“Sure,” went on the deliberate voice, ringing with scorn.  “An’ only a little while ago she called you a dog....  I reckon she meant a different kind of a dog than the hounds over there.  For to say they were like you would be an insult to them....  Sure she hates you, an’ I’ll gamble right now she’s got her arms around Wils’s neck!”

“——!” hissed Belllounds.

“Well, you’ve got a gun in your hand,” went on the taunting voice.  “Ahuh!...  Have it your way.  I’m warmin’ up now, an’ I’d like to tell you ...”

“Shut up!” interrupted the other, frantically.  The blood in him was rising to a fever heat.  But fear still clamped him.  He could not raise the gun and he seemed in agony.

“Your father knows you’re a thief,” declared Wade, with remorseless, deliberate intent.  “I told him how I watched you—­trailed you—­an’ learned the plot you hatched against Wils Moore....  Buster Jack busted himself at last, stealin’ his own father’s cattle....  I’ve seen some ragin’ men in my day, but Old Bill had them beaten.  You’ve disgraced him—­broken his heart—­embittered the end of his life....  An’ he’d mean for you what I mean now!”

“He’d never—­harm me!” gasped Buster Jack, shuddering.

“He’d kill you—­you white-livered pup!” cried Wade, with terrible force.  “Kill you before he’d let you go to worse dishonor!...  An’ I’m goin’ to save him stainin’ his hands.”

“I’ll kill you!” burst out Belllounds, ending in a shriek.  But this was not the temper that always produced heedless action in him.  It was hate.  He could not raise the gun.  His intelligence still dominated his will.  Yet fury had mitigated his terror.

“You’ll be doin’ me a service, Buster....  But you’re mighty slow at startin’.  I reckon I’ll have to play my last trump to make you fight.  Oh, by God!  I can tell you!...  Belllounds, there’re dead men callin’ me now.  Callin’ me not to murder you in cold blood!  I killed one man once—­a man who wouldn’t fight—­an innocent man!  I killed him with my bare hands, an’ if I tell you my story—­an’ how I killed him—­an’ that I’ll do the same for you....  You’ll save me that, Buster.  No man with a gun in his hands could face what he knew....  But save me more.  Save me the tellin’!”

“No!  No!  I won’t listen!”

“Maybe I won’t have to,” replied Wade, mournfully.  He paused, breathing heavily.  The sober calm was gone.

Belllounds lowered the half-raised gun, instantly answering to the strange break in Wade’s strained dominance.

“Don’t tell me—­any more!  I’ll not listen!...  I won’t fight!  Wade, you’re crazy!  Let me off an’ I swear—­”

“Buster, I told Collie you were three years in jail!” suddenly interrupted Wade.

A mortal blow dealt Belllounds would not have caused such a shock of amaze, of torture.  The secret of the punishment meted out to him by his father!  The hideous thing which, instead of reforming, had ruined him!  All of hell was expressed in his burning eyes.