They set out, Joan between Kells and Cleve.  How strange for her!  She had daring enough to feel for Jim’s hand in the dark and to give it a squeeze.  Then he nearly broke her fingers.  She felt the fire in him.  It was indeed a hard situation for him.  The walking was rough, owing to the uneven road and the stones.  Several times Joan stumbled and her spurs jangled.  They passed ruddy camp-fires, where steam and smoke arose with savory odors, where red-faced men were eating; and they passed other camp-fires, burned out and smoldering.  Some tents had dim lights, throwing shadows on the canvas, and others were dark.  There were men on the road, all headed for town, gay, noisy and profane.

Then Joan saw uneven rows of lights, some dim and some bright, and crossing before them were moving dark figures.  Again Kells bethought himself of his own disguise, and buried his chin in his scarf and pulled his wide-brimmed hat down so that hardly a glimpse of his face could be seen.  Joan could not have recognized him at the distance of a yard.

They walked down the middle of the road, past the noisy saloons, past the big, flat structure with its sign “Last Nugget” and its open windows, where shafts of light shone forth, and all the way down to the end of town.  Then Kells turned back.  He scrutinized each group of men he met.  He was looking for members of his Border Legion.  Several times he left Cleve and Joan standing in the road while he peered into saloons.  At these brief intervals Joan looked at Cleve with all her heart in her eyes.  He never spoke.  He seemed under a strain.  Upon the return, when they reached the Last Nugget, Kells said: 

“Jim, hang on to her like grim death!  She’s worth more than all the gold in Alder Creek!”

Then they started for the door.

Joan clung to Cleve on one side, and on the other, instinctively with a frightened girl’s action, she let go Kells’s arm and slipped her hand in his.  He seemed startled.  He bent to her ear, for the din made ordinary talk indistinguishable.  That involuntary hand in his evidently had pleased and touched him, even hurt him, for his whisper was husky.

“It’s all right—­you’re perfectly safe.”

First Joan made out a glare of smoky lamps, a huge place full of smoke and men and sounds.  Kells led the way slowly.  He had his own reason for observance.  There was a stench that sickened Joan—­a blended odor of tobacco and rum and wet sawdust and smoking oil.  There was a noise that appeared almost deafening—­the loud talk and vacant laughter of drinking men, and a din of creaky fiddles and scraping boots and boisterous mirth.  This last and dominating sound came from an adjoining room, which Joan could see through a wide opening.  There was dancing, but Joan could not see the dancers because of the intervening crowd.  Then her gaze came back to the features nearer at hand.  Men and youths were lined up to a long bar nearly as high