A tall, powerful young man came in behind a leveled revolver.

"Car—what—be still, there!" he gasped, steadying the weapon. The man stood motionless, his eyes on the ground.

"It's all right—I never carried a gun in my life," he said quietly.

"Oh, Lindsay, it's only a joke!"

Caroline ran towards him, stopping in horror at the ugly winking eyes of the revolver.

"Mr. Barker only meant—tell Lin about it!" she entreated, sick with foreboding at the dogged man before her, the scornful flushed boy at her side.

"I guess you better tell him, Missy," said the man in a low empty voice.

"Go home, Caroline; go straight home this moment."

Caroline had never heard her cousin speak in that tone, and it was partly in tears, partly in wrath that she answered,

"I will not go straight home, Lindsay Holt, and you needn't talk to me that way, either! Uncle Joe himself asked Mr. Barker—"