"Your wife, Bagot?"

"She is not here, m'sieu'." The voice was low and gloomy.

"Where is she, Bagot?"

"I do not know, m'sieu'."

"When did you see her last?"

"Four weeks ago, m'sieu'."

"That was September, this is October--winter. On the ranches they let
their cattle loose upon the plains in winter, knowing not where they go,
yet looking for them to return in the spring. But a woman--a woman and a
wife--is different.... Bagot, you have been a rough, hard man, and you
have been a stranger to your God, but I thought you loved your wife and
child!"

The hunter's hands clenched, and a wicked light flashed up into his
eyes; but the calm, benignant gaze of the other cooled the tempest in
his veins. The priest sat down on the couch where the child lay, and
took the fevered hand in his own.

"Stay where you are, Bagot, just there where you are, and tell me what
your trouble is, and why your wife is not here.... Say all honestly--by
the name of the Christ!" he added, lifting up an iron crucifix that hung
on his breast.

Bagot sat down on a bench near the fireplace, the light playing on his