His angry eyes flashed over Arnold and the woman beside him, then scanned the green basin where the peaceful cattle lay. “It would seem, Miss Cathrew,” he said, “that you are—caught. Caught with the goods at last. Yonder are my missing steers if I can read my own brand. It looks like the B Bar K to me.” Kate Cathrew wet her lips and her hand moved restlessly on the rifle’s butt. She did not speak, but her black eyes burned like coals in her chalk-white face. Bossick threw back his coat. A star shone faintly in the light. “You can thank Sheriff Selwood’s tireless work for this,” he said, “and so can we. The whole country’s deputized. Your work is known. You may as well give up without a fuss for we——” He stopped, for an odd sound had become apparent—a deep, echoing sound, as of many waters beating on a hollow shore. It seemed to come from the center of the amphitheatre where the cave mouth yawned. For a second the whole group was silent. Then Kate Cathrew flung round to stare with wide orbs at the mouth of the Pipe. Her world was falling about her and she was appalled. The roar of waters became the rumble of hoofs and up from the bowels of the earth came Brand Fair and his men. He blinked in the new light and then his dark eyes went unerringly to the face of the woman—this woman whom he had sought for two full years. “Good morning, Katherine Fair,” he said. Far over by the rock face Nance Allison leaned forward, in her bloody rags and raised a hand slowly to her throat. The dullness in her clouded brain struggled with her natural keenness for mastery and lost. Up from the abysmal depths of physical exhaustion which encompassed her came that spirit which had not yet been conquered. “You!” screamed Cattle Kate, “You! You! It was _you_ who did the trick—not that fool Selwood! I might have guessed!” Fair sat still and looked at her and at the man beside her whose face was a study. “Sure you might have guessed,” he said. “When you and your paramour there robbed the Consolidated and wound the coils of guilt around Jack Fair—you might have guessed that his brother would follow you to the ends of the earth to get you. And he’s _got you_—got you dead to rights.” He, too, showed a deputy’s star. “Jack Fair died in prison—of shame and of a broken heart. For three years I worked in New York to get the goods on you, Arnold, and never could—definitely. Then I hired a better man who could—and did. I have a precious package in a safe place with enough proof in it to have sent you over long ago—but I wanted you both—together—a grand finale. It has been a long trail—long—for me—and for Sonny, the child whom you abandoned, Kate, five years ago.” The woman gasped and raised a clinched fist to let it fall in impotent rage. Fair went on.