I raised myself, felt a post at my shoulder, leaned on it.  I heard Sampson work the action of Wright’s gun.  I heard the hammer click, fall upon empty shells.  He had used up all the loads in Wright’s gun.  I heard him curse as a man cursed at defeat.  I waited, cool and sure now, for him to show his head or other vital part from behind his bolster.  He tried to lift the dead man, to edge him closer toward the table where the gun lay.  But, considering the peril of exposing himself, he found the task beyond him.  He bent, peering at me under Wright’s arm.  Sampson’s eyes were the eyes of a man who meant to kill me.  There was never any mistaking the strange and terrible light of eyes like those.

More than once I had a chance to aim at them, at the top of Sampson’s head, at a strip of his side.  But I had only two shells left.  I wanted to make sure.  Suddenly I remembered Morton and his man.  Then I pealed out a cry—­hoarse, strange, yet far-reaching.  It was answered by a shout.  Sampson heard it.  It called forth all that was in the man.  He flung Wright’s body off.  But even as it dropped, before Sampson could recover to leap as he surely intended for the gun, I covered him, called piercingly to him.  I could kill him there or as he moved.  But one chance I gave him.

“Don’t jump for the gun!  Don’t!  I’ll kill you!  I’ve got two shells left!  Sure as God, I’ll kill you!”

He stood perhaps ten feet from the table where his gun lay.  I saw him calculating chances.  He was game.  He had the courage that forced me to respect him.  I just saw him measure the distance to that gun.  He was magnificent.  He meant to do it.  I would have to kill him.

“Sampson, listen!” I cried, very swiftly.  “The game’s up!  You’re done!  But think of your daughter!  I’ll spare your life, I’ll give you freedom on one condition.  For her sake!  I’ve got you nailed—­all the proofs.  It was I behind the wall the other night.  Blome, Hilliard, Pickens, Bo Snecker, are dead.  I killed Bo Snecker on the way up here.  There lies Wright.  You’re alone.  And here comes Morton and his men to my aid.

“Give up!  Surrender!  Consent to demands and I’ll spare you.  You can go free back to your old country.  It’s for Diane’s sake!  Her life, perhaps her happiness, can be saved!  Hurry, man!  Your answer!”

“Suppose I refuse?” he queried, with a dark and terrible earnestness.

“Then I’ll kill you in your tracks!  You can’t move a hand!  Your word or death!  Hurry, Sampson!  I can’t last much longer.  But I can kill you before I drop.  Be a man!  For her sake!  Quick!  Another second now—­By God, I’ll kill you!”

“All right, Russ!  I give my word,” he said, and deliberately walked to the chair and fell into it, just as Morton came running up with his man.

“Put away your gun,” I ordered them.  “The game’s up.  Snecker and Wright are dead.  Sampson is my prisoner.  He has my word he’ll be protected.  It’s for you to draw up papers with him.  He’ll divide all his property, every last acre, every head of stock as you and Zimmer dictate.  He gives up all.  Then he’s free to leave the country, and he’s never to return.”