“I’m not entering any objection,” said Gordon, coolly. “Just shoot—why don’t you? You have the drop on me.” For a moment it looked as if Sanderson would take him at his word and meet this taunt with instant death for the sender of it, so black was his anger. But encountering Langford’s level gaze, he read something therein, shrugged his shoulders, replaced his pistol, and sauntered off with his companion just as Judge Dale came upon the scene. Langford glanced quickly across the table at Mary. Her eyes were wide with startled horror. She, too, had seen. Just above Red Sanderson’s temple and extending from the forehead up into the hair was an ugly scar—not like that left by a cut, but as if the flesh might have been deeply bruised by some blunt weapon. “Mary! How pale you are!” cried Louise, in alarm. “I’m haunted by that man,” she continued, biting her lip to keep from crying out against the terrors of this country. “He’s always showing up in unexpected places. I shall die if I ever meet him alone.” “You need not be afraid,” said Gordon, speaking quietly from his place at her side. Louise flashed him a swift, bewildering smile of gratitude. Then she remembered she had a grievance against him and she stiffened. But then the feel of his arms came to her—the feel that she had scarcely been conscious of yesterday when the dark water lay at her feet,—and she blushed, and studied her plate diligently. Under this cover, the young ranchman comforted Mary, whom the others had temporarily forgotten, with a long, caressing look from his handsome eyes that was a pledge of tireless vigilance and an unforgetting watchfulness of future protection. CHAPTER XVI THE TRIAL The next morning, every available seat was filled early. People had blocked the rough plank walks leading to the court-house long before the doors were unlocked. The day promised to be fine, and the many teams coming and going between Kemah and the river to pick up the Velpen people who had crossed the ice on foot gave to the little town somewhat of the gala appearance of fair time. The stately and blanketed Sioux from their temporary camps on the flat were standing around, uncommunicative, waiting for proceedings to begin. Long before the judicial party had arrived from the hotel, the cramped room was crowded to its limits. There was loud talking, laughing, and joking. Local wits amused themselves and others by throwing quips at different members of the county bar or their brethren from across the river, as they walked to their places inside the railings with the little mannerisms that were peculiar to each. Some swaggered with their importance; others bore themselves with a ludicrous and exaggerated dignity; while a refreshing few, with absolute self-unconsciousness, sat down for the work in hand. The witty cowboys, restrained by no bothersome feelings of delicacy, took off every one in running asides that kept the room in uproar. Men who did not chew tobacco ate peanuts.