his blood till I was satiated. I did all that, and then my nightmare
descended upon me again. You know how I fled with Hellbeam's hounds on
my heels. I was terrified at the enormity of the thing I'd done. I could
have stood my ground and beaten him--and them. But moral cowardice
overwhelmed me and drove me to these outlands. God, what I suffered! And
after all I haven't the certainty that I deserved it."

Bat came back to his stump and stood against it while Standing passed a
weary hand across his forehead.

"The happenings since then you know as well as I do. I don't need to
talk of them. I mean, how I met and married Nancy, when she was widow of
that no-account McDonald feller, the editor of _The Abercrombie
Herald!_"

Bat nodded.

"Yes, sure, I know, Les. When you married Nancy an' made her
thirteen-year-old daughter--your daughter."

"Yes. I'd almost forgotten. Yes, there's her girl, Nancy. She's still at
school. Well, anyway, you know, these things, all of 'em. But what you
don't know is that you--you Bat, old friend, are solely responsible for
all the work that's being done here. You, old friend, are responsible
that I've enjoyed seven years of something approaching peace of mind.
You, you with your bulldog fighting spirit, you with your hell-may-care
manner of shouldering responsibility, and facing every threat, have been
the staunch pillar on which I have always leant. Without you I'd have
gone under years ago, a victim of my own mental ghosts. No, no, Bat," he
went on quickly, as the lumberman shook his head in sharp denial, "it's