"Not tonight," she reminded him; and then his brain, like his eyes, having readapted its perception to reality, he slowly nodded his head.
"No. That was—last night," he answered, with a bitter change of tone. "I'd forgotten.... Things are moving so rapidly, you see."
"I came," she said, with direct gravity, "because some one told me that you were in danger—of wrecking your life. I came to speak ... for the thought in time."
While her eyes held his, he returned her gaze with a steady inscrutability, and the two stood there with a long silence between them.
Then the man announced in a dead tone:
"It's too late. Come here!"
He led the way to the bedroom door and threw it open with an emotionless gesture. The girl flinched as she looked in and succeeded in stifling a scream only by bringing both her hands swiftly to her lips. But Boone took a step over to the cot where Victor McCalloway had slept and lifted the sheet from something that lay there.
"That's 'Little' Jim Bartleton—or was," he added slowly. "I folded his hands there on his breast such a little while ago that they're hardly cold yet." He paused a moment; then the flat quality went out of his bearing and his voice, though no louder than before, became transformed. It held the throbbing intensity of distant drums beating for action and battle.
"He was trying to serve me by watching the enemies that plotted my murder. He was riding my horse—and was mistaken for me. You see, you come too late."
"But, Boone—when—did this—?"