“Suppose we come home together after this,” Roy suggested, and they arranged to do so, realizing that danger lurked in the dark corners and that it was in some such lonely spot that the deed would be tried again.  They experienced no trouble for a time, though on nearing their cabin one night the younger man fancied that he saw a shadow glide away from its vicinity and out into the blackness of the tundra, as though some one had stood at his very door waiting for him, then became frightened at the two figures approaching.  Dextry had not observed it, however, and Glenister was not positive himself, but it served to give him the uncanny feeling that some determined, unscrupulous force was bent on his destruction.  He determined to go nowhere unarmed.

A few evenings later he went home early and was busied in writing when Dextry came in about ten o’clock.  The old miner hung up his coat before speaking, lit a cigarette, inhaled deeply, then, amid mouthfuls of smoke, began: 

“I had my own toes over the edge to-night.  I was mistook for you, which compliment I don’t aim to have repeated.”

Glenister questioned him eagerly.

“We’re about the same height an’ these hats of ours are alike.  Just as I come by that lumber-pile down yonder, a man hopped out an throwed a ‘gat’ under my nose.  He was quicker than light, and near blowed my skelp into the next block before he saw who I was; then he dropped his weepon and said: 

“‘My mistake.  Go on.’  I accepted his apology.”

“Could you see who he was?”

“Sure.  Guess.”

“I can’t.”

“It was the Bronco Kid.”

“Lord!” ejaculated Glenister.  “Do you think he’s after me?”

“He ain’t after nobody else, an’, take my word for it, it’s got nothin’ to do with McNamara nor that gamblin’ row.  He’s too game for that.  There’s some other reason.”

This was the first mention Dextry had made of the night at the Northern.

“I don’t know why he should have it in for me—­I never did him any favors,” Glenister remarked, cynically.

“Well, you watch out, anyhow.  I’d sooner face McNamara an’ all the crooks he can hire than that gambler.”

During the next few days Roy undertook to meet the proprietor of the Northern face to face, but the Kid had vanished completely from his haunts.  He was not in his gambling-hall at night nor on the street by day.  The young man was still looking for him on the evening of the dance at the hotel, when he chanced to meet one of the Vigilantes, who inquired of him: 

“Aren’t you late for the meeting?”

“What meeting?”

After seeing that they were alone, the other stated: 

“There’s an assembly to-night at eleven o’clock.  Something important, I think.  I supposed, of course, you knew about it.”

“It’s strange I wasn’t notified,” said Roy.  “It’s probably an oversight.  Ill go along with you.”