On the man's announced discovery the group outside again became compact about the unconscious man and the tall cowboy squatted beside him quickly. "Get back out of th' light, boys," he said, quietly, and the curious men moved. "Hum ... I'm a sheepherder, if somebody ain't nicked him in th' arm, boys! I'll be-- "Say, he must of laid on that arm an' stopped th' blood. It's clotted.... Oh, damn! It's bleedin' worse. Say, I'll have to get him inside where we can have him fixed up before that breaks open again. Wonder how much he's bled--" He rose and moved to the door, pulled open the screen quickly. He made one step across the threshold and then paused between strides, for before him in the darkness of the hallway a woman's face stood out like a cameo. It was white, made whiter by the few feeble rays of the light outside that struggled into the entry; the eyes were great, dark splotches, the lips were parted; one hand was at the chin and about the whole suggested posture of her body was a tensity, an anxiety, a helplessness that startled the man ... that, and her beauty. For a moment they stood so, face to face, the one in silhouette, the other in black and white; the one surprised, only, but the other shrinking in terror. "I ... he ..." Then, giving no articulate coherence to the idea that was in his mind, Bruce Bayard stepped through the doorway to his left and entered the office, as though he had not seen the woman at all. He looked about, returned to the hallway, gazed almost absently at the stairway where he had seen that troubled countenance and which was now a blank, hesitated a moment and stepped out to join the others. "I heard somebody shoot, when we was comin' up from th' depot," someone was saying when Bayard broke in: "Nobody here. Anybody seen Charley?" "Here's his dad," Clary said, as a fat, wheezing man made his way importantly into the group. "Uncle, I want to get a room," Bayard said, "to take this here man to so I can wash him up an' look after his arm. He's been shot. I passed Doc on th' road goin' out when I come in, so I'll just try my hand as a veterinary myself. Can you fix me up?" "All right! Right here! Bring him in. I've got a room; a nice dollar room," the man wheezed as he stumped into the building. "No disturbance, mind, but I've got a room ... dollar room ..."--and the screen door slapped shut behind him. "He won't die on you, Bruce," the man with a moustache said, straightening, after inspecting the ragged, dirt-filled wound, and laughing lightly. "It just stung him a little. There's a lot of disorderly conduct left in him yet, an' it's a wonder he ain't been ventilated before." "Yeah.... Well, we'll take him up and look him over," Bayard said, his face serious, and stooped to gather the burden in his arms. "Want any help, Bruce?" Tommy asked.