Aboard the midnight train he made Mrs. Adams comfortable in the chair car.  It was but a few hours’ run to The Junction.  He went to the smoker, took off his coat, and lit a cigar.  Around him men sprawled in all sorts of awkward attitudes, sleeping or trying to sleep.  He had heard nothing further about Waring’s fight with the Brewsters.  They might still be at large.  But he doubted it.  If they were—­Shoop recalled the friendly shooting contest with High-Chin Bob.  If High Chin were riding the country, doubtless he would be headed south.  But if he should happen to cross Shoop’s trail by accident—­Bud shook his head.  He would not look for trouble, but if it came his way it would bump into something solid.

Shoop had buckled on his gun before leaving Jason.  His position as supervisor made him automatically a deputy sheriff.  But had he been nothing more than a citizen homesteader, his aim would have been quite as sincere.

It was nearly daylight when they arrived at The Junction.  Shoop accompanied Mrs. Adams to a hotel.  After breakfast he went out to get a buck-board and team.  Criswell was not on the line of the railroad.

They arrived in Criswell that evening, and were directed to the marshal’s house, where Ramon met them.

“How’s Jim?” was Shoop’s immediate query.

“The Senor Jim is like one who sleeps,” said Ramon.

Mrs. Adams grasped Shoop’s arm.

“He wakens only when the doctor is come.  He has spoken your name, senora.”

The marshal’s wife, a thin, worried-looking woman, apologized for the untidy condition of her home, the reason for which she wished to make obvious.  She was of the type which Shoop designated to himself as “vinegar and salt.”

“Reckon I better go in first, Annie?”

“No.”  And Mrs. Adams opened the door indicated by the other woman.

Shoop caught a glimpse of a white face.  The door closed softly.  Shoop turned to Ramon.

“Let’s go take a smoke, eh?”

Ramon led the way down the street and on out toward the desert.  At the edge of town, he paused and pointed across the spaces.

“It was out there, senor.  I found him.  The others were not found until the morning.  I did not know that they were there.”

“The others?  How many?”

“Three.  One will live, but he will never ride again.  The others, High of the Chin and his brother, were buried by the marshal.  None came to claim them.”

“Were you in it?”

“No, senor.  It was alone that Senor Jim fought them.  He followed them out there alone.  I come and I ask where he is gone.  I find him that night.  I do not know that he is alive.”

“What became of his horse?”

“Dex he come back with no one on him.  It is then that I tell Dex to find for me the Senor Jim.”

“And he trailed back to where Jim went down, eh?  Uh-uh!  I got a dog myself.”