"Girls! he wouldn't let anybody but me wait on him." Dora frowned, her face coloring. She bent a little, lowering her voice. "Why, Mr. Morgan, what do you suppose? He wanted me to _marry_ him!" "That old buffalo wrangler? Well, he _is_ kind of previous!" "He's too fresh to keep, I told him. Marry _him_! He used to come in here, Mr. Morgan, and put his hat down by his foot so he could grab it and run out and kill another man without losin' time. He never used to take his guns off and hang 'em up like other gentlemen when they eat. He just set there watchin' and turnin' his mean old eyes all the time. He's afraid of them, I know by the way he always tried to look behind him without turnin' his head, never sayin' a word to anybody, he's afraid." "Afraid of whom, Dora?" "The ghosts of them murdered men!" Morgan shook his head after seeming to think it over a little while. "I don't believe they'd trouble him much, Dora." "I'd rather wait on a dog!" she said, scorn and rebellion in her pretty eyes. "You can marry somebody else and beat him on that game, anyhow. I'll bet there are plenty of them standing around waiting." "O Mr. Morgan!" Dora was drowned in blushes, greatly pleased. "Not so many as you might think," turning her eyes upon him with coquettish challenge, "only Mr. Gray and Riley Caldwell, the printer on the _Headlight_." "Mr. Gray, the druggist?" "Yes, but he's too old for me!" Dora sighed, "forty if he's a day. He's got money, though, and he's perfec'ly _grand_ on the pieanno. You ought to hear him play _The Maiden's Prayer_!" "I'll listen out for him. I saw him washing his window a while ago--a tall man with a big white shirt." "Yes," abstractedly, "that was him. He's an elegant fine man, but I don't give a snap for none of 'em. I wish I could leave this town and never come back. You'll be in for dinner, won't you?" as Morgan pushed back from the repletion of that standard meal. "And for supper, too, I hope," he said, turning it off as a joke. "I hope to God!" said Dora fervently, seeing no joke in the uncertainty at all. Excitement was laying hold of Ascalon even at that early hour. When Morgan went on the street after breakfast he found many people going about, gathering in groups along the shady fronts, or hastening singly in the manner of men bound upon the confirmation of unusual news. The pale fish of the night were out in considerable numbers, leaking cigarette smoke through all the apertures of their faces as they grouped according to their kind to discuss the probabilities of the day. Seth Craddock was coming back with fire in his red eyes; their deliverer was on his way. There was no secret of Seth's coming any longer. Even Peden leered in triumph when he met Morgan as he sauntered outside his closed door in the peculiar distinction of his black coat, which the strong sun of that summer morning was not powerful enough to strip from his broad back.