It was Uncle Henry who broke the awful tension.

“You was shot!” he cried, to Pell.

The other looked at the old man in the chair.  “Shot?” he said.

“Yes, and a rotten shot it was, too!” Uncle Henry was not afraid to say.  “Gol darn it all!”

The moment was too tragic for anyone to smile.

“Who shot me?” Pell asked.  He was very weak.  He put the towel in the bowl of water, and pressed it to his forehead.

“A friend of mine!” cried Uncle Henry.

Gilbert glared at the old man.  No one could be forgiven for a remark like that.

“I remember, now,” Pell murmured.  “The bandit.”

“And a gol darn nice fellow, too,” Uncle Henry went on.  “A little careless, but—­”

Pell looked startled.  The towel fell from his hand and he looked about him.  “He’s not here still!” he cried, as one just coming out of a stupor to a full realization of his surroundings.

“No, worse luck!” Uncle Henry said.

“He’s gone?” Pell said.

“The rangers came,” Hardy explained.

“Texas?” from Pell.

“Yes, gol darn ’em!” Uncle Henry let out.

Lucia, who had been watching Pell’s face every second, now offered him the bowl of water with her own hands, and drew closer to him.  She picked up the towel that had fallen to the table, and folded it, then dampened it.  Pell looked up and saw her for the first time.

“Oh, so there you are, my dear!” was his cynical greeting.

Lucia still stared at him.  “I thought—­I thought—­you were dead,” she murmured.  Her voice sounded far away to her.  It was scarcely a whisper.

“So it seems!” Morgan Pell answered, his lip curling.  “My dear, I regret to disappoint you.  But aside from a slight pain in my head, I was never better in my whole life!” He wanted to see the effect of his words.

“Shall I bandage your wound for you?” his dutiful wife asked.

He looked at her from the corner of his eye.  “Thank you—­no,” he said.

Lucia sat down on the other side of the table.

Not a word more was said.  Pell took out his own handkerchief, and started to dip it in the bowl of water.  But he was shaking still, and the piece of linen dropped to the floor.  He stooped to pick it up.  As he did so, he saw, in the dim light, the option lying exactly where Pancho Lopez had tossed it.  He grasped it in his hand, crushed and crumpled as it was, and thought no one had observed him.  But Uncle Henry’s eagle eye had seen his movement.

“What’s that?” he called out.

Pell tried to seem unconcerned.  “The option, my dear sir,” he answered truthfully.

“By gollies, he’s got it again!” Uncle Henry yelled, in desperation.  He switched his chair around, and faced Gilbert.  “Why didn’t you tear it up while he was dead?” he asked.

Pell addressed Uncle Henry.  “You’ve got ten thousand dollars of my money,” he firmly said.