“Or that you can do him any good by staying with him?” “No.” “Then why should you make deliberate shipwreck of your life—or let him do it for you? Just now you don’t care what becomes of you. But you have to keep on the best you can.” He spoke quietly, his words unstressed, but just for a flash she caught in his eyes an expression that told her his emotions were a banked volcano. Mollie found herself trembling. “No—no. I married him, for better or worse. I’ll stay with him.” “Can you stay with him when he doesn’t want you, when he won’t stay with you?” “Perhaps he’ll change,” she murmured. The knuckles of his clenched hand were bloodless, she noticed. “Men of his age don’t change. They’re what they have made themselves. They can’t be anything else. Would you waste your life on such an impossible chance? Don’t do it. Begin again.” “How?” she asked. “There’s work at Virginia for a hundred women. You can mend clothes or cook or keep boarders—anything for a start. Afterwards——” He let the future take care of itself. In spite of her dependence Mollie had a capacity for dumb resistance. Scot left her knowing that he had the empty victory of having convinced her judgment but not the deep instinct in her born of habit and tradition. He walked down the grade past dugouts, shanties, and lean-tos. Occasionally he could hear the blast of dynamite. He passed bull teams hauling hay from the Truckee Meadows, the drivers cracking long-lashed whips with short hickory handles. Freight outfits, wood haulers, and ore wagons filled the road. Everywhere was the bustle and activity that go with the early years of a new and prosperous mining camp. He was aware of it all only subconsciously, for his mind was filled with thoughts of the woman he had just left. A medley of voices, a whirl of excited men, roused him from reflection as he reached the end of the business part of town. Just now he was not looking for crowds. He turned to make the climb to A Street when a voice hailed him. “Just in time, Scot. We’re aimin’ to hang Dodson. Come on, old scout.” McClintock stood rooted. Here was an easy way for Mollie out of her troubles. All he had to do was to keep on walking up hill and the matter would settle itself. It was none of his business. If Virginia City had had enough of the ne’er-do-well the matter was one for it to pass upon. The fellow was not worth a short bit anyhow. Scot’s judgment was that he was better dead. None the less he found it impossible to keep on up the hill. He walked toward the mob and pushed a way through with his broad shoulders to the cowering wretch with the rope around his neck. Dodson sank down and clung to McClintock’s knees. “Save me,” he begged, his face ashen gray. “What’s he done?” asked Scot of the man who seemed to be the leader. “You know what the drunken bummer did—killed his own baby. Then when Jerry Mulligan told him what for an hour ago he stuck a knife in him.” “Is Jerry dead?”