“Thank you, Joe. I’m glad you don’t blame me. It had to come. He--he wasn’t so bad until they elected him sheriff. We got along, yuh know. Goin’ onto three years now. I--I hoped they’d defeat him last election.” “Shore. Prob’ly been better if they had. But they say he’s the best sheriff they ever had--I dunno.” “Because he sent my son to prison,” she said painfully. “Yeah. It was his son, too.” “Joe, you know Harry wasn’t a thief, don’t yuh?” “I don’t reckon he was. The JB outfit started out to git Harry--and they got him.” “His own father got him, you mean!” exclaimed Mrs. Deming. “Jim was alone when he found that evidence at Harry’s place. It was nothing but a JB hide. Jim could have buried it and warned Harry. That hide was planted there by the JB. But Jim took the evidence and arrested Harry. Ten years! It was Jim’s evidence that sent my boy to the penitentiary.” “Yes, ma’am.” “And he sent Al Seymour up for stealing a horse, which he didn’t steal. Al was drunk that night and got the wrong one. It was wrong for him to get drunk, I know; but he didn’t intend to take the wrong horse. Jim knew it. Oh, yes, he did. But he went straight out and arrested Al, instead of bringing the horse back. He could have explained it all. Al was no thief.” “He was going to marry Jane, wasn’t he, Mrs. Deming?” “Yes. It broke her heart, Joe. I’m going to her now. Oh, I’ve pleaded with Jim; talked and pleaded until my throat was raw. But what’s the use? He defends himself by saying that he swore to uphold the law, and both Harry and Al broke the law. His duty to the law! He sits in judgment on this whole desert; brags about his iron hand. Oh, it’s iron, all right. It smashed his home; it will smash him, too.” “I dunno; he’s pretty hard, ma’am. I never knowed a man as hard as Jim, and I’ve knowed a lot of hard ones. His job is a religion with him.” “And some day it will raise up and kill him.” “His star is his god,” said the deputy slowly. “And don’t the Bible say something about thou shalt have no other gods before me?” “Mebbe. I dunno much about the Bible. I don’t reckon that God operates much around here--it’s too hot.” “I’ve wondered about it,” she said, wearily. “I’ve prayed a lot, Joe; but nothing came of it.” “Too hot, Mrs. Deming. I don’t reckon a fried prayer ever got any further than a fried aig. Mebbe not as far, because yuh can eat the aig. Well, there’s the town. Yuh’ve got plenty time, ’cause the train ain’t never on time. Lotsa folks would miss the train if it ever came on time.” * * * * * The train was of the mixed variety, half passenger, half freight; a branch line train, using something like seven hours to complete the sixty mile run from Santa Leone to Levering, which was twenty miles south of Calor.