When a man's a man

by Harold Bell Wright

"But I tell you we were quarreling, Kitty," he protested weakly.

"And you think that I could go to you now?" She was trembling with indignation. "Oh, you are so mistaken. It seems that I was mistaken, too. I never dreamed that you—nothing—nothing, that you could ever do would make me forget what you have told me. You are right to go."

"You mean that you will not come to me?" he faltered.

"Could you really think that I would?" she retorted.

"But, Kitty, you will let me go? You will not betray me? You will give me a chance?"

"It is the only thing that I can do," she answered coldly. "I should die of shame, if it were ever known that I had thought of being more to you than I have been; but you must go to-night."

And with this she left him, fairly running toward the house.

Alone in the darkness, Honorable Patches smiled mockingly to himself.

When morning came there was great excitement at the Cross-Triangle Ranch. Patches was missing. And more, the best horse in the Dean's outfit—the big bay with the blazed face, had also disappeared.