“We better get a fire started,” he said to Abington, unconsciously taking the initiative as if this was his own particular affair and he alone must acquit himself well in the emergency. “I’ll scout around with the light. Maybe I can find a cave--his camp, if it’s down in here. Don’t suppose he’ll jar loose any information--” Bill continued to stare down at the man, his underjaw thrust out and in his face a certain implacable hardness that brought him a second puzzled glance from Abington. “Where’s your camp?” Bill demanded abruptly. The man seemed to draw himself together as if he feared a blow. The murderous eyes flinched away from Bill’s relentless stare. “Find out--if you think--you can!” he snarled. “Oh, I’ll find it! Don’t you worry a minute,” Bill said viciously. “If necessary, you’ll tell where it is.” “I won’t tell you. You can go ahead--kill me--be done with it--” The wounded man defied him weakly. “Who, me?” The savage bitterness of Bill’s laugh was a revelation to Abington. “Me kill you? I should sa-ay not! You mind what I told you two years ago, Jack! That still goes. Don’t think you can die and duck out from under in that way. I’ll nurse you like a sick baby! You’ll get well, see? Well enough to travel, anyway.” He turned abruptly away as if he would not trust himself to say more. Presently a fire was crackling beside the cliff and Bill had brought water in his hat for Abington’s use in cleansing the wound. “Fix him up best you can, professor,” said Bill. “Then if you can make out with the fire for light, I’ll borrow the lamp and beat it over to where I cached our stuff. There’s that first-aid kit we saved outa the wreck; I’ll bring it and some grub. It ain’t far. Just over the ridge, half a mile, maybe.” He drew Abington to one side, out of hearing of the wounded man. “That’s Jack Huntley, professor. He’s got to be put in shape for the trip in to Vegas. It’s a matter of life and death. So do what you can--I know you’re a pretty good doctor when it comes to a pinch. I’ll be right back. Well--hang onto him, professor, till I get back with the stuff. Don’t let him sneak out on you!” “If he does,” said Abington grimly, “it will be because he sneaks into the next world. I’ll try and not let that happen, Bill, my lad.” He stood watching the round zone of white light go dancing away and up the hill without any visible means of locomotion, since Bill walked behind it, slipping from rock to rock, pausing and poising here, flitting on again like Peter Pan’s good fairy Tinker Bell. A fantastic comparison in that wild glen where men of past ages had met for their wooing or their warring or to hide from strange beasts that roamed the valley; where even now the air seemed charged with a malignant kind of hate, and with fear that passed all reason--since the man called Jack Huntley had been assured of the best care they could give him.