“I don’t know just where the girl exists now in this case,” went on Learned Counsel, “or how; but she’s somewhere.  It is not wholly necessary that you should specify.”

“My God!” broke out Dan Anderson.  “I wanted—­I hoped so much?  It was my opportunity, my first—­”

“That’s enough,” said Learned Counsel.  “You needn’t say any more.  Every fellow has something of that sort in his life.  What brought McKinney here, and Doc Tomlinson, and all the rest?”

“Ribbons!” said Dan Anderson.  “Tintypes!”

“Precisely.  And who shall cast the first stone?  If the boys knew—­”

“But they don’t know, they can’t know.  Do you think I’d uncover her name, even among my friends—­make her affairs public?  No.”

“Then your only defence cannot be brought into court.”

“No.  So what do you advise?”

“What do you advise your counsel to advise you?” asked Learned Counsel, bitterly.

“Nothing.  I’m done for, either way it goes.”

Dan Anderson turned a drawn face.  “What shall I do?” he asked at length again.

For once Learned Counsel was wise.  “In this sort of crisis,” said he, “one does not consult a lawyer.  He decides for himself, and he lives or dies, succeeds or fails, wins or loses forever, for himself and by himself, without aid of counsel or benefit of clergy.”  He stood and watched the iron go home into the soul of a game man.  Dan Anderson was white, but his reply came sharp and stern.

“You’re right!  Leave me alone.  I’ll take the case now myself.”

They shook hands and separated, not to meet again for days; for Dan Anderson shut himself up in his cabin and denied himself to all.  Gloom and uncertainty reigned among his friends.  That a crisis of some sort was imminent now became generally understood.  At length the crisis came.

There arrived in town, obedient to the summons of Heart’s Desire, the dusty buckboard driven by Willie the sheepherder.  Upon the front seat with him was Mr. Ellsworth; on the back seat sat Porter Barkley and Constance.  The chief actors in the impending drama were now upon the stage, and all Heart’s Desire knew that action of some sort must presently follow.

With due decorum, however, all Heart’s Desire stood apart, while the three travellers, dusty and weary, buried themselves in the privacy of Uncle Jim Brothers’s best spare rooms.  Then Heart’s Desire sought out Willie the sheepherder.

“Now, Willie,” said Doc Tomlinson, “look here—­you tell us the truth for once.  There’s a heap of trouble goin’ on here, and we want to get at the bottom of it.  Maybe you heard something.  Now, say, is this here railroad figurin’ on comin’ in here, or not?”

“Shore it’ll come,” said Willie, sagely.  “Them folks has got money to do just what they want.  Railroad’ll be here in a few days if they feel like it.”

“Maybe we don’t feel like it,” said Doc Tomlinson, grimly.  “We’ll see about that to-night.”