CHAPTER XXIX
TRUTH AND FICTION
EVEN in his own lifetime a man in the mountain desert passes swiftly from the fact of history into the dream of legend. The telephone and the newspaper cannot bring that lonely region into the domain of cold truth. In the time that followed people seized on the story of Andrew Lanning and embroidered it with rare trimmings. It was told over and over again in saloons and around family firesides and at the general-merchandise stores and in the bunk houses of many ranches. Each retelling emphasized something new and added to the vividness of the yarn. They not only squeezed every available drop of interest out of the facts, but they added quite imaginary details. For Andrew had done what many men failed to do in spite of a score of killings—he struck the public fancy. People realized, however vaguely, that here was a unique story of the making of a desperado, and they gathered the story of Andrew Lanning to their hearts.
On the whole, it was not an unkindly interest. In reality the sympathy was with the outlaw. For every one knew that Hal Dozier was on the trail again, and every one felt that in the end he would run down his man, and there was a general hope that the chase might be a long one. For one thing, the end of that chase would have removed one of the few vital current bits of news. Men could no longer open conversations by asking the last tidings of Andrew. Such questions were
