"You stay here li'l while, eh?" He rested a comforting hand upon her shoulder. "'Poleon goin' find your papa now. Bimeby you goin' feel better." He was not sure that she understood him, for she continued to mutter under her breath and began to roll her head as if in pain. Then he summoned all the persuasiveness he could. "Dere now, you're safe in 'Poleon's house; he mak' you well dam' queeck." A good many people were stirring when the pilot climbed once more to the stumpy clearing where the village stood, and whomsoever he met he questioned regarding Sam Kirby; it did not take him long to discover the latter's whereabouts. But 'Poleon's delay, brief as it had been, bore tragic consequences. Had he been a moment or two earlier he might have averted a catastrophe of far-reaching effect, one that had a bearing upon many lives. The Gold Belt Saloon had enjoyed a profitable all-night patronage; less than an hour previously Morris Best had rounded up the last of his gay song-birds and put an end to their carnival. The poker game, however, was still in progress at the big round table. Already numerous early risers were hurrying in to fortify themselves against the raw day just breaking, and among these last-named, by some evil whim of fate, chanced to be the man for whom Sam Kirby had so patiently waited. The fellow had not come seeking trouble--no one who knew the one-armed gambler's reputation sought trouble with him--but, learning that Kirby was still awake and in a dangerous mood, he had entered the Gold Belt determined to protect himself in case of eventualities. Doret was but a few seconds behind the man, but those few seconds were fateful. As the pilot stepped into the saloon he beheld a sight that was enough to freeze him motionless. The big kerosene lamps, swung from the rafter braces above, shed over the interior a peculiar sickly radiance, yellowed now by reason of the pale morning light outside. Beneath one of the lamps a tableau was set. Sam Kirby and the man he had struck the night before were facing each other in the center of the room, and Doret heard the gambler cry: "I've been laying for you!" Kirby's usually impassive face was a sight; it was fearfully contorted; it was the countenance of a maniac. His words were loud and uncannily distinct, and the sound of them had brought a breathless hush over the place. At the moment of Doret's entrance the occupants of the saloon seemed petrified; they stood rooted in their tracks as if the anger in that menacing voice had halted them in mid-action. 'Poleon, too, turned cold, for it seemed to him that he had opened the door upon a roomful of wax figures posed in theatric postures. Then in the flash of an eye the scene dissolved into action, swift and terrifying.