But back to the table she carried little outward agitation. If her heart pounded it was with a sort of exaltation born of impending moments of action. If her face had paled it gave a logical basis for the plea of violent headache upon which she persuaded Morgan to drive her home as soon as the guests rose, and to make the necessary explanations only after she had gone. When Mrs. Masters returned she found a note entreating her not to give way to undue anxiety. Anne was gone, and the hurriedly written lines said she would telegraph tomorrow from her father's house, but that it was not illness which had called her there. * * * * * In such a situation, provided one approach it in the mood of Alexander toward the Gordian knot, the greater complexities appear in retrospect. It was looking back on those pregnant hours that their various enormities were made plain to her, chiefly through the expounding of _ex-post-facto_ wisdom operating cold-bloodedly and without the urge of a peril to be met. With much the same acceptance of the bizarre as that which marks the fantasy of dreams, she endured the discomforts of that night's journey and found herself at daybreak looking into gravely welcoming eyes on the station at Marlin Town. Her own eyes felt sunken and hot with fatigue, but to Joe Gregory, who had also spent a sleepless night, she seemed a picture of the fresh and dauntless. They went first to her father's bungalow, and there a new difficulty presented itself. Larry Masters had gone away to some adjacent town and had left his house tight locked. "Boone's on the move today," Joe Gregory informed her, "but matters'll come to a head ternight. Twell then things won't hardly bust, but when ther time comes, whatever ye kin do hes need ter be done swiftly. When I talked with ye last night I misdoubted we'd hev even this much time ter go on." Then as they sat on the doorstep of the closed house, which no longer afforded her the conventional sanction of paternal presence, the deputy sheriff outlined for her with admirable directness and vigour the situation which had driven him to her for help. To clear away all mystification he sketched baldly the little episode of the down-turned photograph and the bitterness of the three words, "I'm ruined now." "Thet's how come me ter know," he enlightened simply, "thet Boone war sort of crazed-like--an' thet _you_ mout cure him, ef so be ye _would_." Then with a sterner note he added: "Whatever took place betwixt ther two of ye air yore own business, but thar's some of us thet would go down inter hell ter save Boone Wellver. I needed ye, an', despite yer bein' a woman, ef ye're a man in any sense at all, ye'll stand by me right now." Anne rose from the doorstep where she had been dejectedly sitting and held out a hand. "You see, I came," she said briefly; "and I aim to be man enough to do my best."