“I’m sorry to keep you waiting, but you see I’m so weak”—the strained little smile came to his face—“and tremble so, there’s so much to think of—do _you_ hear those women scream—_there_! did you hear that?—but of course not. Now—wait just a moment—have you come to kill me?” “You and those two other hellions—the two that took me and that boy out that night to bury us.” “Did you think of the consequences?” “I reckoned you’d be called paid for, any time any one come gunning for you. I didn’t think there’d _be_ any consequences.” “Hereafter, I mean; to your soul. What a pity you didn’t wait a little longer! Those other two are already punished.” “Don’t lie to me now?” The little smile lighted his face again. “I have a load of sin on me—but I don’t think I ever did lie to any one—I guess I never was tempted—” “Oh, you’ve _acted_ lies enough.” [Illustration: “OH, MAN ... HOW I’VE LONGED FOR THAT BULLET OF YOURS!”] “You’re right—that’s so. But I’m telling you truth now—those two men had both been in the Meadows that day and it killed them. One went crazy and ran off into the desert. They found his bones. The other shot himself a few years ago. Those of us that live are already in hell—” He sat up, now, animated for the moment. “—in hell right here, I tell you. I’d have welcomed you, or any other man that would kill me, any time this fifteen years. I’d have gone out to meet you. Do you think I like to hear the women scream? Do you think I’m not crazed myself by this thing—right back of me here, _now_—crawling, bleeding, breathing on me—trying to come here in front where I must _see_ it? Don’t you see God has known how to punish me worse than you could, just by keeping me alive and sane? Oh, man! you don’t know how I’ve longed for that bullet of yours, right here through the temples where the cries sound worst. I didn’t dare to do it myself—I was afraid I’d make my punishment worse if I tried to shirk; but I used to hope you would come as you said you would. I wonder I didn’t know you at once.” He put his hands to his head and fell back again on the pillow, with a little moan. “Well, it ain’t strange I didn’t know _you_. I was looking for a big man. You seemed as big as a house to me that day. I forgot that I’d grown up and you might be small. When those fellows got tight up there and let on like it was you that some folks hinted had took a child and kept it out of that muss, I couldn’t hardly believe it; and everybody seeming to regard you so highly. And I couldn’t believe this big girl was little Prue Girnway that I remembered. It seemed like you two would have to be a great big man and a little bit of a baby girl with yellow hair; and now I find you’re—say, Mister, _honestly_, you’re such a poor, broke-down, little coot it seems a’most like a shame to put a bullet through you, in spite of all your doings!”