But something was drawing him to Joe Price! He did not quite understand that it was the desire to confide in and confess to his friend what had actuated his choice of moral trails. But the yearning was there, and he was yielding to it. He conjectured shrewdly that Long might not dream that he would have the temerity again to enter the very district where he was being sought. It was his belief that the best place to hide from a posse was in the midst of it! It was this confidence, almost as much as his skill in trailing, which enabled him to gain a point above Joe Price's cabin in the early twilight. He waited patiently until the curtain of night had fallen, and the stars had replaced the fading banners of the sunset, before he slipped down a steep slope and walked his horse into the canyon below the old miner's abode. CHAPTER XXXIV THE COMPASS WAVERS Joe Price regarded Rathburn with a curious look in his eyes when he beheld him in the doorway of his cabin. He stepped swiftly to the one window, which was over the table, and dropped the burlap shade. Then he closed the door. "So they've been here?" asked Rathburn. "What else could you expect?" replied Price testily. "They're combin' these hills for you." He looked at Rathburn keenly, but Rathburn only smiled. "That's not news to me," he said quietly; "I've percolated through their lines twice." "Stay here," said Price, "and I'll look after your horse--or were you hidin' up all day?" "No such luck," answered Rathburn grimly. The old man looked at him curiously; then he went out of the door, closing it carefully after him. Rathburn found cold food, put it on the table, and sat down to eat. When Price returned he had finished. The old miner sat down in a chair opposite Rathburn. "Now, out with it," he said. "Something has happened. I can see it in the way you look an' act. What's up?" Rathburn carefully rolled a brown-paper cigarette, snapped a match into flame, and lit it before he replied. He was half smiling. "I held up the State Bank of Hope this mornin' an' extracted a bag of perfectedly good bills," he announced. "Didn't bother with the counter money. Made 'em serve me from the vault." Joe Price's eyelids did not even flicker. "Any idear what you got?" he asked. "Not whatsoever," replied Rathburn coolly; "but the smallest I saw on top of the package was a fifty." Price nodded. "You got plenty," he said. Rathburn scowled. He had expected some kind of an outbreak--at least a remonstrance from his old friend. He glanced about uneasily and then glared defiance at Price. "It had to come, Joe," he asserted. "There wasn't any way out of it. What's more, I killed that greased pard of Eagen's, Gomez." "How so?" queried Price. "Well, I'll tell _you_, Joe, but I don't expect it to go any further. He said something about Laura Mallory an' a man named Doane, an' I didn't like it. I slapped him. Then he went for a knife he had in his hat."