"Good bait. He swallows the
hook," he commented to himself, and his good-natured grin was not
brightening his face while he washed the dishes and tidied the cabin.
With Lone rode bitterness of soul and a sick fear that had nothing to do
with his own destiny. How long ago Brit had been hurled into the canyon
Lone did not know; he had not asked. But he judged that it must have
been very recently. Swan had not told him of anything but the runaway,
and of helping to carry Brit home--and of the "damn funny thing about
the chain"--the rough-lock, he must have meant. Too well Lone
understood the sinister meaning that probably lay behind that phrase.
"They've started on the Quirt now," he told himself with foreboding.
"She's been telling her father----"
Lone fell into bitter argument with himself. Just how far was it
justifiable to mind his own business? And if he did not mind it, what
possible chance had he against a power so ruthless and so cunning? An
accident to a man driving a loaded wagon down the Spirit Canyon grade
had a diabolic plausibility that no man in the country could question.
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