"
For the girl's few words, the look of her eyes, the prayer, had
strangely touched Venters.
"She was only a girl," he soliloquized. "What was she to Oldring?
Rustlers don't have wives nor sisters nor daughters. She was
bad--that's all. But somehow...well, she may not have willingly
become the companion of rustlers. That prayer of hers to God for
mercy!...Life is strange and cruel. I wonder if other members of
Oldring's gang are women? Likely enough. But what was his game?
Oldring's Mask Rider! A name to make villagers hide and lock
their doors. A name credited with a dozen murders, a hundred
forays, and a thousand stealings of cattle. What part did the
girl have in this? It may have served Oldring to create
mystery."
Hours passed. The white stars moved across the narrow strip of
dark-blue sky above. The silence awoke to the low hum of insects.
Venters watched the immovable white face, and as he watched, hour
by hour waiting for death, the infamy of her passed from his
mind. He thought only of the sadness, the truth of the moment.
Whoever she was--whatever she had done--she was young and she was
dying.
The after-part of the night wore on interminably. The starlight
failed and the gloom blackened to the darkest hour. "She'll die
at the gray of dawn," muttered Venters, remembering some old
woman's fancy. The blackness paled to gray, and the gray
lightened and day peeped over the eastern rim.
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