Just for the sake of peace and quietness I stayed that night in Grave
City, and sat around next morning smoking long cigars while I made my
poor brain think. There were points in Jim's letter, and facts I had
picked up casual at Lordsburgh, and words of gossip dropped in the
hotel; but to put them all together would have puzzled a large-sized
judge. Still, by all the tracks, the signs, the signals, and the little
smells, I reckoned that Mr. Ryan was mighty near reaching a crisis, and
apt to break out sudden as dynamite. First, here was Sheriff Bryant with
two deputies, his wife, and a medicine-man, camped down at Holy Cross.
Now Bryant would scarcely take deputy-sheriffs down there to nurse a
sick lady. Had Holy Cross been seized at last for Balshannon's debts?
That smelt of Ryan.