Almost instantly the long lashes went down to her pale cheeks again. MacQueen cut in suavely: "I reckon this is the time for announcements. Boys, Miss Lee has promised to marry me." Before the stir which this produced had died away, Flatray flashed a question: "In exchange for my life?" The chief of the outlaws looked at him with insolence smoldering in his black eyes. "Now, I wonder when you ever will learn to mind your own business, sheriff! Nobody invited you to sit into this game." "This _is_ my business. I make it mine. Give me a straight answer, Melissy. Am I right? Is it for my life?" "Yes." Her voice was so low he could hardly hear it. "Then I won't have it! The thing is infamous. I can't hide behind the skirts of a girl, least of all you. I can die, but, by God, I'll keep my self-respect." "It's all arranged," Melissy answered in a whisper. Flatray laughed harshly. "I guess not. You can't pay my debts by giving yourself to life-long misery." "You're right pessimistic, sheriff," sneered MacQueen. "What do you take me for? I won't have it. I won't have it." The sheriff's voice was rough and hoarse. "I'd rather die fifty times." "It's not up to you to choose, as it happens," the leader of the outlaws suggested suavely. "You villain! You damned white-livered coward!" The look of the young sheriff scorched. "Speaks right out in meeting, don't he?" grinned Lane. "I know what he is, Jack," Melissy cried. "And he knows I think he's the lowest thing that crawls. But I've got to save you. Don't you see, I've got to do it?" "No, I don't see it," Flatray answered hotly. "I can take what's coming to me, can't I? But if you save my life that way you make me as low a thing as he is. I say I'll not have it." Melissy could stand it no longer. She began to sob. "I--I--Oh, Jack, I've got to do it. Don't you see? Don't you see? _It won't make any difference with me if I don't._ No difference--except that you'll be--dead." She was in his embrace, her arms around his neck, whispering the horrible truth in his ear brokenly. And as he felt her dear young fragrance of hair in his nostrils, the warm, soft litheness of her body against his, the rage and terror in him flooded his veins. Could such things be? Was it possible a man like that could live? Not if he could help it. Gently he unfastened her arms from his neck. MacQueen was standing a dozen feet away, his hands behind his back and his legs wide apart. As Flatray swung around the outlaw read a warning in the blazing eyes. Just as Jack tore loose from his guards MacQueen reached for his revolver. The gun flashed. A red hot blaze scorched through Jack's arm. Next instant MacQueen lay flat on his back, the sheriff's fingers tight around his throat. If he could have had five seconds more the man's neck would have been broken. But they dragged him away, fighting like a wild cat. They flung him down and tied his hands behind him.