"I agree with you," said Wade. He put his arm around his wife. "Better go back to roost, little girl."
"Not until I hear all about it," said Kitty. "Go and get a bath robe or something, like a good boy. Pajamas are very becoming, and all the best people wear 'em, but——"
"I beg everybody's pardon!" Wade exclaimed in confusion. "I thought I had on my—er—that is, it never struck me that I wasn't clad in orthodox garments." He was back in a moment, swathed in a bath robe. "Now, Casey, tell us how you happened to make that stage entrance?"
"Not much to tell about it," Casey replied. "I had an old Indian bedded down in the hay in the stable, and he saw or heard this outfit riding in and woke me up. As a matter of fact, the old boy was just outside with a shotgun all the time. We had that much moral support. He came to tell me that this outfit meant to get Tom."
"This McHale business is serious," said Wade.
"Very serious. I don't mean so far as Tom is concerned; he can take care of himself. But you can see that we can't allow these men to bulldoze us. It's McHale now. To-morrow it may be some one else."
"Yes, I see. But what can you do about it? The law——"
"It's outside the law," said Casey. "The law is too slow. We'll make our own law. Hello! What's that?"
He jumped to his feet, gun in hand, as the chair set against the door scraped back from it. Out of the darkness staggered Sheila McCrae.
Water dripped from her old pony hat and ran in little rivulets from a long, yellow slicker. From head to foot she was spattered with mud. Her face was pale, drawn, and dirt-smeared, and blood oozed slowly from a jagged cut above her left eye. She swayed from side to side as she walked.