Dalton watched him keenly as the three in that picture before the door stood keyed to such tension as the human intelligence seldom is called upon to withstand. Macdonald stood with one foot on the low threshold, the door swinging half open at his back. He was bareheaded, his rough, fair hair in wisps on temples and forehead. Dalton's teeth were showing between his bearded lips, and his quick eyes were scowling, but he held his companion back with a command of his free hand. Macdonald lifted his hands slowly, holding them little above a level with his shoulders. "Give up your prisoner, Macdonald, and we'll deal square with you," Dalton said. "Go in and take him," offered Macdonald, stepping aside out of the door. "Go ahead of us, and put 'em up higher!" Dalton made a little expressive flourish with his gun, evidently distrustful of the homesteader's quick hand, even at his present disadvantage. The man at the back door was using the ax from Macdonald's wood pile, as the sound of splintering timber told. Between three fires, Macdonald felt his chance stretching to the breaking point, for he had no faith at all in Chance Dalton's word. They had come to get him, and it looked now as if they had won. When Macdonald entered the house he saw Thorn sitting in the middle of the floor, where he had rolled and struggled in his efforts to see what was taking place outside. "You've played hell now, ain't you? lettin' 'em git the drop on you that way!" he said to Macdonald, angrily. "They'll swing--" "Hand over that gun, Macdonald," Dalton demanded. They were standing near him, one on either hand, both leveling their guns at his head. Macdonald could see the one at the back door of his little two-roomed bungalow through the hole that he had chopped. "I don't hand my gun to any man; if you want it, come and take it," Macdonald said, feeling that the end was rushing upon him, and wondering what it would be. A bullet was better than a rope, which Chadron had publicly boasted he had laid up for him. There was a long chance if Dalton reached for that gun--a long and desperate chance. The man at the back door was shouting something, his gun thrust through the hole. Dalton made a cross-reach with his left hand for Macdonald's revolver. On the other side the cowboy was watching his comrade's gun pointing through the kitchen door; Macdonald could see the whites of his eyes as he turned them. "Don't shoot in here! we've got 'em," he called. His shifted eye told Macdonald that he was trusting to Dalton, and Dalton at that moment was leaning forward with a strain, cautiously, his hand near Macdonald's holster.