and tighter. "Oh, Uncle Billy, I want my papa and mamma. I tried to find them, and I couldn't. Please find them for me, Uncle Billy, Please! Please!"

It was well past midnight. The big full moon, high now in the sky, cast their shadows almost about their feet when, their labour complete, the party took up the homeward trail. But there were twenty no longer. At their head as before rode Landor, in his arms not a rifle but a blanket; a blanket from which as they journeyed on came now and anon a sound that was alien indeed: the sobs of a baby girl who wept as she slept. Back of him, likewise as when they had come, rode hatchet-faced Crosby; but he, too, was not as before. His saddle had been removed and, in front of him, astride the horse's bare back, warmed by the animal heat, was a brown waif of a boy; not asleep or even drowsy, but wide awake indeed, silently watchful as a prairie owl of every movement about him, every low-spoken word. What whim of satirist chance had put him there, what fate for good or evil, they could only conjecture, could not know, could never know; yet there he