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Show I I range Interests, as a rule, were openly 8YNOP8I8. wreck-r- a Murray Sinclair and hla gang of Hill road were called out to clour the tracks at Smoky Creek. McCloud, a young road caught Sinclair and hla mn In the act of looting the wrecked train. Sinclair pleaded Innocence, declaring It only amounted to a mall aum a treat for the men. MrCloud discharged tha whole outfit and ordered tit wreckage burned. McCloud became with Dicksle Dunning, girl acquainted f the went, who came to look at the wreck. "Whispering" (lordon Smith told President Buck of tha railroad, of brave fight against a gang of erased mlnera and that waa the reason for the superintendent's appointment to hla nftlce. McCloud arranged board at tha boarding house of Mrs. Hlnclulr, the deserted wife. Dicksle Dun-ln- g waa the daughter of the lute Rich-r- d Dunning, who had died of a broken tieart ahortly after hla wife's demise, which occurred after one year of mar- ried life. Smoky Creek bridge waa mysteriously burned. President Bucka notified Smith that be had work ahead. A lock train waa wrecked by an open witch. Later a paaaenger train waa held lip aand the express car robbed. Two men posse pursuing the bandits were ff killed. "Whispering Smith" approached Sinclair. He tried to buy him off, but failed. He warned McCloud that hla life waa In danger. McCloud waa carried forcibly Into Lance Running's presence. Dunning refused the railroad a rlght-o- f. way, he had already algned for. Dicks! Interfered to nrevent a shooting affray, Dlckule met McCloud on a lonely trail to warn him hla life waa In danger. On his Way home a shot passed through bla hat. A sudden rise of the Crawling Stone river created consternation. Dicksle and Marlon appealed to McCloud for help. Whla-pe- r ng Smith Joined the group. McCloud took hla men to fight tha river. Lanca Dunning welcomed them cordially. McCloud succeeded In halting the flood. Icksls and Marlon visited Sinclair at hla ranch. He tried to persuade his deserted wife to return to him. She refused. He accused Smith of having VVhlsperlng Rtolen her lova from Mm. A train waa up and robhed. the bandita escaping. Smith and McCloud started In pursuit. At Itaggs ranch Dn Sang killed old tiagga. Whispering Smith befriended hla son. They t ame to Wllllama Cache. Smith was certain the bandits were there. He Importuned Rebstock. lng of the cache," to give up Du Sang. Rebstock refused. Smith declared he would clean out the whole gang. InduRebstock. Smith came cing upon the bandits, Du Sang among them. Marlon Rr".ytd. ,hat n al'onld come back alive. Bmlth learned that Sinclair. Rebstock an escaped bandit had Joined forces. and He Urted after them with Wlckwire. . CHAPTER XXXV, Continued. While the Johnsons were laughing. Smith walked Into the Blackbird. He had lost 30 minutes, and In losing them had lost his quarry. Sinclair had disappeared, and Whispering Smith made a virtue of necessity by taking the upsetting of his plans with an unruffled face. There was but one thing more, indeed, to do, and that was to eat his supper and ride away. The street encounter had made bo much talk In Oroyllle that Smith declined Gene Johnson's Invitation to go back to the house. It seemed a convenient time to let any other ambitious rustlers make good If they were disposed to try, and Whispering Smith went for his supper to the hotel where the Williams Cache men made their headquarters. ,' When he rode away In the dusk hla face was careworn. John Rebstock bad told him why Sinclair dodged; there were others whom Sinclair wanted to meet first; and Whispering Smith waa again heading on a long, hard ride, and after a man on a better horse, back to the Crawling Stone and Medicine Bend. "There's others he wants to see first or you'd have no trouble In talking business Tou nor no other man will ever get him alive." But Whispering Smith to-da- knew that "See that he doesn't get you alive, Ttebstock," was his parting retort. "If he finds out Kennedy has got the Tower W money, the first thing he does will be to put the Doxology all over you." ' 11 CHAPTER XXXVI. " A Sympathetic Ear. When Whispering Smith rode after Elnclulr, Craw!lng Stone ranch. In common with the whole countryside, had but one Interest In life, and that was to hear of the meeting. Riders across the mountain valleys mot with but one question; brought nothing In their pouches of Interest equal to the last word concerning Sinclair or his pursuer. It was commonly agreed through the mountains that It would be a difficult matter to overhaul any good man riding Sinclair's steel-dus- t horses, but with Sinclair himself In the saddle, unless It pleased him to pull up, the chase was cure to be a stern one. Against this to feed speculation stood cno man's record that of the man who had ridden alone across Deep reek and brought Chuck Williams out on a buckboard. Business In Medicine Bend, meantime, was practically suspended. As the center of all telephone lines the big railroad town was likewise the center of all rumors. Ofllcers and soldiers to and from the fort, stage drivers and cowmen, homesteaders and rustlers, discussed the apprehension of Sinclair. Moreover, behind this effort to arrest one man who had savagely defied the law were ranged all of the prejudices, sympathies, and hatreds of the high country, and prac tically the whole population tributary to Medicine Bend and the Crawling Stone valley were friends either to Sinclair or to his pursuer. Behind Sin clatr ere nearly all the cattlemen, not alone because he was on good terms with the rustlers and protected his friends, but because he warred The big openly on the sheepmen. mall-carrier- s or covertly friendly to Sinclair, while against him were the, homesteaders, the railroad men, the common people and the men who everywhere hate cruelty and outrage and the making of a lie. Lance Dunning had never concealed his friendliness for Sinclair, even after hard stories about him were known to be true, and It was this confidence of fellowship that made Sinclair, 24 hours after he had left Orovllle, ride down the hill trail to Crawling Stone , ranchhouse. The morning had been cold, with a heavy wind and a dull sky. In the afternoon the clouds lowered over the valley and a misting rain set In. Dleksle had gone Into Medicine Bend on the stage In the morning, and, after a stolen hair-hou- r with McCloud at Marlon's, had ridden home to escape the storm. Not less, but much more, than those about her she was alive to the situation In which Sinclair stood and Its danger to those closest to her. In the morning her one prayer to McCloud had been to have a care of himself, and to Marlon to have a care of herself; but even when Dleksle left them It seemed as if neither quite felt the peril as she felt it In the afternoon the rain, falling steadily, kept her In the house, and she sat li her room sewing until the light failed. She went downstairs. Puss had lighted the grate in the living room, and Dleksle threw herself into a chtir. The sounds of hoofs aroused her and she went to a window. To her horror, she saw Sinclair walking with her cousin up to the front door. She ran Into the dining room, and the two men entered the hall and walked Into the office. Choking with excitement, Dleksle ran through the k.'tchen and upstairs to master her agitation. In the office Sinclair was sitting down before the hot stove with a tumbler of whisky. "Lance," he shook bis head as he spoke hoarsely I want to say my friends have stood by me to a man, but there's none of them treated me squarer through thick and thin than you have. Well, I've had some bad luck. It can't he helped. Regards!" He drank, and shook his wet hair again. Four days of hard riding had left no trace on his iron features. Wet to the bone, his eyes flashed with fire. He held the glassful of whisky In a hand as steady as a spirit-leve- l and tossed It down a throat as cool as dew. "I want to say another thing, Lance: I had no more intention than a child of hurting Ed Banks. I warned Ed months ago to keep out of this fight, and I never knew he was In It till It was too late. But I'm hoping he will pull through yet. If they don't kill him In the hospital to spite me. I never recognized the man at all till It waa too late.' Why, one of them used to work for me! A man with the whole railroad gang In these mountains after him has got to look out for himself or his life ain't worth a glass of beer. Thank you, Lance, not any more. I saw two men, with their rifles In their hands, looking for me. I hollered at them; but Lance, I'm rough and ready, as all my friends know, and I will let no man put a drop on me that I will never do. Ed, before I ever recognized him, raised his rifle r that's the only reason I fired. Not so full, Lance, not so full, If you please. Well," he shook his black hair as he threw back his head, "here's to better luck In worse countries!" He paused as he swallowed, and set the tumbler down. "Lance, I'm saying good-bto the mountains." "You're not. going away for good, Murray?" "I'm going away for good. What's the use? For two years these railroad cutthroats have been trying to put something on me; you know that. They've been trying to mix me up at Smoky with that bridge-burnincreek; Sugar Iluttes, they had me there; Tower W nothing would do but I was there, and they've got one of the men In Jail down there now, Lance, trying to sweat enough perjury out of him to send me up. What show has a poor man got against all the money there Is In the country? I wouldn't be afraid of a Jury of my own neighbors the men that know me, Lance any time. What show would I have with a packed Jury In Medicine Bend? I could explain anything I've done to the satisfaction of any reasonable man. I'm human, Lance; that's all I say. I've been mistreated and I don't forget It They've even turned my wife against me as flue a woman as ever lived." Lance swore sympathetically. "There's good stuff In you yet, Murray." "I'm going to say good-bto the mountains," Sinclair went on, grimly, "but I'm going to Medicine Bend tonight and tell the man that hat hounded me what I think of him before I leave. I'm going to give my wife a chance to do what Is right and go with me. She's been poisoned against me I know that; but If she does what's fair and square there'll bo l o trouble no trouble at all. All I want, Lance, Is a square deal. What?" ' I IUOSTDATIONS 'BK APBfe BOWIES : Dleksle with her pulses throbbing at t heard the words. She stood half-wadown the stairs, trembling as she listened. Anger, hatred, the spirit of vengeance, choked In her throat at the sinister words. She longed to stride into the room and confront the murderer and call down retribution on his head. It was no fear of him that restrained her, for the Crawling Stone girl never knew fear. She would have confronted him and denounced him, but produence checked her angry impulse. She knew what he meant to do to ride into Medicine Bend under cover of the storm, murder the two he hated, and escape In the night; and she resolved he should never succeed. If she could But the only get to the telephone! telephone was In the room where he Her sat He was saying good-by- . cousin was trying to dissuade him from riding out into the storm, but he was The door opened; the men going. went out on the porch, and It closed. Dleksle, lightly as a shadow, ran into the office and began ringing Medicine Bend on the telephone. fever-hea- y CHAPTER XXXVII. Dicksle's Ride". When Lance Dunning entered the room ten minutes later Dleksle stood at the telephone; but the ten minutes of that interval had made quite another creature of his cousin.. The wires were down and no one from any quarter gave a response to her frantic ringing. Through the receiver she such thing," he growled, curtly. "And to kill George McCloud, if he , can." He stared without reply. "You beard him say so," persisted Dleksle, vehemently. Lance crossed his legs' and threw back the brim of bis bat "McCloud is nobody's fool. He will look out for himself." "These fiendish wires to Medicine Bend are down. Why hasn't this line been repaired?" she cried, wringing her bands. "There Is no way to give warning to any one that he Is coming, and you have let him go!" Lance whirled In his chair. "Damnation! Could I keep him from going?" "You did not want to; you are keeping out of trouble. What do you care whom he kills "You've gone crazy, Dlcksie. Your Imagination has upset your reason. or Whether he kills anybody not it's too late now to make a row about it" exclaimed Lance, throwing his cigar angrily away. "He won't kill us." "And you expect me to sit by and fold my hands while that wretch sheds more blood, do you?" ' "It can't be helped." "I say it can be helped! I can help . it I will help it as you could have done if you had wanted to. I will ride to Medicine Bend and help it" Lance jumped to his feet with a string of oaths. "Well, this is the limit!" He pointed his finger at her. - JMV and she the rain beating her burning face and a band on her bridle-reiher horse leaping fearfully into the pulled Jim In down the winding hllli to save him for ihe long flat. When wind. - No man could have kept the trail to they struck it tht y bad but four miles the pass that night The horse took to go. Across the flat the wind drove In it as 12 the path flashed In sunshine, end swung Into the familiar stride fury. Reflection, thought aud mson that had carried her so many times were beginning to leave her. Sit was over the 20 miles ahead of tbem. The crying to herself quietly as she ised storm driving Into Dicksle's face to cry when she lost herself, s mere cooled her. Every moment she recol- child, ' riding among the hills. She lected herself better, and before her was praying moaningless wordn. Snow mind all the aspects of her venture purred softly 0.1 her cheeks. Tho cold She had set was soothing her senses. Unable at ranged themselves. herself to a race, and against her rode last to keep her seat on the horse, the hardest rider In the mountains. she stopped him, slipped stiffly to tha She had set herself to what few men ground, and. struggling thro tin tha on the range would have dared and wind as she held fast to the bridle and what no other woman on the range the horn, half walked and half ran to could do. A gust drove Into her face. start the blood through her bwrimbed They were already at the head of the veins. She struggled until st e tould pass, and the horse, with level ground drag her mired feet no farther, and underfoot was falling Into the long tried to draw herself back Into the saddle. It was almost beyond her. Ir reach; but the wind was colder. Dlcksie lowered her head and gave She sobbed and screamed at let help At last she mamigvd to Jim the rein. She realized how wet lessness. she was; her feet and her knees were climb ftounderlngly back Into her seat, wet She had no protection but her and, bending her stiffened arms to' skirt though the meanest rider on Jim's neck, she moaned and cried to all her countless acres would not have him. When again she could hold bet braved a mile on such a night without seat no longer, she fell to the horse's leather and fur. The great lapels of side, dragged herself along In the her riding-Jackereversed, were but- frozen slush, and, screaming with the toned tight across her shoulders, and pain of her freezing hands, drew her the double fold of fur lay warm and self, up Into the saddle. She knew that she dare not venture dry against her heart and lungs; but her hands were cold, and her skirt this again that If she did so she now dragged leaden and cold from her could never remount Shi waist, and water soaked in upon her that she should never llvo. to reach chilled feet. Medicine Bend. She rode on and on She became conscious of how fast and on would it never endT Then she was going. Instinct, made keen came a sound like the beating- of great by thousands of saddle miles, told drums in her ears- .- It was the crash Dlcksie of her terrific pace. She was of Jim's hoofs on the river bridge, riding faster than she would have and she was in Medicine Bend. dared go at noonday and without A horse, galloping low and heavily, thought or fear of accident In spite slued through the snow from Fort of the sliding and the plunging down street Into Boney, and, where it had V the long hill, the storm and the dark- so often stopped before, dashed up on ness brought no thought of fear for the sidewalk In front, of the little herself; her only fear was for those shop. The shock was too much for Its ahead. In supreme moments a horse, unconscious rider, and, shot headlong e like a man when human efforts from her saddle, Dicksle was flung superhuman, puts the lesser dan- bruised and senseless against Marlgers out of reckoning, and the facul- on's door. ties, set on a single purpose, though strained to the breaking-poin- t never .V CHAPTER XXXVIII. break. Low in her saddle, Dlcksie tried to reckon how far they had come At the Door. and how much lay ahead. She could She woke In a dream of hoofs beat- - , feel her skirt stiffening about her knees, and" the rain beating at her Ing at ber brain. Distracted words face was sharper; she knew the sleet fell from her Hps, and when she as it stung her cheeks, and knew what opened ber swollen eyes and saw those about her she could only scream. next was coming the snow. There was no need to urge Jim. He Marlon had called up the stable, but had the rein and Dlcksie bent down to the stablemen could only tell her that ' speak to him, as she often spoke Dicksle's horse, in terrible condition, alone on the road, had come In riderless. While Barn- - ' when, they-werwhen Jim, bolting, almost threw her. hardt the railway surgeon, at the X Recovering instantly, she knew they bedside . administered restoratives,' were no longer alone. She rose alert Marlon talked with blm of Dicksle's , in her seat Her straining eyes could sudden and mysterious coming. Dick-slsee nothing. Was there a sound in lying In pain and quite conscious, the wind? She held her breath to lis- heard all, but, unable to explain, She ten, but before she could apprehend moaned In her helplessness. Jim leaped violently ahead. Dicksle heard Marlon'aJ length tell the doctor screamed in an agony of terror. She that McCloud was out of town, and knew then that she had passed anoth- the news seemed to bring) back her er rider, and so close she might have senses. .Then, rising in the bed, while ' touched him. the surgeon and Marlon coaxed her Fear froze her to the sadtjle ; it lent to lie down, she clutched at their arms wings to her horse. The speed be- and, looking from one to the other, came wild. Dicksle knit herself to her told her story. ' When It was done dumb companion and a prayer choked she swooned, but she .woke to hear in her throat She crouched lest a voices at the door of the shop. bullet tear her from her horse; but as if she dreamed, but at the through the darkness no bullet came, door the words were dread , reality. only the sleet, stinging her face, Sinclair bad made good hts word, and stiffening her gloves, freezing her hair, had come out of the storm with a sumchilling her limbs, and weighting her mons upon Marlon and it was the surlike lead on her struggling horse. She geon who threw open the door and knew not even Sinclair could overtake saw Sinclair standing in the snow. her now that no living man could lay ITO BE CONTINUED.) 1 n t, fit . e e, -- She-hear- Oicksie Gave Jim the Rein. could hear only the sweep of the rain and the harsh crackle of tho wind. Sometimes praying, sometimes fainting and sometimes despairing, she stood clinging to the Instrument ringing and pounding upon it like one frenzied. Iance looked at her In amazement. "Why, God a'mlghty, Dlcksie, what's tho matter?" He called twice to her before she turned, and her words almost stunned him: "Why did you not detain Sinclair here Why did you not arrest him?" Lance's sombrero raked heavily to one side of his face, and one end of hla mustache running up much higher on the other, did not begin to express "Arrest blm? Arhis astonishment. rest Sinclair? Dicksle, are you crazy? Why the devil should I arrest Sinclair? Do you suppose I am going to mix up In a fight like this? Do you think I want to get killed? The levelheaded man In this country, Just at prebeut, Is the man who can keep out of trouble, and the man who succeeds, let me tell you, has got more than plenty to do." Lance, getting no answer but a fierce, searching gaze from Dicksle's wild eyes, laid his hand on a chair, lighted a cigar, and sat down before the fire. Dlcksie dropped the telephone receiver, put her hand to her girdle, and looked at him. When she spoke her tone was stinging. "You know that man Is going to Medicine Bend to kill his wife!" Lance took the cigar from his mouth and returned her look. "I know no ! "Dlcksie Dunning, you won't stir out of this house Her face hardened. "How dare you speak In that way to me? Who are you, that you order me what to do, where to stay? Am I your cowboy, to be defiled with your curses?" lie looked at her In amazement She was only 18; he would still face her down. "I'll tell you who I ara. I am master here, and you will do as I tell you. You will ride to Medicine Bend will you?" He struck the table with his clinched fist "Do you hear me? I say, by Ood, not a horse shall leave this ranch In this storm to go anywhere for anybody or with anybody!" "Then I say to you this ranch Is my ranch, and these horses are my horses! From this hour forth I will or der them to go and come when and where I please!" She stepped toward him. "Henceforward I am mistress here, Do you hear me? Henceforward I give orders in Crawling Stone house, and every one under this roof takes orders from me!" "Dlcksie, what do you mean? For God's sake, you're not going to try to ride" Site swept from the room. What happened afterward she could never recall. Who got Jim for her or whether she got the horse up herself, what was said to her In low, kindly words of warning by the man at Jim's neck when she sprang J? to the saddle, who the uian was, she could not have toH All she felt at last was that she was free and out under the black sky, with t, Delight to Weary Traveler Green Gardens of Damascus Rett the and all this water and leafage are so lavisn that the broken mud walls and Eye After Long Journey Through slovenly houses have no power to vex the Detert. the eye. These long gardens of Da . The chief attractions' at Damascus ninseus form the paradise of the Arab are the world-famegardens which world. Making a pilgrimage to the surround the city, the glimpse we get city after weeks and months of dreary of oriental life as found In the bazars, and desolate desert lite, the running fine streets, the shops, and last, but water Is a Joy to his sight and muslo by no means of less Interest, the fa- to hts ears, and It is something to mous mosque of Omclades. walk through shady lanes, to admire One hundred and fifty square miles the variety of landscape and the beauof green He In compact order round ty of scenery In a land where the sun about Damascus, spread out with all beats down all day with unremitting the profusion of a virgin forest Or- force until the earth Is like a furnace chards and flower gardens, parks, of Iron beneath a sky of molten brass. Biblical World. plantations of corn and of other produce pass before the eye In rapid and The natives changeable succession. Jueer,Freak of Nature. A picture of a young and beautiful claim that there are more than 8,000 miles of shady lanes In the gardens of woman, attired in the latest fashion, Damascus through which It Is possi- la the freak of nature that Vllllnm ble to ride. On such a ride the visitor Stevenson, living on one of Joseph J. passes orchards of figs and orchards White's cranberry bogs, near Hanof apricots. For hedges thore Is the over, N. J., has found In an ordinary briar rose and for a canopy the wa- eg. He Is at a loss to account for blossoms lnut Pomegranate glow the presence of the picture in the egg. through the shade; the vine boughs and all the scientists consulted thus trail across the briars; a little water- far have failed to give an fall breaks on the edge of the rond, |