I never thought she'd take it so hard--" Robert Grant Burns stopped and looked at him in heavy silence.

"Good Lord!" he snapped out at last.

"I dunno whether to fire you off the job--or raise your salary! You got the punch, all right.

And the chances are you've ruined her nerve for shooting, into the bargain." He stood looking down perturbedly at Gil, who was smoothing Jean's hair back from her forehead after the manner of men who feel tenderly toward the woman who cries or faints in their presence.

"I'm after the punch every time," Burns went on ruefully, "but there's no use being a hog about it.