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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Man of the Forest, by Zane Grey
+#13 in our series by Zane Grey
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+Title: The Man of the Forest
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+Author:  Zane Grey
+
+Official Release Date: October, 2002  [Etext #3457]
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+The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Man of the Forest, by Zane Grey
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+
+
+
+THE MAN OF THE FOREST
+
+by Zane Grey
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+At sunset hour the forest was still, lonely, sweet with tang
+of fir and spruce, blazing in gold and red and green; and
+the man who glided on under the great trees seemed to blend
+with the colors and, disappearing, to have become a part of
+the wild woodland.
+
+Old Baldy, highest of the White Mountains, stood up round
+and bare, rimmed bright gold in the last glow of the setting
+sun.  Then, as the fire dropped behind the domed peak, a
+change, a cold and darkening blight, passed down the black
+spear-pointed slopes over all that mountain world.
+
+It was a wild, richly timbered, and abundantly watered
+region of dark forests and grassy parks, ten thousand feet
+above sea-level, isolated on all sides by the southern
+Arizona desert -- the virgin home of elk and deer, of bear
+and lion, of wolf and fox, and the birthplace as well as the
+hiding-place of the fierce Apache.
+
+September in that latitude was marked by the sudden cool
+night breeze following shortly after sundown.  Twilight
+appeared to come on its wings, as did faint sounds, not
+distinguishable before in the stillness.
+
+Milt Dale, man of the forest, halted at the edge of a
+timbered ridge, to listen and to watch.  Beneath him lay a
+narrow valley, open and grassy, from which rose a faint
+murmur of running water.  Its music was pierced by the wild
+staccato yelp of a hunting coyote.  From overhead in the
+giant fir came a twittering and rustling of grouse settling
+for the night; and from across the valley drifted the last
+low calls of wild turkeys going to roost.
+
+To Dale's keen ear these sounds were all they should have
+been, betokening an unchanged serenity of forestland.  He was
+glad, for he had expected to hear the clipclop of white
+men's horses -- which to hear up in those fastnesses was
+hateful to him.  He and the Indian were friends.  That fierce
+foe had no enmity toward the lone hunter.  But there hid
+somewhere in the forest a gang of bad men, sheep-thieves,
+whom Dale did not want to meet.
+
+As he started out upon the slope, a sudden flaring of the
+afterglow of sunset flooded down from Old Baldy, filling the
+valley with lights and shadows, yellow and blue, like the
+radiance of the sky.  The pools in the curves of the brook
+shone darkly bright.  Dale's gaze swept up and down the
+valley, and then tried to pierce the black shadows across
+the brook where the wall of spruce stood up, its speared and
+spiked crest against the pale clouds.  The wind began to moan
+in the trees and there was a feeling of rain in the air.
+Dale, striking a trail, turned his back to the fading
+afterglow and strode down the valley.
+
+With night at hand and a rain-storm brewing, he did not head
+for his own camp, some miles distant, but directed his steps
+toward an old log cabin.  When he reached it darkness had
+almost set in.  He approached with caution.  This cabin, like
+the few others scattered in the valleys, might harbor
+Indians or a bear or a panther.  Nothing, however, appeared
+to be there.  Then Dale studied the clouds driving across the
+sky, and he felt the cool dampness of a fine, misty rain on
+his face.  It would rain off and on during the night.
+Whereupon he entered the cabin.
+
+And the next moment he heard quick hoof-beats of trotting
+horses.  Peering out, he saw dim, moving forms in the
+darkness, quite close at hand.  They had approached against
+the wind so that sound had been deadened.  Five horses with
+riders, Dale made out -- saw them loom close.  Then he heard
+rough voices.  Quickly he turned to feel in the dark for a
+ladder he knew led to a loft; and finding it, he quickly
+mounted, taking care not to make a noise with his rifle, and
+lay down upon the floor of brush and poles.  Scarcely had he
+done so when heavy steps, with accompaniment of clinking
+spurs, passed through the door below into the cabin.
+
+"Wal, Beasley, are you here?" queried a loud voice.
+
+There was no reply.  The man below growled under his breath,
+and again the spurs jingled.
+
+"Fellars, Beasley ain't here yet," he called.  "Put the
+hosses under the shed.  We'll wait."
+
+"Wait, huh!" came a harsh reply.  "Mebbe all night -- an' we
+got nuthin' to eat."
+
+"Shut up, Moze.  Reckon you're no good for anythin' but
+eatin'.  Put them hosses away an' some of you rustle
+fire-wood in here."
+
+Low, muttered curses, then mingled with dull thuds of hoofs
+and strain of leather and heaves of tired horses.
+
+Another shuffling, clinking footstep entered the cabin.
+
+"Snake, it'd been sense to fetch a pack along," drawled this
+newcomer.
+
+"Reckon so, Jim.  But we didn't, an' what's the use
+hollerin'?  Beasley won't keep us waitin' long."
+
+Dale, lying still and prone, felt a slow start in all his
+blood -- a thrilling wave.  That deep-voiced man below was
+Snake Anson, the worst and most dangerous character of the
+region; and the others, undoubtedly, composed his gang, long
+notorious in that sparsely settle country.  And the Beasley
+mentioned -- he was one of the two biggest ranchers and
+sheep-raisers of the White Mountain ranges.  What was the
+meaning of a rendezvous between Snake Anson and Beasley?
+Milt Dale answered that question to Beasley's discredit; and
+many strange matters pertaining to sheep and herders, always
+a mystery to the little village of Pine, now became as clear
+as daylight.
+
+Other men entered the cabin.
+
+"It ain't a-goin' to rain much," said one.  Then came a crash
+of wood thrown to the ground.
+
+"Jim, hyar's a chunk of pine log, dry as punk," said
+another.
+
+Rustlings and slow footsteps, and then heavy thuds attested
+to the probability that Jim was knocking the end of a log
+upon the ground to split off a corner whereby a handful of
+dry splinters could be procured.
+
+"Snake, lemme your pipe, an' I'll hev a fire in a jiffy."
+
+"Wal, I want my terbacco an' I ain't carin' about no fire,"
+replied Snake.
+
+"Reckon you're the meanest cuss in these woods," drawled
+Jim.
+
+Sharp click of steel on flint -- many times -- and then a
+sound of hard blowing and sputtering told of Jim's efforts
+to start a fire.  Presently the pitchy blackness of the cabin
+changed; there came a little crackling of wood and the
+rustle of flame, and then a steady growing roar.
+
+As it chanced, Dale lay face down upon the floor of the
+loft, and right near his eyes there were cracks between the
+boughs.  When the fire blazed up he was fairly well able to
+see the men below.  The only one he had ever seen was Jim
+Wilson, who had been well known at Pine before Snake Anson
+had ever been heard of.  Jim was the best of a bad lot, and
+he had friends among the honest people.  It was rumored that
+he and Snake did not pull well together.
+
+"Fire feels good," said the burly Moze, who appeared as
+broad as he was black-visaged.  "Fall's sure a-comin'. . .
+Now if only we had some grub!"
+
+"Moze, there's a hunk of deer meat in my saddle-bag, an' if
+you git it you can have half," spoke up another voice.
+
+Moze shuffled out with alacrity.
+
+In the firelight Snake Anson's face looked lean and
+serpent-like, his eyes glittered, and his long neck and all
+of his long length carried out the analogy of his name.
+
+"Snake, what's this here deal with Beasley?" inquired Jim.
+
+"Reckon you'll l'arn when I do," replied the leader.  He
+appeared tired and thoughtful.
+
+"Ain't we done away with enough of them poor greaser herders
+-- for nothin'?" queried the youngest of the gang, a boy in
+years, whose hard, bitter lips and hungry eyes somehow set
+him apart from his comrades.
+
+"You're dead right, Burt -- an' that's my stand," replied
+the man who had sent Moze out.  "Snake, snow 'll be flyin'
+round these woods before long," said Jim Wilson.  "Are we
+goin' to winter down in the Tonto Basin or over on the
+Gila?"
+
+"Reckon we'll do some tall ridin' before we strike south,"
+replied Snake, gruffly.
+
+At the juncture Moze returned.
+
+"Boss, I heerd a hoss comin' up the trail," he said.
+
+Snake rose and stood at the door, listening.  Outside the
+wind moaned fitfully and scattering raindrops pattered upon
+the cabin.
+
+"A-huh!" exclaimed Snake, in relief.
+
+Silence ensued then for a moment, at the end of which
+interval Dale heard a rapid clip-clop on the rocky trail
+outside.  The men below shuffled uneasily, but none of the
+spoke.  The fire cracked cheerily.  Snake Anson stepped back
+from before the door with an action that expressed both
+doubt and caution.
+
+The trotting horse had halted out there somewhere.
+
+"Ho there, inside!" called a voice from the darkness.
+
+"Ho yourself!" replied Anson.
+
+"That you, Snake?" quickly followed the query.
+
+"Reckon so," returned Anson, showing himself.
+
+The newcomer entered.  He was a large man, wearing a slicker
+that shone wet in the firelight.  His sombrero, pulled well
+down, shadowed his face, so that the upper half of his
+features might as well have been masked.  He had a black,
+drooping mustache, and a chin like a rock.  A potential
+force, matured and powerful, seemed to be wrapped in his
+movements.
+
+"Hullo, Snake!  Hullo, Wilson!" he said.  "I've backed out on
+the other deal.  Sent for you on -- on another little matter
+...  particular private."
+
+Here he indicated with a significant gesture that Snake's
+men were to leave the cabin.
+
+"A-huh!  ejaculated Anson, dubiously.  Then he turned
+abruptly.  Moze, you an' Shady an' Burt go wait outside.
+Reckon this ain't the deal I expected....  An' you can saddle
+the hosses."
+
+The three members of the gang filed out, all glancing keenly
+at the stranger, who had moved back into the shadow.
+
+"All right now, Beasley," said Anson, low-voiced.  "What's
+your game?  Jim, here, is in on my deals."
+
+Then Beasley came forward to the fire, stretching his hands
+to the blaze.
+
+"Nothin' to do with sheep," replied he.
+
+"Wal, I reckoned not," assented the other.  "An' say --
+whatever your game is, I ain't likin' the way you kept me
+waitin' an' ridin' around.  We waited near all day at Big
+Spring.  Then thet greaser rode up an' sent us here.  We're a
+long way from camp with no grub an' no blankets"
+
+"I won't keep you long," said Beasley.  "But even if I did
+you'd not mind -- when I tell you this deal concerns Al
+Auchincloss -- the man who made an outlaw of you!"
+
+Anson's sudden action then seemed a leap of his whole frame.
+Wilson, likewise, bent forward eagerly.  Beasley glanced at
+the door -- then began to whisper.
+
+"Old Auchincloss is on his last legs.  He's goin' to croak.
+He's sent back to Missouri for a niece -- a young girl --
+an' he means to leave his ranches an' sheep -- all his stock
+to her.  Seems he has no one else. . . .  Them ranches -- an'
+all them sheep an' hosses!  You know me an' Al were pardners
+in sheep-raisin' for years.  He swore I cheated him an' he
+threw me out.  An' all these years I've been swearin' he did
+me dirt -- owed me sheep an' money.  I've got as many friends
+in Pine -- an' all the way down the trail -- as Auchincloss
+has. . . .  An' Snake, see here --"
+
+He paused to draw a deep breath and his big hands trembled
+over the blaze.  Anson leaned forward, like a serpent ready
+to strike, and Jim Wilson was as tense with his divination
+of the plot at hand.
+
+"See here," panted Beasley.  "The girl's due to arrive at
+Magdalena on the sixteenth.  That's a week from to-morrow.
+She'll take the stage to Snowdrop, where some of
+Auchincloss's men will meet her with a team."
+
+"A-huh!" grunted Anson as Beasley halted again.  "An' what of
+all thet?"
+
+"She mustn't never get as far as Snowdrop!"
+
+"You want me to hold up the stage -- an' get the girl?"
+
+"Exactly."
+
+"Wal -- an' what then?
+
+Make off with her. . . .  She disappears.  That's your affair.
+. . .  I'll press my claims on Auchincloss -- hound him --
+an' be ready when he croaks to take over his property.  Then
+the girl can come back, for all I care. . . .  You an' Wilson
+fix up the deal between you.  If you have to let the gang in
+on it don't give them any hunch as to who an' what.  This 'll
+make you a rich stake.  An' providin', when it's paid, you
+strike for new territory."
+
+"Thet might be wise," muttered Snake Anson.  "Beasley, the
+weak point in your game is the uncertainty of life.  Old Al
+is tough.  He may fool you."
+
+"Auchincloss is a dyin' man," declared Beasley, with such
+positiveness that it could not be doubted.
+
+"Wal, he sure wasn't plumb hearty when I last seen him. . .
+.  Beasley, in case I play your game -- how'm I to know that
+girl?"
+
+"Her name's Helen Rayner," replied Beasley, eagerly.  "She's
+twenty years old.  All of them Auchinclosses was handsome an'
+they say she's the handsomest."
+
+"A-huh!  . . .  Beasley, this 's sure a bigger deal -- an' one
+I ain't fancyin'. . . .  But I never doubted your word. . . .
+Come on -- an' talk out.  What's in it for me?"
+
+"Don't let any one in on this.  You two can hold up the
+stage.  Why, it was never held up. . . .  But you want to
+mask. . . .  How about ten thousand sheep -- or what they
+bring at Phenix in gold?"
+
+Jim Wilson whistled low.
+
+"An' leave for new territory?" repeated Snake Anson, under
+his breath.
+
+"You've said it."
+
+"Wal, I ain't fancyin' the girl end of this deal, but you
+can count on me. . . .  September sixteenth at Magdalena --
+an' her name's Helen -- an' she's handsome?"
+
+"Yes.  My herders will begin drivin' south in about two
+weeks.  Later, if the weather holds good, send me word by one
+of them an' I'll meet you."
+
+Beasley spread his hands once more over the blaze, pulled on
+his gloves and pulled down his sombrero, and with an abrupt
+word of parting strode out into the night.
+
+"Jim, what do you make of him?" queried Snake Anson.
+
+"Pard, he's got us beat two ways for Sunday," replied
+Wilson.
+
+"A-huh!  . . .  Wal, let's get back to camp." And he led the
+way out.
+
+Low voices drifted into the cabin, then came snorts of
+horses and striking hoofs, and after that a steady trot,
+gradually ceasing.  Once more the moan of wind and soft
+patter of rain filled the forest stillness.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Milt Dale quietly sat up to gaze, with thoughtful eyes, into
+the gloom.
+
+He was thirty years old.  As a boy of fourteen he had run off
+from his school and home in Iowa and, joining a wagon-train
+of pioneers, he was one of the first to see log cabins built
+on the slopes of the White Mountains.  But he had not taken
+kindly to farming or sheep-raising or monotonous home toil,
+and for twelve years he had lived in the forest, with only
+infrequent visits to Pine and Show Down and Snowdrop.  This
+wandering forest life of his did not indicate that he did
+not care for the villagers, for he did care, and he was
+welcome everywhere, but that he loved wild life and solitude
+and beauty with the primitive instinctive force of a savage.
+
+And on this night he had stumbled upon a dark plot against
+the only one of all the honest white people in that region
+whom he could not call a friend.
+
+"That man Beasley!" he soliloquized.  "Beasley -- in cahoots
+with Snake Anson!  . . .  Well, he was right.  Al Auchincloss
+is on his last legs.  Poor old man!  When I tell him he'll
+never believe ME, that's sure!"
+
+Discovery of the plot meant to Dale that he must hurry down
+to Pine.
+
+"A girl -- Helen Rayner -- twenty years old," he mused.
+"Beasley wants her made off with. . . .  That means -- worse
+than killed!"
+
+Dale accepted facts of life with that equanimity and
+fatality acquired by one long versed in the cruel annals of
+forest lore.  Bad men worked their evil just as savage wolves
+relayed a deer.  He had shot wolves for that trick.  With men,
+good or bad, he had not clashed.  Old women and children
+appealed to him, but he had never had any interest in girls.
+The image, then, of this Helen Rayner came strangely to
+Dale; and he suddenly realized that he had meant somehow to
+circumvent Beasley, not to befriend old Al Auchincloss, but
+for the sake of the girl.  Probably she was already on her
+way West, alone, eager, hopeful of a future home.  How little
+people guessed what awaited them at a journey's end!  Many
+trails ended abruptly in the forest -- and only trained
+woodsmen could read the tragedy.
+
+"Strange how I cut across country to-day from Spruce Swamp,"
+reflected Dale.  Circumstances, movements, usually were not
+strange to him.  His methods and habits were seldom changed
+by chance.  The matter, then, of his turning off a course out
+of his way for no apparent reason, and of his having
+overheard a plot singularly involving a young girl, was
+indeed an adventure to provoke thought.  It provoked more,
+for Dale grew conscious of an unfamiliar smoldering heat
+along his veins.  He who had little to do with the strife of
+men, and nothing to do with anger, felt his blood grow hot
+at the cowardly trap laid for an innocent girl.
+
+"Old Al won't listen to me," pondered Dale.  "An' even if he
+did, he wouldn't believe me.  Maybe nobody will. . . .  All
+the same, Snake Anson won't get that girl."
+
+With these last words Dale satisfied himself of his own
+position, and his pondering ceased.  Taking his rifle, he
+descended from the loft and peered out of the door.  The
+night had grown darker, windier, cooler; broken clouds were
+scudding across the sky; only a few stars showed; fine rain
+was blowing from the northwest; and the forest seemed full
+of a low, dull roar.
+
+"Reckon I'd better hang up here," he said, and turned to the
+fire.  The coals were red now.  From the depths of his
+hunting-coat he procured a little bag of salt and some
+strips of dried meat.  These strips he laid for a moment on
+the hot embers, until they began to sizzle and curl; then
+with a sharpened stick he removed them and ate like a hungry
+hunter grateful for little.
+
+He sat on a block of wood with his palms spread to the dying
+warmth of the fire and his eyes fixed upon the changing,
+glowing, golden embers.  Outside, the wind continued to rise
+and the moan of the forest increased to a roar.  Dale felt
+the comfortable warmth stealing over him, drowsily lulling;
+and he heard the storm-wind in the trees, now like a
+waterfall, and anon like a retreating army, and again low
+and sad; and he saw pictures in the glowing embers, strange
+as dreams.
+
+Presently he rose and, climbing to the loft, he stretched
+himself out, and soon fell asleep.
+
+
+When the gray dawn broke he was on his way, 'cross-country,
+to the village of Pine.
+
+During the night the wind had shifted and the rain had
+ceased.  A suspicion of frost shone on the grass in open
+places.  All was gray -- the parks, the glades -- and deeper,
+darker gray marked the aisles of the forest.  Shadows lurked
+under the trees and the silence seemed consistent with
+spectral forms.  Then the east kindled, the gray lightened,
+the dreaming woodland awoke to the far-reaching rays of a
+bursting red sun.
+
+This was always the happiest moment of Dale's lonely days,
+as sunset was his saddest.  He responded, and there was
+something in his blood that answered the whistle of a stag
+from a near-by ridge.  His strides were long, noiseless, and
+they left dark trace where his feet brushed the dew-laden
+grass.
+
+Dale pursued a zigzag course over the ridges to escape the
+hardest climbing, but the "senacas" -- those parklike
+meadows so named by Mexican sheep-herders -- were as round
+and level as if they had been made by man in beautiful
+contrast to the dark-green, rough, and rugged ridges.  Both
+open senaca and dense wooded ridge showed to his quick eye
+an abundance of game.  The cracking of twigs and disappearing
+flash of gray among the spruces, a round black lumbering
+object, a twittering in the brush, and stealthy steps, were
+all easy signs for Dale to read.  Once, as he noiselessly
+emerged into a little glade, he espied a red fox stalking
+some quarry, which, as he advanced, proved to be a flock of
+partridges.  They whirred up, brushing the branches, and the
+fox trotted away.  In every senaca Dale encountered wild
+turkeys feeding on the seeds of the high grass.
+
+It had always been his custom, on his visits to Pine, to
+kill and pack fresh meat down to several old friends, who
+were glad to give him lodging.  And, hurried though he was
+now, he did not intend to make an exception of this trip.
+
+At length he got down into the pine belt, where the great,
+gnarled, yellow trees soared aloft, stately, and aloof from
+one another, and the ground was a brown, odorous, springy
+mat of pine-needles, level as a floor.  Squirrels watched him
+from all around, scurrying away at his near approach --
+tiny, brown, light-striped squirrels, and larger ones,
+russet-colored, and the splendid dark-grays with their white
+bushy tails and plumed ears.
+
+This belt of pine ended abruptly upon wide, gray, rolling,
+open land, almost like a prairie, with foot-hills lifting
+near and far, and the red-gold blaze of aspen thickets
+catching the morning sun.  Here Dale flushed a flock of wild
+turkeys, upward of forty in number, and their subdued color
+of gray flecked with white, and graceful, sleek build,
+showed them to be hens.  There was not a gobbler in the
+flock.  They began to run pell-mell out into the grass, until
+only their heads appeared bobbing along, and finally
+disappeared.  Dale caught a glimpse of skulking coyotes that
+evidently had been stalking the turkeys, and as they saw him
+and darted into the timber he took a quick shot at the
+hindmost.  His bullet struck low, as he had meant it to, but
+too low, and the coyote got only a dusting of earth and
+pine-needles thrown up into his face.  This frightened him so
+that he leaped aside blindly to butt into a tree, rolled
+over, gained his feet, and then the cover of the forest.
+Dale was amused at this.  His hand was against all the
+predatory beasts of the forest, though he had learned that
+lion and bear and wolf and fox were all as necessary to the
+great scheme of nature as were the gentle, beautiful wild
+creatures upon which they preyed.  But some he loved better
+than others, and so he deplored the inexplicable cruelty.
+
+He crossed the wide, grassy plain and struck another gradual
+descent where aspens and pines crowded a shallow ravine and
+warm, sun-lighted glades bordered along a sparkling brook.
+Here be heard a turkey gobble, and that was a signal for him
+to change his course and make a crouching, silent detour
+around a clump of aspens.  In a sunny patch of grass a dozen
+or more big gobblers stood, all suspiciously facing in his
+direction, heads erect, with that wild aspect peculiar to
+their species.  Old wild turkey gobblers were the most
+difficult game to stalk.  Dale shot two of them.  The others
+began to run like ostriches, thudding over the ground,
+spreading their wings, and with that running start launched
+their heavy bodies into whirring flight.  They flew low, at
+about the height of a man from the grass, and vanished in
+the woods.
+
+Dale threw the two turkeys over his shoulder and went on his
+way.  Soon he came to a break in the forest level, from which
+he gazed down a league-long slope of pine and cedar, out
+upon the bare, glistening desert, stretching away, endlessly
+rolling out to the dim, dark horizon line.
+
+The little hamlet of Pine lay on the last level of sparsely
+timbered forest.  A road, running parallel with a
+dark-watered, swift-flowing stream, divided the cluster of
+log cabins from which columns of blue smoke drifted lazily
+aloft.  Fields of corn and fields of oats, yellow in the
+sunlight, surrounded the village; and green pastures, dotted
+with horses and cattle, reached away to the denser woodland.
+This site appeared to be a natural clearing, for there was
+no evidence of cut timber.  The scene was rather too wild to
+be pastoral, but it was serene, tranquil, giving the
+impression of a remote community, prosperous and happy,
+drifting along the peaceful tenor of sequestered lives.
+
+Dale halted before a neat little log cabin and a little
+patch of garden bordered with sunflowers.  His call was
+answered by an old woman, gray and bent, but remarkably
+spry, who appeared at the door.
+
+"Why, land's sakes, if it ain't Milt Dale!" she exclaimed,
+in welcome.
+
+"Reckon it's me, Mrs.  Cass," he replied.  "An, I've brought
+you a turkey."
+
+"Milt, you're that good boy who never forgits old Widow
+Cass. . . .  What a gobbler!  First one I've seen this fall.
+My man Tom used to fetch home gobblers like that. . . .  An'
+mebbe he'll come home again sometime."
+
+Her husband, Tom Cass, had gone into the forest years before
+and had never returned.  But the old woman always looked for
+him and never gave up hope.
+
+"Men have been lost in the forest an' yet come back,"
+replied Dale, as he had said to her many a time.
+
+"Come right in.  You air hungry, I know.  Now, son, when last
+did you eat a fresh egg or a flapjack?"
+
+"You should remember," he answered, laughing, as he followed
+her into a small, clean kitchen.
+
+"Laws-a'-me!  An' thet's months ago," she replied, shaking
+her gray head.  "Milt, you should give up that wild life --
+an' marry -- an' have a home."
+
+"You always tell me that."
+
+"Yes, an' I'll see you do it yet. . . .  Now you set there,
+an' pretty soon I'll give you thet to eat which 'll make
+your mouth water."
+
+"What's the news, Auntie?" he asked.
+
+"Nary news in this dead place.  Why, nobody's been to
+Snowdrop in two weeks!  . . .  Sary Jones died, poor old soul
+-- she's better off -- an' one of my cows run away.  Milt,
+she's wild when she gits loose in the woods.  An' you'll have
+to track her, 'cause nobody else can.  An' John Dakker's
+heifer was killed by a lion, an' Lem Harden's fast hoss --
+you know his favorite -- was stole by hoss-thieves.  Lem is
+jest crazy.  An' that reminds me, Milt, where's your big
+ranger, thet you'd never sell or lend?"
+
+"My horses are up in the woods, Auntie; safe, I reckon, from
+horse-thieves."
+
+"Well, that's a blessin'.  We've had some stock stole this
+summer, Milt, an' no mistake."
+
+Thus, while preparing a meal for Dale, the old woman went on
+recounting all that had happened in the little village since
+his last visit.  Dale enjoyed her gossip and quaint
+philosophy, and it was exceedingly good to sit at her table.
+In his opinion, nowhere else could there have been such
+butter and cream, such ham and eggs.  Besides, she always had
+apple pie, it seemed, at any time he happened in; and apple
+pie was one of Dale's few regrets while up in the lonely
+forest.
+
+"How's old Al Auchincloss?" presently inquired Dale.
+
+"Poorly -- poorly," sighed Mrs.  Cass.  "But he tramps an'
+rides around same as ever.  Al's not long for this world. . .
+.  An', Milt, that reminds me -- there's the biggest news you
+ever heard."
+
+"You don't say so!" exclaimed Dale, to encourage the excited
+old woman.
+
+"Al has sent back to Saint Joe for his niece, Helen Rayner.
+She's to inherit all his property.  We've heard much of her
+-- a purty lass, they say. . . .  Now, Milt Dale, here's your
+chance.  Stay out of the woods an' go to work. . . .  You can
+marry that girl!"
+
+"No chance for me, Auntie," replied Dale, smiling.
+
+The old woman snorted.  "Much you know!  Any girl would have
+you, Milt Dale, if you'd only throw a kerchief."
+
+"Me!  . . .  An' why, Auntie?" he queried, half amused, half
+thoughtful.  When he got back to civilization he always had
+to adjust his thoughts to the ideas of people.
+
+"Why?  I declare, Milt, you live so in the woods you're like
+a boy of ten -- an' then sometimes as old as the hills. . .
+.There's no young man to compare with you, hereabouts.  An'
+this girl -- she'll have all the spunk of the
+Auchinclosses."
+
+"Then maybe she'd not be such a catch, after all," replied
+Dale.
+
+"Wal, you've no cause to love them, that's sure.  But, Milt,
+the Auchincloss women are always good wives."
+
+"Dear Auntie, you're dreamin'," said Dale, soberly.  "I want
+no wife.  I'm happy in the woods."
+
+"Air you goin' to live like an Injun all your days, Milt
+Dale?" she queried, sharply.
+
+"I hope so."
+
+"You ought to be ashamed.  But some lass will change you,
+boy, an' mebbe it'll be this Helen Rayner.  I hope an' pray
+so to thet."
+
+"Auntie, supposin' she did change me.  She'd never change old
+Al.  He hates me, you know."
+
+"Wal, I ain't so sure, Milt.  I met Al the other day.  He
+inquired for you, an' said you was wild, but he reckoned men
+like you was good for pioneer settlements.  Lord knows the
+good turns you've done this village!  Milt, old Al doesn't
+approve of your wild life, but he never had no hard feelin's
+till thet tame lion of yours killed so many of his sheep."
+
+"Auntie, I don't believe Tom ever killed Al's sheep,"
+declared Dale, positively.
+
+"Wal, Al thinks so, an' many other people," replied Mrs.
+Cass, shaking her gray head doubtfully.  "You never swore he
+didn't.  An' there was them two sheep-herders who did swear
+they seen him."
+
+"They only saw a cougar.  An' they were so scared they ran."
+
+"Who wouldn't?  Thet big beast is enough to scare any one.
+For land's sakes, don't ever fetch him down here again!  I'll
+never forgit the time you did.  All the folks an' children
+an' hosses in Pine broke an' run thet day."
+
+"Yes; but Tom wasn't to blame.  Auntie, he's the tamest of my
+pets.  Didn't he try to put his head on your lap an' lick
+your hand?"
+
+"Wal, Milt, I ain't gainsayin' your cougar pet didn't act
+better 'n a lot of people I know.  Fer he did.  But the looks
+of him an' what's been said was enough for me."
+
+"An' what's all that, Auntie?"
+
+"They say he's wild when out of your sight.  An' thet he'd
+trail an' kill anythin' you put him after."
+
+"I trained him to be just that way."
+
+"Wal, leave Tom to home up in the woods-when you visit us."
+
+Dale finished his hearty meal, and listened awhile longer to
+the old woman's talk; then, taking his rifle and the other
+turkey, he bade her good-by.  She followed him out.
+
+"Now, Milt, you'll come soon again, won't you -- jest to see
+Al's niece -- who'll be here in a week?"
+
+"I reckon I'll drop in some day. . . .  Auntie, have you seen
+my friends, the Mormon boys?"
+
+"No, I 'ain't seen them an' don't want to," she retorted.
+"Milt Dale, if any one ever corrals you it'll be Mormons."
+
+"Don't worry, Auntie.  I like those boys.  They often see me
+up in the woods an' ask me to help them track a hoss or help
+kill some fresh meat."
+
+"They're workin' for Beasley now."
+
+"Is that so?" rejoined Dale, with a sudden start.  "An' what
+doin'?"
+
+"Beasley is gettin' so rich he's buildin' a fence, an'
+didn't have enough help, so I hear."
+
+"Beasley gettin' rich!" repeated Dale, thoughtfully.  "More
+sheep an' horses an' cattle than ever, I reckon?"
+
+"Laws-a'-me!  Why, Milt, Beasley 'ain't any idea what he
+owns.  Yes, he's the biggest man in these parts, since poor
+old Al's took to failin'.  I reckon Al's health ain't none
+improved by Beasley's success.  They've bad some bitter
+quarrels lately -- so I hear.  Al ain't what he was."
+
+Dale bade good-by again to his old friend and strode away,
+thoughtful and serious.  Beasley would not only be difficult
+to circumvent, but he would be dangerous to oppose.  There
+did not appear much doubt of his driving his way rough-shod
+to the dominance of affairs there in Pine.  Dale, passing
+down the road, began to meet acquaintances who had hearty
+welcome for his presence and interest in his doings, so that
+his pondering was interrupted for the time being.  He carried
+the turkey to another old friend, and when he left her house
+he went on to the village store.  This was a large log cabin,
+roughly covered with clapboards, with a wide plank platform
+in front and a hitching-rail in the road.  Several horses
+were standing there, and a group of lazy, shirt-sleeved
+loungers.
+
+"I'll be doggoned if it ain't Milt Dale!" exclaimed one.
+
+"Howdy, Milt, old buckskin!  Right down glad to see you,"
+greeted another.
+
+"Hello, Dale!  You air shore good for sore eyes," drawled
+still another.
+
+After a long period of absence Dale always experienced a
+singular warmth of feeling when he met these acquaintances.
+It faded quickly when he got back to the intimacy of his
+woodland, and that was because the people of Pine, with few
+exceptions -- though they liked him and greatly admired his
+outdoor wisdom -- regarded him as a sort of nonentity.
+Because he loved the wild and preferred it to village and
+range life, they had classed him as not one of them.  Some
+believed him lazy; others believed him shiftless; others
+thought him an Indian in mind and habits; and there were
+many who called him slow-witted.  Then there was another side
+to their regard for him, which always afforded him
+good-natured amusement.  Two of this group asked him to bring
+in some turkey or venison; another wanted to hunt with him.
+Lem Harden came out of the store and appealed to Dale to
+recover his stolen horse.  Lem's brother wanted a
+wild-running mare tracked and brought home.  Jesse Lyons
+wanted a colt broken, and broken with patience, not
+violence, as was the method of the hard-riding boys at Pine.
+So one and all they besieged Dale with their selfish needs,
+all unconscious of the flattering nature of these overtures.
+And on the moment there happened by two women whose remarks,
+as they entered the store, bore strong testimony to Dale's
+personality.
+
+"If there ain't Milt Dale!" exclaimed the older of the two.
+"How lucky!  My cow's sick, an' the men are no good
+doctorin'.  I'll jest ask Milt over."
+
+"No one like Milt!" responded the other woman, heartily.
+
+"Good day there -- you Milt Dale!" called the first speaker.
+"When you git away from these lazy men come over."
+
+Dale never refused a service, and that was why his
+infrequent visits to Pine were wont to be prolonged beyond
+his own pleasure.
+
+Presently Beasley strode down the street, and when about to
+enter the store he espied Dale.
+
+"Hullo there, Milt!" he called, cordially, as he came
+forward with extended hand.  His greeting was sincere, but
+the lightning glance he shot over Dale was not born of his
+pleasure.  Seen in daylight, Beasley was a big, bold, bluff
+man, with strong, dark features.  His aggressive presence
+suggested that he was a good friend and a bad enemy.
+
+Dale shook hands with him.
+
+"How are you, Beasley?"
+
+"Ain't complainin', Milt, though I got more work than I can
+rustle.  Reckon you wouldn't take a job bossin' my
+sheep-herders?"
+
+"Reckon I wouldn't," replied Dale.  "Thanks all the same."
+
+"What's goin' on up in the woods?"
+
+"Plenty of turkey an' deer.  Lots of bear, too.  The Indians
+have worked back on the south side early this fall.  But I
+reckon winter will come late an' be mild."
+
+"Good!  An' where 're you headin' from?"
+
+"'Cross-country from my camp," replied Dale, rather
+evasively.
+
+"Your camp!  Nobody ever found that yet," declared Beasley,
+gruffly.
+
+"It's up there," said Dale.
+
+"Reckon you've got that cougar chained in your cabin door?"
+queried Beasley, and there was a barely distinguishable
+shudder of his muscular frame.  Also the pupils dilated in
+his hard brown eyes.
+
+"Tom ain't chained.  An' I haven't no cabin, Beasley."
+
+"You mean to tell me that big brute stays in your camp
+without bein' hog-tied or corralled!" demanded Beasley.
+
+"Sure he does."
+
+"Beats me!  But, then, I'm queer on cougars.  Have had many a
+cougar trail me at night.  Ain't sayin' I was scared.  But I
+don't care for that brand of varmint. . . .  Milt, you goin'
+to stay down awhile?"
+
+"Yes, I'll hang around some."
+
+"Come over to the ranch.  Glad to see you any time.  Some old
+huntin' pards of yours are workin' for me."
+
+"Thanks, Beasley.  I reckon I'll come over."
+
+Beasley turned away and took a step, and then, as if with an
+after-thought, he wheeled again.
+
+"Suppose you've heard about old Al Auchincloss bein' near
+petered out?" queried Beasley.  A strong, ponderous cast of
+thought seemed to emanate from his features.  Dale divined
+that Beasley's next step would be to further his advancement
+by some word or hint.
+
+"Widow Cass was tellin' me all the news.  Too bad about old
+Al," replied Dale.
+
+"Sure is.  He's done for.  An' I'm sorry -- though Al's never
+been square --"
+
+"Beasley," interrupted Dale, quickly, "you can't say that to
+me.  Al Auchincloss always was the whitest an' squarest man
+in this sheep country."
+
+Beasley gave Dale a fleeting, dark glance.
+
+"Dale, what you think ain't goin' to influence feelin' on
+this range," returned Beasley, deliberately.  "You live in
+the woods an' --"
+
+"Reckon livin' in the woods I might think -- an' know a
+whole lot," interposed Dale, just as deliberately.  The group
+of men exchanged surprised glances.  This was Milt Dale in
+different aspect.  And Beasley did not conceal a puzzled
+surprise.
+
+"About what -- now?" he asked, bluntly.
+
+"Why, about what's goin' on in Pine," replied Dale.
+
+Some of the men laughed.
+
+"Shore lots goin' on -- an' no mistake," put in Lem Harden.
+
+Probably the keen Beasley had never before considered Milt
+Dale as a responsible person; certainly never one in any way
+to cross his trail.  But on the instant, perhaps, some
+instinct was born, or he divined an antagonism in Dale that
+was both surprising and perplexing.
+
+"Dale, I've differences with Al Auchincloss -- have had them
+for years," said Beasley.  "Much of what he owns is mine.  An'
+it's goin' to come to me.  Now I reckon people will be takin'
+sides -- some for me an' some for Al.  Most are for me. . . .
+Where do you stand?  Al Auchincloss never had no use for you,
+an' besides he's a dyin' man.  Are you goin' on his side?"
+
+"Yes, I reckon I am."
+
+"Wal, I'm glad you've declared yourself," rejoined Beasley,
+shortly, and he strode away with the ponderous gait of a man
+who would brush any obstacle from his path.
+
+"Milt, thet's bad -- makin' Beasley sore at you," said Lem
+Harden.  "He's on the way to boss this outfit."
+
+"He's sure goin' to step into Al's boots," said another.
+
+"Thet was white of Milt to stick up fer poor old Al,"
+declared Lem's brother.
+
+Dale broke away from them and wended a thoughtful way down
+the road.  The burden of what he knew about Beasley weighed
+less heavily upon him, and the close-lipped course be had
+decided upon appeared wisest.  He needed to think before
+undertaking to call upon old Al Auchincloss; and to that end
+he sought an hour's seclusion under the pines.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+In the afternoon, Dale, having accomplished some tasks
+imposed upon him by his old friends at Pine, directed slow
+steps toward the Auchincloss ranch.
+
+The flat, square stone and log cabin of unusually large size
+stood upon a little hill half a mile out of the village.  A
+home as well as a fort, it had been the first structure
+erected in that region, and the process of building had more
+than once been interrupted by Indian attacks.  The Apaches
+had for some time, however, confined their fierce raids to
+points south of the White Mountain range.  Auchincloss's
+house looked down upon barns and sheds and corrals of all
+sizes and shapes, and hundreds of acres of well-cultivated
+soil.  Fields of oats waved gray and yellow in the afternoon
+sun; an immense green pasture was divided by a
+willow-bordered brook, and here were droves of horses, and
+out on the rolling bare flats were straggling herds of
+cattle.
+
+The whole ranch showed many years of toil and the
+perseverance of man.  The brook irrigated the verdant valley
+between the ranch and the village.  Water for the house,
+however, came down from the high, wooded slope of the
+mountain, and had been brought there by a simple expedient.
+Pine logs of uniform size had been laid end to end, with a
+deep trough cut in them, and they made a shining line down
+the slope, across the valley, and up the little hill to the
+Auchincloss home.  Near the house the hollowed halves of logs
+had been bound together, making a crude pipe.  Water ran
+uphill in this case, one of the facts that made the ranch
+famous, as it had always been a wonder and delight to the
+small boys of Pine.  The two good women who managed
+Auchincloss's large household were often shocked by the
+strange things that floated into their kitchen with the
+ever-flowing stream of clear, cold mountain water.
+
+As it happened this day Dale encountered Al Auchincloss
+sitting in the shade of a porch, talking to some of his
+sheep-herders and stockmen.  Auchincloss was a short man of
+extremely powerful build and great width of shoulder.  He had
+no gray hairs, and he did not look old, yet there was in his
+face a certain weariness, something that resembled sloping
+lines of distress, dim and pale, that told of age and the
+ebb-tide of vitality.  His features, cast in large mold, were
+clean-cut and comely, and he had frank blue eyes, somewhat
+sad, yet still full of spirit.
+
+Dale had no idea how his visit would be taken, and he
+certainly would not have been surprised to be ordered off
+the place.  He had not set foot there for years.  Therefore it
+was with surprise that he saw Auchincloss wave away the
+herders and take his entrance without any particular
+expression.
+
+"Howdy, Al!  How are you?" greeted Dale, easily, as he leaned
+his rifle against the log wall.
+
+Auchincloss did not rise, but he offered his hand.
+
+"Wal, Milt Dale, I reckon this is the first time I ever seen
+you that I couldn't lay you flat on your back," replied the
+rancher.  His tone was both testy and full of pathos.
+
+"I take it you mean you ain't very well," replied Dale.  "I'm
+sorry, Al."
+
+"No, it ain't thet.  Never was sick in my life.  I'm just
+played out, like a hoss thet had been strong an' willin',
+an' did too much. . . .  Wal, you don't look a day older,
+Milt.  Livin' in the woods rolls over a man's head."
+
+"Yes, I'm feelin' fine, an' time never bothers me."
+
+"Wal, mebbe you ain't such a fool, after all.  I've wondered
+lately -- since I had time to think. . . .  But, Milt, you
+don't git no richer."
+
+"Al, I have all I want an' need."
+
+"Wal, then, you don't support anybody; you don't do any good
+in the world."
+
+"We don't agree, Al," replied Dale, with his slow smile.
+
+"Reckon we never did. . . .  An' you jest come over to pay
+your respects to me, eh?"
+
+"Not altogether," answered Dale, ponderingly.  "First off,
+I'd like to say I'll pay back them sheep you always claimed
+my tame cougar killed."
+
+"You will!  An' how'd you go about that?"
+
+"Wasn't very many sheep, was there?
+
+"A matter of fifty head."
+
+"So many!  Al, do you still think old Tom killed them sheep?"
+
+"Humph!  Milt, I know damn well he did."
+
+"Al, now how could you know somethin' I don't?  Be
+reasonable, now.  Let's don't fall out about this again.  I'll
+pay back the sheep.  Work it out --"
+
+"Milt Dale, you'll come down here an' work out that fifty
+head of sheep!" ejaculated the old rancher, incredulously.
+
+"Sure."
+
+"Wal, I'll be damned!" He sat back and gazed with shrewd
+eyes at Dale.  "What's got into you, Milt?  Hev you heard
+about my niece thet's comin', an' think you'll shine up to
+her?"
+
+"Yes, Al, her comin' has a good deal to do with my deal,"
+replied Dale, soberly.  "But I never thought to shine up to
+her, as you hint."
+
+"Haw!  Haw!  You're just like all the other colts hereabouts.
+Reckon it's a good sign, too.  It'll take a woman to fetch
+you out of the woods.  But, boy, this niece of mine, Helen
+Rayner, will stand you on your head.  I never seen her.  They
+say she's jest like her mother.  An' Nell Auchincloss -- what
+a girl she was!"
+
+Dale felt his face grow red.  Indeed, this was strange
+conversation for him.
+
+"Honest, Al --" he began.
+
+"Son, don't lie to an old man."
+
+"Lie!  I wouldn't lie to any one.  Al, it's only men who live
+in towns an' are always makin' deals.  I live in the forest,
+where there's nothin' to make me lie."
+
+"Wal, no offense meant, I'm sure," responded Auchincloss.
+"An' mebbe there's somethin' in what you say . . .  We was
+talkin' about them sheep your big cat killed.  Wal, Milt, I
+can't prove it, that's sure.  An' mebbe you'll think me
+doddery when I tell you my reason.  It wasn't what them
+greaser herders said about seein' a cougar in the herd."
+
+"What was it, then?" queried Dale, much interested.
+
+"Wal, thet day a year ago I seen your pet.  He was lyin' in
+front of the store an' you was inside tradin', fer supplies,
+I reckon.  It was like meetin' an enemy face to face.
+Because, damn me if I didn't know that cougar was guilty
+when he looked in my eyes!  There!"
+
+The old rancher expected to be laughed at.  But Dale was
+grave.
+
+"Al, I know how you felt," he replied, as if they were
+discussing an action of a human being.  "Sure I'd hate to
+doubt old Tom.  But he's a cougar.  An' the ways of animals
+are strange . . .  Anyway, Al, I'll make good the loss of
+your sheep."
+
+"No, you won't," rejoined Auchincloss, quickly.  "We'll call
+it off .  I'm takin' it square of you to make the offer.
+Thet's enough.  So forget your worry about work, if you had
+any."
+
+"There's somethin' else, Al, I wanted to say," began Dale,
+with hesitation.  "An' it's about Beasley."
+
+Auchincloss started violently, and a flame of red shot into
+his face.  Then he raised a big hand that shook.  Dale saw in
+a flash how the old man's nerves had gone.
+
+"Don't mention -- thet -- thet greaser -- to me!" burst out
+the rancher.  "It makes me see -- red. . . .  Dale, I ain't
+overlookin' that you spoke up fer me to-day -- stood fer my
+side.  Lem Harden told me.  I was glad.  An' thet's why --
+to-day -- I forgot our old quarrel. . . .  But not a word
+about thet sheep-thief -- or I'll drive you off the place!"
+
+"But, Al -- be reasonable," remonstrated Dale.  "It's
+necessary thet I speak of -- of Beasley."
+
+"It ain't.  Not to me.  I won't listen."
+
+"Reckon you'll have to, Al," returned Dale.  "Beasley's after
+your property.  He's made a deal --"
+
+"By Heaven!  I know that!" shouted Auchincloss, tottering up,
+with his face now black-red.  "Do you think thet's new to me?
+Shut up, Dale!  I can't stand it."
+
+"But Al -- there's worse," went on Dale, hurriedly.  "Worse!
+Your life's threatened -- an' your niece, Helen -- she's to
+be --"
+
+"Shut up -- an' clear out!" roared Auchincloss, waving his
+huge fists.
+
+He seemed on the verge of a collapse as, shaking all over,
+he backed into the door.  A few seconds of rage had
+transformed him into a pitiful old man.
+
+"But, Al -- I'm your friend --" began Dale, appealingly.
+
+"Friend, hey?" returned the rancher, with grim, bitter
+passion.  "Then you're the only one. . . .  Milt Dale, I'm
+rich an' I'm a dyin' man.  I trust nobody . . .  But, you wild
+hunter -- if you're my friend -- prove it!  . . .  Go kill
+thet greaser sheep-thief!  DO somethin' -- an' then come talk
+to me!"
+
+With that he lurched, half falling, into the house, and
+slammed the door.
+
+Dale stood there for a blank moment, and then, taking up his
+rifle, he strode away.
+
+Toward sunset Dale located the camp of his four Mormon
+friends, and reached it in time for supper.
+
+John, Roy, Joe, and Hal Beeman were sons of a pioneer Mormon
+who had settled the little community of Snowdrop.  They were
+young men in years, but hard labor and hard life in the open
+had made them look matured.  Only a year's difference in age
+stood between John and Roy, and between Roy and Joe, and
+likewise Joe and Hal.  When it came to appearance they were
+difficult to distinguish from one another.  Horsemen,
+sheep-herders, cattle-raisers, hunters -- they all possessed
+long, wiry, powerful frames, lean, bronzed, still faces, and
+the quiet, keen eyes of men used to the open.
+
+Their camp was situated beside a spring in a cove surrounded
+by aspens, some three miles from Pine; and, though working
+for Beasley, near the village, they had ridden to and fro
+from camp, after the habit of seclusion peculiar to their
+kind.
+
+Dale and the brothers had much in common, and a warm regard
+had sprang up.  But their exchange of confidences had wholly
+concerned things pertaining to the forest.  Dale ate supper
+with them, and talked as usual when he met them, without
+giving any hint of the purpose forming in his mind.  After
+the meal he helped Joe round up the horses, hobble them for
+the night, and drive them into a grassy glade among the
+pines.  Later, when the shadows stole through the forest on
+the cool wind, and the camp-fire glowed comfortably, Dale
+broached the subject that possessed him.
+
+"An' so you're working for Beasley?" he queried, by way of
+starting conversation.
+
+"We was," drawled John.  "But to-day, bein' the end of our
+month, we got our pay an' quit.  Beasley sure was sore."
+
+"Why'd you knock off?"
+
+John essayed no reply, and his brothers all had that quiet,
+suppressed look of knowledge under restraint.
+
+"Listen to what I come to tell you, then you'll talk," went
+on Dale.  And hurriedly he told of Beasley's plot to abduct
+Al Auchincloss's niece and claim the dying man's property.
+
+When Dale ended, rather breathlessly, the Mormon boys sat
+without any show of surprise or feeling.  John, the eldest,
+took up a stick and slowly poked the red embers of the fire,
+making the white sparks fly.
+
+"Now, Milt, why'd you tell us thet?" he asked, guardedly.
+
+"You're the only friends I've got," replied Dale.  "It didn't
+seem safe for me to talk down in the village.  I thought of
+you boys right off.  I ain't goin' to let Snake Anson get
+that girl.  An' I need help, so I come to you."
+
+"Beasley's strong around Pine, an' old Al's weakenin'.
+Beasley will git the property, girl or no girl," said John.
+
+"Things don't always turn out as they look.  But no matter
+about that.  The girl deal is what riled me. . . .  She's to
+arrive at Magdalena on the sixteenth, an' take stage for
+Snowdrop. . . .  Now what to do?  If she travels on that stage
+I'll be on it, you bet.  But she oughtn't to be in it at all.
+. . .  Boys, somehow I'm goin' to save her.  Will you help me?
+I reckon I've been in some tight corners for you.  Sure, this
+'s different.  But are you my friends?  You know now what
+Beasley is.  An' you're all lost at the hands of Snake
+Anson's gang.  You've got fast hosses, eyes for trackin', an'
+you can handle a rifle.  You're the kind of fellows I'd want
+in a tight pinch with a bad gang.  Will you stand by me or
+see me go alone?"
+
+Then John Beeman, silently, and with pale face, gave Dale's
+hand a powerful grip, and one by one the other brothers rose
+to do likewise.  Their eyes flashed with hard glint and a
+strange bitterness hovered around their thin lips.
+
+"Milt, mebbe we know what Beasley is better 'n you," said
+John, at length.  "He ruined my father.  He's cheated other
+Mormons.  We boys have proved to ourselves thet he gets the
+sheep Anson's gang steals. . . .  An' drives the herds to
+Phenix!  Our people won't let us accuse Beasley.  So we've
+suffered in silence.  My father always said, let some one
+else say the first word against Beasley, an' you've come to
+us!"
+
+Roy Beeman put a hand on Dale's shoulder.  He, perhaps, was
+the keenest of the brothers and the one to whom adventure
+and peril called most.  He had been oftenest with Dale, on
+many a long trail, and he was the hardest rider and the most
+relentless tracker in all that range country.
+
+"An' we're goin' with you," he said, in a strong and rolling
+voice.
+
+They resumed their seats before the fire.  John threw on more
+wood, and with a crackling and sparkling the blaze curled
+up, fanned by the wind.  As twilight deepened into night the
+moan in the pines increased to a roar.  A pack of coyotes
+commenced to pierce the air in staccato cries.
+
+The five young men conversed long and earnestly,
+considering, planning, rejecting ideas advanced by each.
+Dale and Roy Beeman suggested most of what became acceptable
+to all.  Hunters of their type resembled explorers in slow
+and deliberate attention to details.  What they had to deal
+with here was a situation of unlimited possibilities; the
+horses and outfit needed; a long detour to reach Magdalena
+unobserved; the rescue of a strange girl who would no doubt
+be self-willed and determined to ride on the stage -- the
+rescue forcible, if necessary; the fight and the inevitable
+pursuit; the flight into the forest, and the safe delivery
+of the girl to Auchincloss.
+
+"Then, Milt, will we go after Beasley?" queried Roy Beeman,
+significantly.
+
+Dale was silent and thoughtful.
+
+"Sufficient unto the day!" said John.  "An, fellars, let's go
+to bed."
+
+They rolled out their tarpaulins, Dale sharing Roy's
+blankets, and soon were asleep, while the red embers slowly
+faded, and the great roar of wind died down, and the forest
+stillness set in.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+Helen Rayner had been on the westbound overland train fully
+twenty-four hours before she made an alarming discovery.
+
+Accompanied by her sister Bo, a precocious girl of sixteen,
+Helen had left St.  Joseph with a heart saddened by farewells
+to loved ones at home, yet full of thrilling and vivid
+anticipations of the strange life in the Far West.  All her
+people had the pioneer spirit; love of change, action,
+adventure, was in her blood.  Then duty to a widowed mother
+with a large and growing family had called to Helen to
+accept this rich uncle's offer.  She had taught school and
+also her little brothers and sisters; she had helped along
+in other ways.  And now, though the tearing up of the roots
+of old loved ties was hard, this opportunity was
+irresistible in its call.  The prayer of her dreams had been
+answered.  To bring good fortune to her family; to take care
+of this beautiful, wild little sister; to leave the yellow,
+sordid, humdrum towns for the great, rolling, boundless
+open; to live on a wonderful ranch that was some day to be
+her own; to have fulfilled a deep, instinctive, and
+undeveloped love of horses, cattle, sheep, of desert and
+mountain, of trees and brooks and wild flowers -- all this
+was the sum of her most passionate longings, now in some
+marvelous, fairylike way to come true.
+
+A check to her happy anticipations, a blank, sickening dash
+of cold water upon her warm and intimate dreams, had been
+the discovery that Harve Riggs was on the train.  His
+presence could mean only one thing -- that he had followed
+her.  Riggs had been the worst of many sore trials back there
+in St.  Joseph.  He had possessed some claim or influence upon
+her mother, who favored his offer of marriage to Helen; he
+was neither attractive, nor good, nor industrious, nor
+anything that interested her; he was the boastful, strutting
+adventurer, not genuinely Western, and he affected long hair
+and guns and notoriety.  Helen had suspected the veracity of
+the many fights he claimed had been his, and also she
+suspected that he was not really big enough to be bad -- as
+Western men were bad.  But on the train, in the station at La
+Junta, one glimpse of him, manifestly spying upon her while
+trying to keep out of her sight, warned Helen that she now
+might have a problem on her hands.
+
+The recognition sobered her.  All was not to be a road of
+roses to this new home in the West.  Riggs would follow her,
+if he could not accompany her, and to gain his own ends he
+would stoop to anything.  Helen felt the startling
+realization of being cast upon her own resources, and then a
+numbing discouragement and loneliness and helplessness.  But
+these feelings did not long persist in the quick pride and
+flash of her temper.  Opportunity knocked at her door and she
+meant to be at home to it.  She would not have been Al
+Auchincloss's niece if she had faltered.  And, when temper
+was succeeded by genuine anger, she could have laughed to
+scorn this Harve Riggs and his schemes, whatever they were.
+Once and for all she dismissed fear of him.  When she left
+St.  Joseph she had faced the West with a beating heart and a
+high resolve to be worthy of that West.  Homes had to be made
+out there in that far country, so Uncle Al had written, and
+women were needed to make homes.  She meant to be one of
+these women and to make of her sister another.  And with the
+thought that she would know definitely what to say to Riggs
+when he approached her, sooner or later, Helen dismissed him
+from mind.
+
+While the train was in motion, enabling Helen to watch the
+ever-changing scenery, and resting her from the strenuous
+task of keeping Bo well in hand at stations, she lapsed
+again into dreamy gaze at the pine forests and the red,
+rocky gullies and the dim, bold mountains.  She saw the sun
+set over distant ranges of New Mexico -- a golden blaze of
+glory, as new to her as the strange fancies born in her,
+thrilling and fleeting by.  Bo's raptures were not silent,
+and the instant the sun sank and the color faded she just as
+rapturously importuned Helen to get out the huge basket of
+food they bad brought from home.
+
+They had two seats, facing each other, at the end of the
+coach, and piled there, with the basket on top, was luggage
+that constituted all the girls owned in the world.  Indeed,
+it was very much more than they had ever owned before,
+because their mother, in her care for them and desire to
+have them look well in the eyes of this rich uncle, had
+spent money and pains to give them pretty and serviceable
+clothes.
+
+The girls sat together, with the heavy basket on their
+knees, and ate while they gazed out at the cool, dark
+ridges.  The train clattered slowly on, apparently over a
+road that was all curves.  And it was supper-time for
+everybody in that crowded coach.  If Helen had not been so
+absorbed by the great, wild mountain-land she would have had
+more interest in the passengers.  As it was she saw them, and
+was amused and thoughtful at the men and women and a few
+children in the car, all middle-class people, poor and
+hopeful, traveling out there to the New West to find homes.
+It was splendid and beautiful, this fact, yet it inspired a
+brief and inexplicable sadness.  From the train window, that
+world of forest and crag, with its long bare reaches
+between, seemed so lonely, so wild, so unlivable.  How
+endless the distance!  For hours and miles upon miles no
+house, no hut, no Indian tepee!  It was amazing, the length
+and breadth of this beautiful land.  And Helen, who loved
+brooks and running streams, saw no water at all.
+
+Then darkness settled down over the slow-moving panorama; a
+cool night wind blew in at the window; white stars began to
+blink out of the blue.  The sisters, with hands clasped and
+heads nestled together, went to sleep under a heavy cloak.
+
+
+Early the next morning, while the girls were again delving
+into their apparently bottomless basket, the train stopped
+at Las Vegas.
+
+"Look!  Look!" cried Bo, in thrilling voice.  "Cowboys!  Oh,
+Nell, look!"
+
+Helen, laughing, looked first at her sister, and thought how
+most of all she was good to look at.  Bo was little, instinct
+with pulsating life, and she had chestnut hair and dark-blue
+eyes.  These eyes were flashing, roguish, and they drew like
+magnets.
+
+Outside on the rude station platform were railroad men,
+Mexicans, and a group of lounging cowboys.  Long, lean,
+bow-legged fellows they were, with young, frank faces and
+intent eyes.  One of them seemed particularly attractive with
+his superb build, his red-bronze face and bright-red scarf,
+his swinging gun, and the huge, long, curved spurs.
+Evidently he caught Bo's admiring gaze, for, with a word to
+his companions, he sauntered toward the window where the
+girls sat.  His gait was singular, almost awkward, as if he
+was not accustomed to walking.  The long spurs jingled
+musically.  He removed his sombrero and stood at ease, frank,
+cool, smiling.  Helen liked him on sight, and, looking to see
+what effect he had upon Bo, she found that young lady
+staring, frightened stiff.
+
+"Good mawnin'," drawled the cowboy, with slow, good-humored
+smile.  "Now where might you-all be travelin'?"
+
+The sound of his voice, the clean-cut and droll geniality;
+seemed new and delightful to Helen.
+
+"We go to Magdalena -- then take stage for the White
+Mountains," replied Helen.
+
+The cowboy's still, intent eyes showed surprise.
+
+"Apache country, miss," he said.  "I reckon I'm sorry.  Thet's
+shore no place for you-all . . .  Beggin' your pawdin -- you
+ain't Mormons?"
+
+"No.  We're nieces of Al Auchincloss," rejoined Helen.
+
+"Wal, you don't say!  I've been down Magdalena way an' heerd
+of Al. . . .  Reckon you're goin' a-visitin'?"
+
+"It's to be home for us."
+
+"Shore thet's fine.  The West needs girls. . . .  Yes, I've
+heerd of Al.  An old Arizona cattle-man in a sheep country!
+Thet's bad. . . .  Now I'm wonderin' -- if I'd drift down
+there an' ask him for a job ridin' for him -- would I get
+it?"
+
+His lazy smile was infectious and his meaning was as clear
+as crystal water.  The gaze he bent upon Bo somehow pleased
+Helen.  The last year or two, since Bo had grown prettier all
+the time, she had been a magnet for admiring glances.  This
+one of the cowboy's inspired respect and liking, as well as
+amusement.  It certainly was not lost upon Bo.
+
+"My uncle once said in a letter that he never had enough men
+to run his ranch," replied Helen, smiling.
+"Shore I'll go.  I reckon I'd jest naturally drift that way
+-- now."
+
+He seemed so laconic, so easy, so nice, that he could not
+have been taken seriously, yet Helen's quick perceptions
+registered a daring, a something that was both sudden and
+inevitable in him.  His last word was as clear as the soft
+look he fixed upon Bo.
+
+Helen had a mischievous trait, which, subdue it as she
+would, occasionally cropped out; and Bo, who once in her
+wilful life had been rendered speechless, offered such a
+temptation.
+
+"Maybe my little sister will put in a good word for you --
+to Uncle Al," said Helen.  Just then the train jerked, and
+started slowly.  The cowboy took two long strides beside the
+car, his heated boyish face almost on a level with the
+window, his eyes, now shy and a little wistful, yet bold,
+too, fixed upon Bo.
+
+"Good-by -- Sweetheart!" he called.
+
+He halted -- was lost to view.
+
+"Well!" ejaculated Helen, contritely, half sorry, half
+amused.  "What a sudden young gentleman!"
+
+Bo had blushed beautifully.
+
+"Nell, wasn't he glorious!" she burst out, with eyes
+shining.
+
+"I'd hardly call him that, but he was-nice," replied Helen,
+much relieved that Bo had apparently not taken offense at
+her.
+
+It appeared plain that Bo resisted a frantic desire to look
+out of the window and to wave her hand.  But she only peeped
+out, manifestly to her disappointment.
+
+"Do you think he -- he'll come to Uncle Al's?" asked Bo.
+
+"Child, he was only in fun."
+
+"Nell, I'll bet you he comes.  Oh, it'd be great!  I'm going
+to love cowboys.  They don't look like that Harve Riggs who
+ran after you so."
+
+Helen sighed, partly because of the reminder of her odious
+suitor, and partly because Bo's future already called
+mysteriously to the child.  Helen had to be at once a mother
+and a protector to a girl of intense and wilful spirit.
+
+One of the trainmen directed the girls' attention to a
+green, sloping mountain rising to a bold, blunt bluff of
+bare rock; and, calling it Starvation Peak, be told a story
+of how Indians had once driven Spaniards up there and
+starved them.  Bo was intensely interested, and thereafter
+she watched more keenly than ever, and always had a question
+for a passing trainman.  The adobe houses of the Mexicans
+pleased her, and, then the train got out into Indian
+country, where pueblos appeared near the track and Indians
+with their bright colors and shaggy wild mustangs -- then
+she was enraptured.
+
+"But these Indians are peaceful!" she exclaimed once,
+regretfully.
+
+"Gracious, child!  You don't want to see hostile Indians, do
+you?" queried Helen.
+
+"I do, you bet," was the frank rejoinder.
+
+"Well, I'LL bet that I'll be sorry I didn't leave you with
+mother."
+
+"Nell -- you never will!"
+
+
+They reached Albuquerque about noon, and this important
+station, where they had to change trains, had been the first
+dreaded anticipation of the journey.  It certainly was a busy
+place -- full of jabbering Mexicans, stalking, red-faced,
+wicked-looking cowboys, lolling Indians.  In the confusion
+Helen would have been hard put to it to preserve calmness,
+with Bo to watch, and all that baggage to carry, and the
+other train to find; but the kindly brakeman who had been
+attentive to them now helped them off the train into the
+other -- a service for which Helen was very grateful.
+
+"Albuquerque's a hard place," confided the trainman.  "Better
+stay in the car -- and don't hang out the windows. . . .
+Good luck to you!"
+
+Only a few passengers were in the car and they were Mexicans
+at the forward end.  This branch train consisted of one
+passenger-coach, with a baggage-car, attached to a string of
+freight-cars.  Helen told herself, somewhat grimly, that soon
+she would know surely whether or not her suspicions of Harve
+Riggs had warrant.  If he was going on to Magdalena on that
+day he must go in this coach.  Presently Bo, who was not
+obeying admonitions, drew her head out of the window.  Her
+eyes were wide in amaze, her mouth open.
+
+"Nell!  I saw that man Riggs!" she whispered.  "He's going to
+get on this train."
+
+"Bo, I saw him yesterday," replied Helen, soberly.  "He's
+followed you -- the -- the -- "
+
+"Now, Bo, don't get excited," remonstrated Helen.  "We've
+left home now.  We've got to take things as they come.  Never
+mind if Riggs has followed me.  I'll settle him."
+
+"Oh!  Then you won't speak -- have anything to do with him?"
+
+"I won't if I can help it."
+
+Other passengers boarded the train, dusty, uncouth, ragged
+men, and some hard-featured, poorly clad women, marked by
+toil, and several more Mexicans.  With bustle and loud talk
+they found their several seats.
+
+Then Helen saw Harve Riggs enter, burdened with much
+luggage.  He was a man of about medium height, of dark,
+flashy appearance, cultivating long black mustache and hair.
+His apparel was striking, as it consisted of black
+frock-coat, black trousers stuffed in high, fancy-topped
+boots, an embroidered vest, and flowing tie, and a black
+sombrero.  His belt and gun were prominent.  It was
+significant that he excited comment among the other
+passengers.
+
+When he had deposited his pieces of baggage he seemed to
+square himself, and, turning abruptly, approached the seat
+occupied by the girls.  When he reached it he sat down upon
+the arm of the one opposite, took off his sombrero, and
+deliberately looked at Helen.  His eyes were light, glinting,
+with hard, restless quiver, and his mouth was coarse and
+arrogant.  Helen had never seen him detached from her home
+surroundings, and now the difference struck cold upon her
+heart.
+
+"Hello, Nell!" he said.  "Surprised to see me?"
+
+"No," she replied, coldly.
+
+"I'll gamble you are."
+
+"Harve Riggs, I told you the day before I left home that
+nothing you could do or say mattered to me."
+
+"Reckon that ain't so, Nell.  Any woman I keep track of has
+reason to think.  An' you know it."
+
+"Then you followed me -- out here?" demanded Helen, and her
+voice, despite her control, quivered with anger
+
+"I sure did," he replied, and there was as much thought of
+himself in the act as there was of her.
+
+"Why?  Why?  It's useless -- hopeless."
+
+"I swore I'd have you, or nobody else would," he replied,
+and here, in the passion of his voice there sounded egotism
+rather than hunger for a woman's love.  "But I reckon I'd
+have struck West anyhow, sooner or later."
+
+"You're not going to -- all the way -- to Pine?" faltered
+Helen, momentarily weakening.
+
+"Nell, I'll camp on your trail from now on," he declared.
+
+Then Bo sat bolt-upright, with pale face and flashing eyes.
+
+"Harve Riggs, you leave Nell alone," she burst out, in
+ringing, brave young voice.  "I'll tell you what -- I'll bet
+-- if you follow her and nag her any more, my uncle Al or
+some cowboy will run you out of the country."
+
+"Hello, Pepper!" replied Riggs, coolly.  "I see your manners
+haven't improved an' you're still wild about cowboys."
+
+"People don't have good manners with -- with --"
+
+"Bo, hush!" admonished Helen.  It was difficult to reprove Bo
+just then, for that young lady had not the slightest fear of
+Riggs.  Indeed, she looked as if she could slap his face.  And
+Helen realized that however her intelligence had grasped the
+possibilities of leaving home for a wild country, and
+whatever her determination to be brave, the actual beginning
+of self-reliance had left her spirit weak.  She would rise
+out of that.  But just now this flashing-eyed little sister
+seemed a protector.  Bo would readily adapt herself to the
+West, Helen thought, because she was so young, primitive,
+elemental.
+
+Whereupon Bo turned her back to Riggs and looked out of the
+window.  The man laughed.  Then he stood up and leaned over
+Helen.
+
+"Nell, I'm goin' wherever you go," he said, steadily.  "You
+can take that friendly or not, just as it pleases you.  But
+if you've got any sense you'll not give these people out
+here a hunch against me.  I might hurt somebody. . . .  An'
+wouldn't it be better -- to act friends?  For I'm goin' to
+look after you, whether you like it or not."
+
+Helen had considered this man an annoyance, and later a
+menace, and now she must declare open enmity with him.
+However disgusting the idea that he considered himself a
+factor in her new life, it was the truth.  He existed, he had
+control over his movements.  She could not change that.  She
+hated the need of thinking so much about him; and suddenly,
+with a hot, bursting anger, she hated the man.
+
+"You'll not look after me.  I'll take care of myself," she
+said, and she turned her back upon him.  She heard him mutter
+under his breath and slowly move away down the car.  Then Bo
+slipped a hand in hers.
+
+"Never mind, Nell," she whispered.  "You know what old
+Sheriff Haines said about Harve Riggs.  'A four-flush
+would-be gun-fighter!  If he ever strikes a real Western town
+he'll get run out of it.' I just wish my red-faced cowboy
+had got on this train!"
+
+Helen felt a rush of gladness that she had yielded to Bo's
+wild importunities to take her West.  The spirit which had
+made Bo incorrigible at home probably would make her react
+happily to life out in this free country.  Yet Helen, with
+all her warmth and gratefulness, had to laugh at her sister.
+
+"Your red-faced cowboy!  Why, Bo, you were scared stiff.  And
+now you claim him!"
+
+"I certainly could love that fellow," replied Bo, dreamily.
+
+"Child, you've been saying that about fellows for a long
+time.  And you've never looked twice at any of them yet."
+
+"He was different. . . .  Nell, I'll bet he comes to Pine."
+
+"I hope he does.  I wish he was on this train.  I liked his
+looks, Bo."
+
+"Well, Nell dear, he looked at ME first and last -- so don't
+get your hopes up. . . .  Oh, the train's starting!  . . .
+Good-by, Albu-ker -- what's that awful name?  . . .  Nell,
+let's eat dinner.  I'm starved."
+
+Then Helen forgot her troubles and the uncertain future, and
+what with listening to Bo's chatter, and partaking again of
+the endless good things to eat in the huge basket, and
+watching the noble mountains, she drew once more into happy
+mood.
+
+The valley of the Rio Grande opened to view, wide near at
+hand in a great gray-green gap between the bare black
+mountains, narrow in the distance, where the yellow river
+wound away, glistening under a hot sun.  Bo squealed in glee
+at sight of naked little Mexican children that darted into
+adobe huts as the train clattered by, and she exclaimed her
+pleasure in the Indians, and the mustangs, and particularly
+in a group of cowboys riding into town on spirited horses.
+Helen saw all Bo pointed out, but it was to the wonderful
+rolling valley that her gaze clung longest, and to the dim
+purple distance that seemed to hold something from her.  She
+had never before experienced any feeling like that; she had
+never seen a tenth so far.  And the sight awoke something
+strange in her.  The sun was burning hot, as she could tell
+when she put a hand outside the window, and a strong wind
+blew sheets of dry dust at the train.  She gathered at once
+what tremendous factors in the Southwest were the sun and
+the dust and the wind.  And her realization made her love
+them.  It was there; the open, the wild, the beautiful, the
+lonely land; and she felt the poignant call of blood in her
+-- to seek, to strive, to find, to live.  One look down that
+yellow valley, endless between its dark iron ramparts, had
+given her understanding of her uncle.  She must be like him
+in spirit, as it was claimed she resembled him otherwise.
+
+At length Bo grew tired of watching scenery that contained
+no life, and, with her bright head on the faded cloak, she
+went to sleep.  But Helen kept steady, farseeing gaze out
+upon that land of rock and plain; and during the long hours,
+as she watched through clouds of dust and veils of heat,
+some strong and doubtful and restless sentiment seemed to
+change and then to fix.  It was her physical acceptance --
+her eyes and her senses taking the West as she had already
+taken it in spirit.
+
+A woman should love her home wherever fate placed her, Helen
+believed, and not so much from duty as from delight and
+romance and living.  How could life ever be tedious or
+monotonous out here in this tremendous vastness of bare
+earth and open sky, where the need to achieve made thinking
+and pondering superficial?
+
+It was with regret that she saw the last of the valley of
+the Rio Grande, and then of its paralleled mountain ranges.
+But the miles brought compensation in other valleys, other
+bold, black upheavals of rock, and then again bare,
+boundless yellow plains, and sparsely cedared ridges, and
+white dry washes, ghastly in the sunlight, and dazzling beds
+of alkali, and then a desert space where golden and blue
+flowers bloomed.
+
+She noted, too, that the whites and yellows of earth and
+rock had begun to shade to red -- and this she knew meant an
+approach to Arizona.  Arizona, the wild, the lonely, the red
+desert, the green plateau -- Arizona with its thundering
+rivers, its unknown spaces, its pasture-lands and
+timber-lands, its wild horses, cowboys, outlaws, wolves and
+lions and savages!  As to a boy, that name stirred and
+thrilled and sang to her of nameless, sweet, intangible
+things, mysterious and all of adventure.  But she, being a
+girl of twenty, who had accepted responsibilities, must
+conceal the depths of her heart and that which her mother
+had complained was her misfortune in not being born a boy.
+
+Time passed, while Helen watched and learned and dreamed.
+The train stopped, at long intervals, at wayside stations
+where there seemed nothing but adobe sheds and lazy
+Mexicans, and dust and heat.  Bo awoke and began to chatter,
+and to dig into the basket.  She learned from the conductor
+that Magdalena was only two stations on.  And she was full of
+conjectures as to who would meet them, what would happen.  So
+Helen was drawn back to sober realities, in which there was
+considerable zest.  Assuredly she did not know what was going
+to happen.  Twice Riggs passed up and down the aisle, his
+dark face and light eyes and sardonic smile deliberately
+forced upon her sight.  But again Helen fought a growing
+dread with contemptuous scorn.  This fellow was not half a
+man.  It was not conceivable what he could do, except annoy
+her, until she arrived at Pine.  Her uncle was to meet her or
+send for her at Snowdrop, which place, Helen knew, was
+distant a good long ride by stage from Magdalena.  This
+stage-ride was the climax and the dread of all the long
+journey, in Helen's considerations.
+
+"Oh, Nell!" cried Bo, with delight.  "We're nearly there!
+Next station, the conductor said."
+
+"I wonder if the stage travels at night," said Helen,
+thoughtfully.
+
+"Sure it does!" replied the irrepressible Bo.
+
+The train, though it clattered along as usual, seemed to
+Helen to fly.  There the sun was setting over bleak New
+Mexican bluffs, Magdalena was at hand, and night, and
+adventure.  Helen's heart beat fast.  She watched the yellow
+plains where the cattle grazed; their presence, and
+irrigation ditches and cottonwood-trees told her that the
+railroad part of the journey was nearly ended.  Then, at Bo's
+little scream, she looked across the car and out of the
+window to see a line of low, flat, red-adobe houses.  The
+train began to slow down.  Helen saw children run, white
+children and Mexican together; then more houses, and high
+upon a hill an immense adobe church, crude and glaring, yet
+somehow beautiful.
+
+Helen told Bo to put on her bonnet, and, performing a like
+office for herself, she was ashamed of the trembling of her
+fingers.  There were bustle and talk in the car.
+
+The train stopped.  Helen peered out to see a straggling
+crowd of Mexicans and Indians, all motionless and stolid, as
+if trains or nothing else mattered.  Next Helen saw a white
+man, and that was a relief.  He stood out in front of the
+others.  Tall and broad, somehow striking, he drew a second
+glance that showed him to be a hunter clad in gray-fringed
+buckskin, and carrying a rifle.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Here, there was no kindly brakeman to help the sisters with
+their luggage.  Helen bade Bo take her share; thus burdened,
+they made an awkward and laborious shift to get off the
+train.
+
+Upon the platform of the car a strong hand seized Helen's
+heavy bag, with which she was straining, and a loud voice
+called out:
+
+"Girls, we're here -- sure out in the wild an' woolly West!"
+
+The speaker was Riggs, and he had possessed himself of part
+of her baggage with action and speech meant more to impress
+the curious crowd than to be really kind.  In the excitement
+of arriving Helen had forgotten him.  The manner of sudden
+reminder -- the insincerity of it -- made her temper flash.
+She almost fell, encumbered as she was, in her hurry to
+descend the steps.  She saw the tall hunter in gray step
+forward close to her as she reached for the bag Riggs held.
+
+"Mr.  Riggs, I'll carry my bag," she said.
+
+"Let me lug this.  You help Bo with hers," he replied,
+familiarly.
+
+"But I want it," she rejoined, quietly, with sharp
+determination.  No little force was needed to pull the bag
+away from Riggs.
+
+"See here, Helen, you ain't goin' any farther with that
+joke, are you?" he queried, deprecatingly, and he still
+spoke quite loud.
+
+"It's no joke to me," replied Helen.  "I told you I didn't
+want your attention."
+
+"Sure.  But that was temper.  I'm your friend -- from your
+home town.  An' I ain't goin' to let a quarrel keep me from
+lookin' after you till you're safe at your uncle's."
+
+Helen turned her back upon him.  The tall hunter had just
+helped Bo off the car.  Then Helen looked up into a smooth
+bronzed face and piercing gray eyes.
+
+"Are you Helen Rayner?" he asked.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"My name's Dale.  I've come to meet you."
+
+"Ah!  My uncle sent you?" added Helen, in quick relief.
+
+"No; I can't say Al sent me," began the man, "but I reckon
+--"
+
+He was interrupted by Riggs, who, grasping Helen by the arm,
+pulled her back a step.
+
+"Say, mister, did Auchincloss send you to meet my young
+friends here?" he demanded, arrogantly.
+
+Dale's glance turned from Helen to Riggs.  She could not read
+this quiet gray gaze, but it thrilled her.
+
+"No.  I come on my own hook," he answered.
+
+"You'll understand, then -- they're in my charge," added
+Riggs.
+
+This time the steady light-gray eyes met Helen's, and if
+there was not a smile in them or behind them she was still
+further baffled.
+
+"Helen, I reckon you said you didn't want this fellow's
+attention."
+
+"I certainly said that," replied Helen, quickly.  Just then
+Bo slipped close to her and gave her arm a little squeeze.
+Probably Bo's thought was like hers -- here was a real
+Western man.  That was her first impression, and following
+swiftly upon it was a sensation of eased nerves.
+
+Riggs swaggered closer to Dale.
+
+"Say, Buckskin, I hail from Texas --"
+
+"You're wastin' our time an' we've need to hurry,"
+interrupted Dale.  His tone seemed friendly.  "An' if you ever
+lived long in Texas you wouldn't pester a lady an' you sure
+wouldn't talk like you do."
+
+"What!" shouted Riggs, hotly.  He dropped his right hand
+significantly to his hip.
+
+"Don't throw your gun.  It might go off," said Dale.
+
+Whatever Riggs's intention had been -- and it was probably
+just what Dale evidently had read it -- he now flushed an
+angry red and jerked at his gun.
+
+Dale's hand flashed too swiftly for Helen's eye to follow
+it.  But she heard the thud as it struck.  The gun went flying
+to the platform and scattered a group of Indians and
+Mexicans.
+
+"You'll hurt yourself some day," said Dale.
+
+Helen had never heard a slow, cool voice like this hunter's.
+Without excitement or emotion or hurry, it yet seemed full
+and significant of things the words did not mean.  Bo uttered
+a strange little exultant cry.
+
+Riggs's arm had dropped limp.  No doubt it was numb.  He
+stared, and his predominating expression was surprise.  As
+the shuffling crowd began to snicker and whisper, Riggs gave
+Dale a malignant glance, shifted it to Helen, and then
+lurched away in the direction of his gun.
+
+Dale did not pay any more attention to him.  Gathering up
+Helen's baggage, he said, "Come on," and shouldered a lane
+through the gaping crowd.  The girls followed close at his
+heels.
+
+"Nell!  what 'd I tell you?" whispered Bo.  "Oh, you're all
+atremble!"
+
+Helen was aware of her unsteadiness; anger and fear and
+relief in quick succession had left her rather weak.  Once
+through the motley crowd of loungers, she saw an old gray
+stage-coach and four lean horses.  A grizzled, sunburned man
+sat on the driver's seat, whip and reins in hand.  Beside him
+was a younger man with rifle across his knees.  Another man,
+young, tall, lean, dark, stood holding the coach door open.
+He touched his sombrero to the girls.  His eyes were sharp as
+he addressed Dale.
+
+"Milt, wasn't you held up?"
+
+"No.  But some long-haired galoot was tryin' to hold up the
+girls.  Wanted to throw his gun on me.  I was sure scared,"
+replied Dale, as he deposited the luggage.
+
+Bo laughed.  Her eyes, resting upon Dale, were warm and
+bright.  The young man at the coach door took a second look
+at her, and then a smile changed the dark hardness of his
+face.
+
+Dale helped the girls up the high step into the stage, and
+then, placing the lighter luggage, in with them, he threw
+the heavier pieces on top
+
+"Joe, climb up," he said.
+
+"Wal, Milt," drawled the driver," let's ooze along."
+
+Dale hesitated, with his hand on the door.  He glanced at the
+crowd, now edging close again, and then at Helen.
+
+"I reckon I ought to tell you," he said, and indecision
+appeared to concern him.
+
+"What?" exclaimed Helen.
+
+"Bad news.  But talkin' takes time.  An' we mustn't lose any."
+
+"There's need of hurry?" queried Helen, sitting up sharply.
+
+"I reckon."
+
+"Is this the stage to Snowdrop?
+
+"No.  That leaves in the mornin'.  We rustled this old trap to
+get a start to-night."
+
+"The sooner the better.  But I -- I don't understand," said
+Helen, bewildered.
+
+"It'll not be safe for you to ride on the mornin' stage,"
+returned Dale.
+
+"Safe!  Oh, what do you mean?" exclaimed Helen.
+Apprehensively she gazed at him and then back at Bo.
+
+"Explainin' will take time.  An' facts may change your mind.
+But if you can't trust me --"
+
+"Trust you!" interposed Helen, blankly.  "You mean to take us
+to Snowdrop?  "
+
+"I reckon we'd better go roundabout an' not hit Snowdrop,"
+he replied, shortly.
+
+"Then to Pine -- to my uncle -- Al Auchincloss?
+
+"Yes, I'm goin' to try hard."
+
+Helen caught her breath.  She divined that some peril menaced
+her.  She looked steadily, with all a woman's keenness, into
+this man's face.  The moment was one of the fateful decisions
+she knew the West had in store for her.  Her future and that
+of Bo's were now to be dependent upon her judgments.  It was
+a hard moment and, though she shivered inwardly, she
+welcomed the initial and inevitable step.  This man Dale, by
+his dress of buckskin, must be either scout or hunter.  His
+size, his action, the tone of his voice had been reassuring.
+But Helen must decide from what she saw in his face whether
+or not to trust him.  And that face was clear bronze,
+unlined, unshadowed, like a tranquil mask, clean-cut,
+strong-jawed, with eyes of wonderful transparent gray.
+
+"Yes, I'll trust you," she said.  "Get in, and let us hurry.
+Then you can explain."
+
+"All ready, Bill.  Send 'em along," called Dale.
+
+He had to stoop to enter the stage, and, once in, he
+appeared to fill that side upon which he sat.  Then the
+driver cracked his whip; the stage lurched and began to
+roll; the motley crowd was left behind.  Helen awakened to
+the reality, as she saw Bo staring with big eyes at the
+hunter, that a stranger adventure than she had ever dreamed
+of had began with the rattling roll of that old stage-coach.
+
+Dale laid off his sombrero and leaned forward, holding his
+rifle between his knees.  The light shone better upon his
+features now that he was bareheaded.  Helen had never seen a
+face like that, which at first glance appeared darkly
+bronzed and hard, and then became clear, cold, aloof, still,
+intense.  She wished she might see a smile upon it.  And now
+that the die was cast she could not tell why she had trusted
+it.  There was singular force in it, but she did not
+recognize what kind of force.  One instant she thought it was
+stern, and the next that it was sweet, and again that it was
+neither.
+
+"I'm glad you've got your sister," he said, presently.
+
+"How did you know she's my sister?"
+
+"I reckon she looks like you."
+
+"No one else ever thought so," replied Helen, trying to
+smile.
+
+Bo had no difficulty in smiling, as she said, "Wish I was
+half as pretty as Nell."
+
+"Nell.  Isn't your name Helen?" queried Dale.
+
+"Yes.  But my -- some few call me Nell."
+
+"I like Nell better than Helen.  An' what's yours?" went on
+Dale, looking at Bo.
+
+"Mine's Bo.  just plain B-o.  Isn't it silly?  But I wasn't
+asked when they gave it to me," she replied.
+
+"Bo.  It's nice an' short.  Never heard it before.  But I
+haven't met many people for years."
+
+"Oh!  we've left the town!" cried Bo.  "Look, Nell!  How bare!
+It's just like desert."
+
+"It is desert.  We've forty miles of that before we come to a
+hill or a tree."
+
+Helen glanced out.  A flat, dull-green expanse waved away
+from the road on and on to a bright, dark horizon-line,
+where the sun was setting rayless in a clear sky.  Open,
+desolate, and lonely, the scene gave her a cold thrill.
+
+"Did your uncle Al ever write anythin' about a man named
+Beasley?" asked Dale.
+
+"Indeed he did," replied Helen, with a start of surprise.
+
+"Beasley!  That name is familiar to us -- and detestable.  My
+uncle complained of this man for years.  Then he grew bitter
+-- accused Beasley.  But the last year or so not a word!"
+
+"Well, now," began the hunter, earnestly, "let's get the bad
+news over.  I'm sorry you must be worried.  But you must learn
+to take the West as it is.  There's good an' bad, maybe more
+bad.  That's because the country's young. . . .  So to come
+right out with it -- this Beasley hired a gang of outlaws to
+meet the stage you was goin' in to Snowdrop -- to-morrow --
+an' to make off with you."
+
+"Make off with me?" ejaculated Helen, bewildered.
+
+"Kidnap you!  Which, in that gang, would be worse than
+killing you!" declared Dale, grimly, and he closed a huge
+fist on his knee.
+
+Helen was utterly astounded.
+
+"How hor-rible!" she gasped out.  "Make off with me!  . . .
+What in Heaven's name for?"
+
+Bo gave vent to a fierce little utterance.
+
+"For reasons you ought to guess," replied Dale, and he
+leaned forward again.  Neither his voice nor face changed in
+the least, but yet there was a something about him that
+fascinated Helen.  "I'm a hunter.  I live in the woods.  A few
+nights ago I happened to be caught out in a storm an' I took
+to an old log cabin.  Soon as I got there I heard horses.  I
+hid up in the loft.  Some men rode up an' come in.  It was
+dark.  They couldn't see me.  An' they talked.  It turned out
+they were Snake Anson an' his gang of sheep-thieves.  They
+expected to meet Beasley there.  Pretty soon he came.  He told
+Anson how old Al, your uncle, was on his last legs -- how he
+had sent for you to have his property when he died.  Beasley
+swore he had claims on Al.  An' he made a deal with Anson to
+get you out of the way.  He named the day you were to reach
+Magdalena.  With Al dead an' you not there, Beasley could get
+the property.  An' then he wouldn't care if you did come to
+claim it.  It 'd be too late. . . .  Well, they rode away that
+night.  An' next day I rustled down to Pine.  They're all my
+friends at Pine, except old Al.  But they think I'm queer.  I
+didn't want to confide.  in many people.  Beasley is strong in
+Pine, an' for that matter I suspect Snake Anson has other
+friends there besides Beasley.  So I went to see your uncle.
+He never had any use for me because he thought I was lazy
+like an Indian.  Old Al hates lazy men.  Then we fell out --
+or he fell out -- because he believed a tame lion of mine
+had killed some of his sheep.  An' now I reckon that Tom
+might have done it.  I tried to lead up to this deal of
+Beasley's about you, but old Al wouldn't listen.  He's cross
+-- very cross.  An' when I tried to tell him, why, he went
+right out of his head.  Sent me off the ranch.  Now I reckon
+you begin to see what a pickle I was in.  Finally I went to
+four friends I could trust.  They're Mormon boys -- brothers.
+That's Joe out on top, with the driver.  I told them all
+about Beasley's deal an' asked them to help me.  So we
+planned to beat Anson an' his gang to Magdalena.  It happens
+that Beasley is as strong in Magdalena as he is in Pine.  An'
+we had to go careful.  But the boys had a couple of friends
+here -- Mormons, too, who agreed to help us.  They had this
+old stage. . . .  An' here you are." Dale spread out his big
+hands and looked gravely at Helen and then at Bo.
+
+"You're perfectly splendid!" cried Bo, ringingly.  She was
+white; her fingers were clenched; her eyes blazed.
+
+Dale appeared startled out of his gravity, and surprised,
+then pleased.  A smile made his face like a boy's.  Helen felt
+her body all rigid, yet slightly trembling.  Her hands were
+cold.  The horror of this revelation held her speechless.  But
+in her heart she echoed Bo's exclamation of admiration and
+gratitude.
+
+"So far, then," resumed Dale, with a heavy breath of relief.
+"No wonder you're upset.  I've a blunt way of talkin'. . . .
+Now we've thirty miles to ride on this Snowdrop road before
+we can turn off.  To-day sometime the rest of the boys --
+Roy, John, an' Hal -- were to leave Show Down, which's a
+town farther on from Snowdrop.  They have my horses an' packs
+besides their own.  Somewhere on the road we'll meet them --
+to-night, maybe -- or tomorrow.  I hope not to-night, because
+that 'd mean Anson's gang was ridin' in to Magdalena."
+
+Helen wrung her hands helplessly.
+
+"Oh, have I no courage?" she whispered.
+
+"Nell, I'm as scared as you are," said Bo, consolingly,
+embracing her sister.
+
+"I reckon that's natural," said Dale, as if excusing them.
+"But, scared or not, you both brace up.  It's a bad job.  But
+I've done my best.  An' you'll be safer with me an' the
+Beeman boys than you'd be in Magdalena, or anywhere else,
+except your uncle's."
+
+"Mr.  -- Mr.  Dale," faltered Helen, with her tears falling,
+"don't think me a coward -- or -- or ungrateful.  I'm
+neither.  It's only I'm so -- so shocked.  After all we hoped
+and expected -- this -- this -- is such a -- a terrible
+surprise."
+
+"Never mind, Nell dear.  Let's take what comes," murmured Bo.
+
+"That's the talk," said Dale.  "You see, I've come right out
+with the worst.  Maybe we'll get through easy.  When we meet
+the boys we'll take to the horses an' the trails.  Can you
+ride?"
+
+"Bo has been used to horses all her life and I ride fairly
+well," responded Helen.  The idea of riding quickened her
+spirit.
+
+"Good!  We may have some hard ridin' before I get you up to
+Pine.  Hello!  What's that?"
+
+Above the creaking, rattling, rolling roar of the stage
+Helen heard a rapid beat of hoofs.  A horse flashed by,
+galloping hard.
+
+Dale opened the door and peered out.  The stage rolled to a
+halt.  He stepped down and gazed ahead.
+
+"Joe, who was that?" he queried.
+
+"Nary me.  An' Bill didn't know him, either," replied Joe.  "I
+seen him 'way back.  He was ridin' some.  An' he slowed up
+goin' past us.  Now he's runnin' again."
+
+Dale shook his head as if he did not like the circumstances.
+
+"Milt, he'll never get by Roy on this road," said Joe.
+
+Maybe he'll get by before Roy strikes in on the road."
+
+"It ain't likely."
+
+Helen could not restrain her fears.  "Mr.  Dale, you think he
+was a messenger -- going ahead to post that -- that Anson
+gang?"
+
+"He might be," replied Dale, simply.
+
+Then the young man called Joe leaned out from the seat above
+and called: "Miss Helen, don't you worry.  Thet fellar is
+more liable to stop lead than anythin' else."
+
+His words, meant to be kind and reassuring, were almost as
+sinister to Helen as the menace to her own life.  Long had
+she known how cheap life was held in the West, but she had
+only known it abstractly, and she had never let the fact
+remain before her consciousness.  This cheerful young man
+spoke calmly of spilling blood in her behalf.  The thought it
+roused was tragic -- for bloodshed was insupportable to her
+-- and then the thrills which followed were so new, strange,
+bold, and tingling that they were revolting.  Helen grew
+conscious of unplumbed depths, of instincts at which she was
+amazed and ashamed.
+
+"Joe, hand down that basket of grub -- the small one with
+the canteen," said Dale, reaching out a long arm.  Presently
+he placed a cloth-covered basket inside the stage.  "Girls,
+eat all you want an' then some."
+
+"We have a basket half full yet," replied Helen.
+
+"You'll need it all before we get to Pine. . . .  Now, I'll
+ride up on top with the boys an' eat my supper.  It'll be
+dark, presently, an' we'll stop often to listen.  But don't
+be scared."
+
+With that he took his rifle and, closing the door, clambered
+up to the driver's seat.  Then the stage lurched again and
+began to roll along.
+
+Not the least thing to wonder at of this eventful evening
+was the way Bo reached for the basket of food.  Helen simply
+stared at her.
+
+"Bo, you CAN'T EAT!" she exclaimed.
+
+"I should smile I can," replied that practical young lady.
+"And you're going to if I have to stuff things in your
+mouth.  Where's your wits, Nell?  He said we must eat.  That
+means our strength is going to have some pretty severe
+trials. . . .  Gee!  it's all great -- just like a story!  The
+unexpected -- why, he looks like a prince turned hunter!  --
+long, dark, stage journey -- held up -- fight -- escape --
+wild ride on horses -- woods and camps and wild places --
+pursued -- hidden in the forest -- more hard rides -- then
+safe at the ranch.  And of course he falls madly in love with
+me -- no, you, for I'll be true to my Las Vegas lover --"
+
+"Hush, silly!  Bo, tell me, aren't you SCARED?"
+
+"Scared!  I'm scared stiff.  But if Western girls stand such
+things, we can.  No Western girl is going to beat ME!"
+
+That brought Helen to a realization of the brave place she
+had given herself in dreams, and she was at once ashamed of
+herself and wildly proud of this little sister.
+
+"Bo, thank Heaven I brought you with me!" exclaimed Helen,
+fervently.  "I'll eat if it chokes me."
+
+Whereupon she found herself actually hungry, and while she
+ate she glanced out of the stage, first from one side and
+then from the other.  These windows had no glass and they let
+the cool night air blow in.  The sun had long since sunk.  Out
+to the west, where a bold, black horizon-line swept away
+endlessly, the sky was clear gold, shading to yellow and
+blue above.  Stars were out, pale and wan, but growing
+brighter.  The earth appeared bare and heaving, like a calm
+sea.  The wind bore a fragrance new to Helen, acridly sweet
+and clean, and it was so cold it made her fingers numb.
+
+"I heard some animal yelp," said Bo, suddenly, and she
+listened with head poised.
+
+But Helen heard nothing save the steady clip-clop of hoofs,
+the clink of chains, the creak and rattle of the old stage,
+and occasionally the low voices of the men above.
+
+When the girls had satisfied hunger and thirst, night had
+settled down black.  They pulled the cloaks up over them, and
+close together leaned back in a corner of the seat and
+talked in whispers.  Helen did not have much to say, but Bo
+was talkative.
+
+"This beats me!" she said once, after an interval.  "Where
+are we, Nell?  Those men up there are Mormons.  Maybe they are
+abducting us!"
+
+"Mr.  Dale isn't a Mormon," replied Helen.
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"I could tell by the way he spoke of his friends."
+
+"Well, I wish it wasn't so dark.  I'm not afraid of men in
+daylight. . . .  Nell, did you ever see such a wonderful
+looking fellow?  What'd they call him?  Milt -- Milt Dale.  He
+said he lived in the woods.  If I hadn't fallen in love with
+that cowboy who called me -- well, I'd be a goner now."
+
+After an interval of silence Bo whispered, startlingly,
+"Wonder if Harve Riggs is following us now?"
+
+"Of course he is," replied Helen, hopelessly.
+
+"He'd better look out.  Why, Nell, he never saw -- he never
+-- what did Uncle Al used to call it?  -- sav -- savvied --
+that's it.  Riggs never savvied that hunter.  But I did, you
+bet."
+
+"Savvied!  What do you mean, Bo?"
+
+"I mean that long-haired galoot never saw his real danger.
+But I felt it.  Something went light inside me.  Dale never
+took him seriously at all."
+
+"Riggs will turn up at Uncle Al's, sure as I'm born," said
+Helen.
+
+"Let him turn," replied Bo, contemptuously.  "Nell, don't you
+ever bother your head again about him.  I'll bet they're all
+men out here.  And I wouldn't be in Harve Riggs's boots for a
+lot."
+
+After that Bo talked of her uncle and his fatal illness, and
+from that she drifted back to the loved ones at home, now
+seemingly at the other side of the world, and then she broke
+down and cried, after which she fell asleep on Helen's
+shoulder.
+
+But Helen could not have fallen asleep if she had wanted to.
+
+She had always, since she could remember, longed for a
+moving, active life; and 'or want of a better idea she had
+chosen to dream of gipsies.  And now it struck her grimly
+that, if these first few hours of her advent in the West
+were forecasts of the future, she was destined to have her
+longings more than fulfilled.
+
+Presently the stage rolled slower and slower, until it came
+to a halt.  Then the horses heaved, the harnesses clinked,
+the men whispered.  Otherwise there was an intense quiet.  She
+looked out, expecting to find it pitch-dark.  It was black,
+yet a transparent blackness.  To her surprise she could see a
+long way.  A shooting-star electrified her.  The men were
+listening.  She listened, too, but beyond the slight sounds
+about the stage she heard nothing.  Presently the driver
+clucked to his horses, and travel was resumed.
+
+For a while the stage rolled on rapidly, evidently downhill,
+swaying from side to side, and rattling as if about to fall
+to pieces.  Then it slowed on a level, and again it halted
+for a few moments, and once more in motion it began a
+laborsome climb.  Helen imagined miles had been covered.  The
+desert appeared to heave into billows, growing rougher, and
+dark, round bushes dimly stood out.  The road grew uneven and
+rocky, and when the stage began another descent its violent
+rocking jolted Bo out of her sleep and in fact almost out of
+Helen's arms.
+
+"Where am I?" asked Bo, dazedly.
+
+"Bo, you're having your heart's desire, but I can't tell you
+where you are," replied Helen.
+
+Bo awakened thoroughly, which fact was now no wonder,
+considering the jostling of the old stage.
+
+"Hold on to me, Nell!  . . .  Is it a runaway?"
+
+"We've come about a thousand miles like this, I think,"
+replied Helen.  "I've not a whole bone in my body."
+
+Bo peered out of the window.
+
+"Oh, how dark and lonesome!  But it'd be nice if it wasn't so
+cold.  I'm freezing."
+
+"I thought you loved cold air," taunted Helen.
+
+"Say, Nell, you begin to talk like yourself," responded Bo.
+
+It was difficult to hold on to the stage and each other and
+the cloak all at once, but they succeeded, except in the
+roughest places, when from time to time they were bounced
+around.  Bo sustained a sharp rap on the head.
+
+"Oooooo!" she moaned.  "Nell Rayner, I'll never forgive you
+for fetching me on this awful trip."
+
+"Just think of your handsome Las Vegas cowboy," replied
+Helen.
+
+Either this remark subdued Bo or the suggestion sufficed to
+reconcile her to the hardships of the ride.
+
+Meanwhile, as they talked and maintained silence and tried
+to sleep, the driver of the stage kept at his task after the
+manner of Western men who knew how to get the best out of
+horses and bad roads and distance.
+
+By and by the stage halted again and remained at a
+standstill for so long, with the men whispering on top, that
+Helen and Bo were roused to apprehension.
+
+Suddenly a sharp whistle came from the darkness ahead.
+
+"Thet's Roy," said Joe Beeman, in a low voice.
+
+"I reckon.  An' meetin' us so quick looks bad," replied Dale.
+"Drive on, Bill."
+
+"Mebbe it seems quick to you," muttered the driver, but if
+we hain't come thirty mile, an' if thet ridge thar hain't
+your turnin'-off place, why, I don't know nothin'."
+
+The stage rolled on a little farther, while Helen and Bo sat
+clasping each other tight, wondering with bated breath what
+was to be the next thing to happen.
+
+Then once more they were at a standstill.  Helen heard the
+thud of boots striking the ground, and the snorts of horses.
+
+"Nell, I see horses," whispered Bo, excitedly.  "There, to
+the side of the road . . .  and here comes a man. . . .  Oh,
+if he shouldn't be the one they're expecting!"
+
+Helen peered out to see a tall, dark form, moving silently,
+and beyond it a vague outline of horses, and then pale
+gleams of what must have been pack-loads.
+
+Dale loomed up, and met the stranger in the road.
+
+"Howdy, Milt?  You got the girl sure, or you wouldn't be
+here," said a low voice.
+
+"Roy, I've got two girls -- sisters," replied Dale.
+
+The man Roy whistled softly under his breath.  Then another
+lean, rangy form strode out of the darkness, and was met by
+Dale.
+
+"Now, boys -- how about Anson's gang?" queried Dale.
+
+"At Snowdrop, drinkin' an' quarrelin'.  Reckon they'll leave
+there about daybreak," replied Roy.
+
+"How long have you been here?"
+
+"Mebbe a couple of hours."
+
+"Any horse go by?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Roy, a strange rider passed us before dark.  He was hittin'
+the road.  An' he's got by here before you came."
+
+"I don't like thet news," replied Roy, tersely.  "Let's
+rustle.  With girls on hossback you'll need all the start you
+can get.  Hey, John?"
+
+"Snake Anson shore can foller hoss tracks," replied the
+third man.
+
+"Milt, say the word," went on Roy, as he looked up at the
+stars.  "Daylight not far away.  Here's the forks of the road,
+an' your hosses, an' our outfit.  You can be in the pines by
+sunup."
+
+In the silence that ensued Helen heard the throb of her
+heart and the panting little breaths of her sister.  They
+both peered out, hands clenched together, watching and
+listening in strained attention.
+
+"It's possible that rider last night wasn't a messenger to
+Anson," said Dale.  "In that case Anson won't make anythin'
+of our wheel tracks or horse tracks.  He'll go right on to
+meet the regular stage.  Bill, can you go back an' meet the
+stage comin' before Anson does?"
+
+"Wal, I reckon so -- an' take it easy at thet," replied
+Bill.
+
+"All right," continued Dale, instantly.  "John, you an' Joe
+an' Hal ride back to meet the regular stage.  An' when you
+meet it get on an' be on it when Anson holds it up."
+
+"Thet's shore agreeable to me," drawled John.
+
+"I'd like to be on it, too," said Roy, grimly.
+
+"No.  I'll need you till I'm safe in the woods.  Bill, hand
+down the bags.  An' you, Roy, help me pack them.  Did you get
+all the supplies I wanted?"
+
+"Shore did.  If the young ladies ain't powerful particular
+you can feed them well for a couple of months."
+
+Dale wheeled and, striding to the stage, he opened the door.
+
+"Girls, you're not asleep?  Come," he called.
+
+Bo stepped down first.
+
+"I was asleep till this -- this vehicle fell off the road
+back a ways," she replied.
+
+Roy Beeman's low laugh was significant.  He took off his
+sombrero and stood silent.  The old driver smothered a loud
+guffaw.
+
+"Veehicle!  Wal, I'll be doggoned!  Joe, did you hear thet?
+All the spunky gurls ain't born out West."
+
+As Helen followed with cloak and bag Roy assisted her, and
+she encountered keen eyes upon her face.  He seemed both
+gentle and respectful, and she felt his solicitude.  His
+heavy gun, swinging low, struck her as she stepped down.
+
+Dale reached into the stage and hauled out baskets and bags.
+These he set down on the ground.
+
+"Turn around, Bill, an' go along with you.  John an' Hal will
+follow presently," ordered Dale.
+
+"Wal, gurls," said, looking down upon them, "I was shore
+powerful glad to meet you-all.  An' I'm ashamed of my country
+-- offerin' two sich purty gurls insults an' low-down
+tricks.  But shore you'll go through safe now.  You couldn't
+be in better company fer ridin' or huntin' or marryin' or
+gittin' religion --"
+
+"Shut up, you old grizzly!" broke in Dale, sharply.
+
+"Haw!  Haw!  Good-by, gurls, an' good luck!" ended Bill, as he
+began to whip the reins.
+
+Bo said good-by quite distinctly, but Helen could only
+murmur hers.  The old driver seemed a friend.
+
+Then the horses wheeled and stamped, the stage careened and
+creaked, presently to roll out of sight in the gloom.
+
+"You're shiverin'," said Dale, suddenly, looking down upon
+Helen.  She felt his big, hard hand clasp hers.  "Cold as
+ice!"
+
+"I am c-cold," replied Helen.  "I guess we're not warmly
+dressed."
+
+"Nell, we roasted all day, and now we're freezing," declared
+Bo.  "I didn't know it was winter at night out here."
+
+"Miss, haven't you some warm gloves an' a coat?" asked Roy,
+anxiously.  "It 'ain't begun to get cold yet."
+
+"Nell, we've heavy gloves, riding-suits and boots -- all
+fine and new -- in this black bag," said Bo,
+enthusiastically kicking a bag at her feet.
+
+"Yes, so we have.  But a lot of good they'll do us,
+to-night," returned Helen.
+
+"Miss, you'd do well to change right here," said Roy,
+earnestly.  "It'll save time in the long run an' a lot of
+sufferin' before sunup."
+
+Helen stared at the young man, absolutely amazed with his
+simplicity.  She was advised to change her traveling-dress
+for a riding-suit -- out somewhere in a cold, windy desert
+-- in the middle of the night -- among strange young man!
+
+"Bo, which bag is it?" asked Dale, as if she were his
+sister.  And when she indicated the one, he picked it up.
+"Come off the road."
+
+Bo followed him, and Helen found herself mechanically at
+their heels.  Dale led them a few paces off the road behind
+some low bushes.
+
+"Hurry an' change here," he said.  "We'll make a pack of your
+outfit an' leave room for this bag."
+
+Then he stalked away and in a few strides disappeared.
+
+Bo sat down to begin unlacing her shoes.  Helen could just
+see her pale, pretty face and big, gleaming eyes by the
+light of the stars.  It struck her then that Bo was going to
+make eminently more of a success of Western life than she
+was.
+
+"Nell, those fellows are n-nice," said Bo, reflectively.
+"Aren't you c-cold?  Say, he said hurry!"
+
+It was beyond Helen's comprehension how she ever began to
+disrobe out there in that open, windy desert, but after she
+had gotten launched on the task she found that it required
+more fortitude than courage.  The cold wind pierced right
+through her.  Almost she could have laughed at the way Bo
+made things fly.
+
+"G-g-g-gee!" chattered Bo.  "I n-never w-was so c-c-cold in
+all my life.  Nell Rayner, m-may the g-good Lord forgive
+y-you!"
+
+Helen was too intent on her own troubles to take breath to
+talk.  She was a strong, healthy girl, swift and efficient
+with her hands, yet this, the hardest physical ordeal she
+had ever experienced, almost overcame her.  Bo outdistanced
+her by moments, helped her with buttons, and laced one whole
+boot for her.  Then, with hands that stung, Helen packed the
+traveling-suits in the bag.
+
+"There!  But what an awful mess!" exclaimed Helen.  "Oh, Bo,
+our pretty traveling-dresses!"
+
+"We'll press them t-to-morrow -- on a l-log," replied Bo,
+and she giggled.
+
+They started for the road.  Bo, strange to note, did not
+carry her share of the burden, and she seemed unsteady on
+her feet.
+
+The men were waiting beside a group of horses, one of which
+carried a pack.
+
+"Nothin' slow about you," said Dale, relieving Helen of the
+grip.  "Roy, put them up while I sling on this bag."
+
+Roy led out two of the horses.
+
+"Get up," he said, indicating Bo.  "The stirrups are short on
+this saddle."
+
+Bo was an adept at mounting, but she made such awkward and
+slow work of it in this instance that Helen could not
+believe her eyes.
+
+"Haw 're the stirrups?" asked Roy.  "Stand in them.  Guess
+they're about right. . . .  Careful now!  Thet hoss is
+skittish.  Hold him in."
+
+Bo was not living up to the reputation with which Helen had
+credited her.
+
+"Now, miss, you get up," said Roy to Helen.  And in another
+instant she found herself astride a black, spirited horse.
+Numb with cold as she was, she yet felt the coursing thrills
+along her veins.
+
+Roy was at the stirrups with swift hands.
+
+"You're taller 'n I guessed," he said.  "Stay up, but lift
+your foot. . . .  Shore now, I'm glad you have them thick,
+soft boots.  Mebbe we'll ride all over the White Mountains."
+
+"Bo, do you hear that?" called Helen.
+
+But Bo did not answer.  She was leaning rather unnaturally in
+her saddle.  Helen became anxious.  Just then Dale strode back
+to them.
+
+"All cinched up, Roy?"
+
+"Jest ready," replied Roy.
+
+Then Dale stood beside Helen.  How tall he was!  His wide
+shoulders seemed on a level with the pommel of her saddle.
+He put an affectionate hand on the horse.
+
+"His name's Ranger an' he's the fastest an' finest horse in
+this country."
+
+"I reckon he shore is -- along with my bay," corroborated
+Roy.
+
+"Roy, if you rode Ranger he'd beat your pet," said Dale.  "We
+can start now.  Roy, you drive the pack-horses."
+
+He took another look at Helen's saddle and then moved to do
+likewise with Bo's.
+
+"Are you -- all right?" he asked, quickly.
+
+Bo reeled in her seat.
+
+"I'm n-near froze," she replied, in a faint voice.  Her face
+shone white in the starlight.  Helen recognized that Bo was
+more than cold.
+
+"Oh, Bo!" she called, in distress.
+
+"Nell, don't you worry, now."
+
+"Let me carry you," suggested Dale.
+
+"No.  I'll s-s-stick on this horse or d-die," fiercely
+retorted Bo.
+
+The two men looked up at her white face and then at each
+other.  Then Roy walked away toward the dark bunch of horses
+off the road and Dale swung astride the one horse left.
+
+"Keep close to me," he said.
+
+Bo fell in line and Helen brought up the rear.
+
+Helen imagined she was near the end of a dream.  Presently
+she would awaken with a start and see the pale walls of her
+little room at home, and hear the cherry branches brushing
+her window, and the old clarion-voiced cock proclaim the
+hour of dawn.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+The horses trotted.  And the exercise soon warmed Helen,
+until she was fairly comfortable except in her fingers.  In
+mind, however, she grew more miserable as she more fully
+realized her situation.  The night now became so dark that,
+although the head of her horse was alongside the flank of
+Bo's, she could scarcely see Bo.  From time to time Helen's
+anxious query brought from her sister the answer that she
+was all right.
+
+Helen had not ridden a horse for more than a year, and for
+several years she had not ridden with any regularity.
+Despite her thrills upon mounting, she had entertained
+misgivings.  But she was agreeably surprised, for the horse,
+Ranger, had an easy gait, and she found she had not
+forgotten how to ride.  Bo, having been used to riding on a
+farm near home, might be expected to acquit herself
+admirably.  It occurred to Helen what a plight they would
+have been in but for the thick, comfortable riding outfits.
+
+Dark as the night was, Helen could dimly make out the road
+underneath.  It was rocky, and apparently little used.  When
+Dale turned off the road into the low brush or sage of what
+seemed a level plain, the traveling was harder, rougher, and
+yet no slower.  The horses kept to the gait of the leaders.
+Helen, discovering it unnecessary, ceased attempting to
+guide Ranger.  There were dim shapes in the gloom ahead, and
+always they gave Helen uneasiness, until closer approach
+proved them to be rocks or low, scrubby trees.  These
+increased in both size and number as the horses progressed.
+Often Helen looked back into the gloom behind.  This act was
+involuntary and occasioned her sensations of dread.  Dale
+expected to be pursued.  And Helen experienced, along with
+the dread, flashes of unfamiliar resentment.  Not only was
+there an attempt afoot to rob her of her heritage, but even
+her personal liberty.  Then she shuddered at the significance
+of Dale's words regarding her possible abduction by this
+hired gang.  It seemed monstrous, impossible.  Yet, manifestly
+it was true enough to Dale and his allies.  The West, then,
+in reality was raw, hard, inevitable.
+
+Suddenly her horse stopped.  He had come up alongside Bo's
+horse.  Dale had halted ahead, and apparently was listening.
+Roy and the pack-train were out of sight in the gloom.
+
+"What is it?" whispered Helen.
+
+"Reckon I heard a wolf," replied Dale.
+
+"Was that cry a wolf's?" asked Bo.  "I heard.  It was wild."
+
+"We're gettin' up close to the foot-hills," said Dale.  "Feel
+how much colder the air is."
+
+"I'm warm now," replied Bo.  "I guess being near froze was
+what ailed me. . . .  Nell, how 're you?"
+
+"I'm warm, too, but --" Helen answered.
+
+"If you had your choice of being here or back home, snug in
+bed -- which would you take?" asked Bo.
+
+"Bo!" exclaimed Helen, aghast.
+
+"Well, I'd choose to be right here on this horse," rejoined
+Bo.
+
+Dale heard her, for he turned an instant, then slapped his
+horse and started on.
+
+Helen now rode beside Bo, and for a long time they climbed
+steadily in silence.  Helen knew when that dark hour before
+dawn had passed, and she welcomed an almost imperceptible
+lightening in the east.  Then the stars paled.  Gradually a
+grayness absorbed all but the larger stars.  The great white
+morning star, wonderful as Helen had never seen it, lost its
+brilliance and life and seemed to retreat into the dimming
+blue.
+
+Daylight came gradually, so that the gray desert became
+distinguishable by degrees.  Rolling bare hills, half
+obscured by the gray lifting mantle of night, rose in the
+foreground, and behind was gray space, slowly taking form
+and substance.  In the east there was a kindling of pale rose
+and silver that lengthened and brightened along a horizon
+growing visibly rugged.
+
+"Reckon we'd better catch up with Roy," said Dale, and he
+spurred his horse.
+
+Ranger and Bo's mount needed no other urging, and they swung
+into a canter.  Far ahead the pack-animals showed with Roy
+driving them.  The cold wind was so keen in Helen's face that
+tears blurred her eyes and froze her cheeks.  And riding
+Ranger at that pace was like riding in a rocking-chair.  That
+ride, invigorating and exciting, seemed all too short.
+
+"Oh, Nell, I don't care -- what becomes of -- me!" exclaimed
+Bo, breathlessly.
+
+Her face was white and red, fresh as a rose, her eyes
+glanced darkly blue, her hair blew out in bright, unruly
+strands.  Helen knew she felt some of the physical
+stimulation that had so roused Bo, and seemed so
+irresistible, but somber thought was not deflected thereby.
+
+It was clear daylight when Roy led off round a knoll from
+which patches of scrubby trees -- cedars, Dale called them
+-- straggled up on the side of the foot-hills.
+
+"They grow on the north slopes, where the snow stays
+longest," said Dale.
+
+They descended into a valley that looked shallow, but proved
+to be deep and wide, and then began to climb another
+foot-hill.  Upon surmounting it Helen saw the rising sun, and
+so glorious a view confronted her that she was unable to
+answer Bo's wild exclamations.
+
+Bare, yellow, cedar-dotted slopes, apparently level, so
+gradual was the ascent, stretched away to a dense ragged
+line of forest that rose black over range after range, at
+last to fail near the bare summit of a magnificent mountain,
+sunrise-flushed against the blue sky.
+
+"Oh, beautiful!" cried Bo.  "But they ought to be called
+Black Mountains."
+
+"Old Baldy, there, is white half the year," replied Dale.
+
+"Look back an' see what you say," suggested Roy.
+
+The girls turned to gaze silently.  Helen imagined she looked
+down upon the whole wide world.  How vastly different was the
+desert!  Verily it yawned away from her, red and gold near at
+hand, growing softly flushed with purple far away, a barren
+void, borderless and immense, where dark-green patches and
+black lines and upheaved ridges only served to emphasize
+distance and space.
+
+"See thet little green spot," said Roy, pointing.  "Thet's
+Snowdrop.  An' the other one -- 'way to the right -- thet's
+Show Down."
+
+"Where is Pine?" queried Helen, eagerly.
+
+"Farther still, up over the foot-hills at the edge of the
+woods."
+
+"Then we're riding away from it."
+
+"Yes.  If we'd gone straight for Pine thet gang could
+overtake us.  Pine is four days' ride.  An' by takin' to the
+mountains Milt can hide his tracks.  An' when he's thrown
+Anson off the scent, then he'll circle down to Pine."
+
+"Mr.  Dale, do you think you'll get us there safely -- and
+soon?" asked Helen, wistfully.
+
+"I won't promise soon, but I promise safe.  An' I don't like
+bein' called Mister," he replied.
+
+"Are we ever going to eat?" inquired Bo, demurely.
+
+At this query Roy Beeman turned with a laugh to look at Bo.
+Helen saw his face fully in the light, and it was thin and
+hard, darkly bronzed, with eyes like those of a hawk, and
+with square chin and lean jaws showing scant, light beard.
+
+"We shore are," he replied.  "Soon as we reach the timber.
+Thet won't be long."
+
+"Reckon we can rustle some an' then take a good rest," said
+Dale, and he urged his horse into a jog-trot.
+
+During a steady trot for a long hour, Helen's roving eyes
+were everywhere, taking note of the things from near to far
+-- the scant sage that soon gave place to as scanty a grass,
+and the dark blots that proved to be dwarf cedars, and the
+ravines opening out as if by magic from what had appeared
+level ground, to wind away widening between gray stone
+walls, and farther on, patches of lonely pine-trees, two and
+three together, and then a straggling clump of yellow
+aspens, and up beyond the fringed border of forest, growing
+nearer all the while, the black sweeping benches rising to
+the noble dome of the dominant mountain of the range.
+
+No birds or animals were seen in that long ride up toward
+the timber, which fact seemed strange to Helen.  The air lost
+something of its cold, cutting edge as the sun rose higher,
+and it gained sweeter tang of forest-land.  The first faint
+suggestion of that fragrance was utterly new to Helen, yet
+it brought a vague sensation of familiarity and with it an
+emotion as strange.  It was as if she had smelled that keen,
+pungent tang long ago, and her physical sense caught it
+before her memory.
+
+The yellow plain had only appeared to be level.  Roy led down
+into a shallow ravine, where a tiny stream meandered, and he
+followed this around to the left, coming at length to a
+point where cedars and dwarf pines formed a little grove.
+Here, as the others rode up, he sat cross-legged in his
+saddle, and waited.
+
+"We'll hang up awhile," he said.  "Reckon you're tired?"
+
+"I'm hungry, but not tired yet," replied Bo.
+
+Helen dismounted, to find that walking was something she had
+apparently lost the power to do.  Bo laughed at her, but she,
+too, was awkward when once more upon the ground.
+
+Then Roy got down.  Helen was surprised to find him lame.  He
+caught her quick glance.
+
+"A hoss threw me once an' rolled on me.  Only broke my
+collar-bone, five ribs, one arm, an' my bow-legs in two
+places!"
+
+Notwithstanding this evidence that he was a cripple, as he
+stood there tall and lithe in his homespun, ragged garments,
+he looked singularly powerful and capable.
+
+"Reckon walkin' around would be good for you girls," advised
+Dale.  "If you ain't stiff yet, you'll be soon.  An' walkin'
+will help.  Don't go far.  I'll call when breakfast's ready."
+
+
+A little while later the girls were whistled in from their
+walk and found camp-fire and meal awaiting them.  Roy was
+sitting cross-legged, like an Indian, in front of a
+tarpaulin, upon which was spread a homely but substantial
+fare.  Helen's quick eye detected a cleanliness and
+thoroughness she had scarcely expected to find in the camp
+cooking of men of the wilds.  Moreover, the fare was good.
+She ate heartily, and as for Bo's appetite, she was inclined
+to be as much ashamed of that as amused at it.  The young men
+were all eyes, assiduous in their service to the girls, but
+speaking seldom.  It was not lost upon Helen how Dale's gray
+gaze went often down across the open country.  She divined
+apprehension from it rather than saw much expression in it.
+
+"I -- declare," burst out Bo, when she could not eat any
+more, "this isn't believable.  I'm dreaming. . . .  Nell, the
+black horse you rode is the prettiest I ever saw."
+
+Ranger, with the other animals, was grazing along the little
+brook.  Packs and saddles had been removed.  The men ate
+leisurely.  There was little evidence of hurried flight.  Yet
+Helen could not cast off uneasiness.  Roy might have been
+deep, and careless, with a motive to spare the girls'
+anxiety, but Dale seemed incapable of anything he did not
+absolutely mean.
+
+"Rest or walk," he advised the girls.  "We've got forty miles
+to ride before dark."
+
+Helen preferred to rest, but Bo walked about, petting the
+horses and prying into the packs.  She was curious and eager.
+
+Dale and Roy talked in low tones while they cleaned up the
+utensils and packed them away in a heavy canvas bag.
+
+"You really expect Anson 'll strike my trail this mornin'?"
+Dale was asking.
+
+"I shore do," replied Roy.
+
+"An' how do you figure that so soon?"
+
+"How'd you figure it -- if you was Snake Anson?" queried
+Roy, in reply.
+
+"Depends on that rider from Magdalena," Said Dale, soberly.
+"Although it's likely I'd seen them wheel tracks an' hoss
+tracks made where we turned off.  But supposin' he does."
+
+"Milt, listen.  I told you Snake met us boys face to face day
+before yesterday in Show Down.  An' he was plumb curious."
+
+"But he missed seein' or hearin' about me," replied Dale.
+
+"Mebbe he did an' mebbe he didn't.  Anyway, what's the
+difference whether he finds out this mornin' or this
+evenin'?"
+
+"Then you ain't expectin' a fight if Anson holds up the
+stage?"
+
+"Wal, he'd have to shoot first, which ain't likely.  John an'
+Hal, since thet shootin'-scrape a year ago, have been sort
+of gun-shy.  Joe might get riled.  But I reckon the best we
+can be shore of is a delay.  An' it'd be sense not to count
+on thet."
+
+"Then you hang up here an' keep watch for Anson's gang --
+say long enough so's to be sure they'd be in sight if they
+find our tracks this mornin'.  Makin' sure one way or
+another, you ride 'cross-country to Big Spring, where I'll
+camp to-night."
+
+Roy nodded approval of that suggestion.  Then without more
+words both men picked up ropes and went after the horses.
+Helen was watching Dale, so that when Bo cried out in great
+excitement Helen turned to see a savage yellow little
+mustang standing straight up on his hind legs and pawing the
+air.  Roy had roped him and was now dragging him into camp.
+
+"Nell, look at that for a wild pony!" exclaimed Bo.
+
+Helen busied herself getting well out of the way of the
+infuriated mustang.  Roy dragged him to a cedar near by.
+
+"Come now, Buckskin," said Roy, soothingly, and he slowly
+approached the quivering animal.  He went closer, hand over
+hand, on the lasso.  Buckskin showed the whites of his eyes
+and also his white teeth.  But he stood while Roy loosened
+the loop and, slipping it down over his head, fastened it in
+a complicated knot round his nose.
+
+"Thet's a hackamore," he said, indicating the knot.  He's
+never had a bridle, an' never will have one, I reckon."
+
+"You don't ride him?" queried Helen.
+
+"Sometimes I do," replied Roy, with a smile.  "Would you
+girls like to try him?"
+
+"Excuse me," answered Helen.
+
+"Gee!" ejaculated Bo.  "He looks like a devil.  But I'd tackle
+him -- if you think I could."
+
+The wild leaven of the West had found quick root in Bo
+Rayner.
+
+"Wal, I'm sorry, but I reckon I'll not let you -- for a
+spell," replied Roy, dryly.
+
+"He pitches somethin' powerful bad."
+
+"Pitches.  You mean bucks?"
+
+"I reckon."
+
+In the next half-hour Helen saw more and learned more about
+how horses of the open range were handled than she had ever
+heard of.  Excepting Ranger, and Roy's bay, and the white
+pony Bo rode, the rest of the horses had actually to be
+roped and hauled into camp to be saddled and packed.  It was
+a job for fearless, strong men, and one that called for
+patience as well as arms of iron.  So that for Helen Rayner
+the thing succeeding the confidence she had placed in these
+men was respect.  To an observing woman that half-hour told
+much.
+
+When all was in readiness for a start Dale mounted, and
+said, significantly: "Roy, I'll look for you about sundown.
+I hope no sooner."
+
+"Wal, it'd be bad if I had to rustle along soon with bad
+news.  Let's hope for the best.  We've been shore lucky so
+far.  Now you take to the pine-mats in the woods an' hide
+your trail."
+
+Dale turned away.  Then the girls bade Roy good-by, and
+followed.  Soon Roy and his buckskin-colored mustang were
+lost to sight round a clump of trees.
+
+The unhampered horses led the way; the pack-animals trotted
+after them; the riders were close behind.  All traveled at a
+jog-trot.  And this gait made the packs bob up and down and
+from side to side.  The sun felt warm at Helen's back and the
+wind lost its frosty coldness, that almost appeared damp,
+for a dry, sweet fragrance.  Dale drove up the shallow valley
+that showed timber on the levels above and a black border of
+timber some few miles ahead.  It did not take long to reach
+the edge of the forest.
+
+Helen wondered why the big pines grew so far on that plain
+and no farther.  Probably the growth had to do with snow,
+but, as the ground was level, she could not see why the edge
+of the woods should come just there.
+
+They rode into the forest.
+
+To Helen it seemed a strange, critical entrance into another
+world, which she was destined to know and to love.  The pines
+were big, brown-barked, seamed, and knotted, with no typical
+conformation except a majesty and beauty.  They grew far
+apart.  Few small pines and little underbrush flourished
+beneath them.  The floor of this forest appeared remarkable
+in that it consisted of patches of high silvery grass and
+wide brown areas of pine-needles.  These manifestly were what
+Roy had meant by pine-mats.  Here and there a fallen monarch
+lay riven or rotting.  Helen was presently struck with the
+silence of the forest and the strange fact that the horses
+seldom made any sound at all, and when they did it was a
+cracking of dead twig or thud of hoof on log.  Likewise she
+became aware of a springy nature of the ground.  And then she
+saw that the pine-mats gave like rubber cushions under the
+hoofs of the horses, and after they had passed sprang back
+to place again, leaving no track.  Helen could not see a sign
+of a trail they left behind.  Indeed, it would take a sharp
+eye to follow Dale through that forest.  This knowledge was
+infinitely comforting to Helen, and for the first time since
+the flight had begun she felt a lessening of the weight upon
+mind and heart.  It left her free for some of the
+appreciation she might have had in this wonderful ride under
+happier circumstances.
+
+Bo, however, seemed too young, too wild, too intense to mind
+what the circumstances were.  She responded to reality.  Helen
+began to suspect that the girl would welcome any adventure,
+and Helen knew surely now that Bo was a true Auchincloss.
+For three long days Helen had felt a constraint with which
+heretofore she had been unfamiliar; for the last hours it
+had been submerged under dread.  But it must be, she
+concluded, blood like her sister's, pounding at her veins to
+be set free to race and to burn.
+
+Bo loved action.  She had an eye for beauty, but she was not
+contemplative.  She was now helping Dale drive the horses and
+hold them in rather close formation.  She rode well, and as
+yet showed no symptoms of fatigue or pain.  Helen began to be
+aware of both, but not enough yet to limit her interest.
+
+A wonderful forest without birds did not seem real to her.
+Of all living creatures in nature Helen liked birds best,
+and she knew many and could imitate the songs of a few.  But
+here under the stately pines there were no birds.  Squirrels,
+however, began to be seen here and there, and in the course
+of an hour's travel became abundant.  The only one with which
+she was familiar was the chipmunk.  All the others, from the
+slim bright blacks to the striped russets and the
+white-tailed grays, were totally new to her.  They appeared
+tame and curious.  The reds barked and scolded at the passing
+cavalcade; the blacks glided to some safe branch, there to
+watch; the grays paid no especial heed to this invasion of
+their domain.
+
+Once Dale, halting his horse, pointed with long arm, and
+Helen, following the direction, descried several gray deer
+standing in a glade, motionless, with long ears up.  They
+made a wild and beautiful picture.  Suddenly they bounded
+away with remarkable springy strides.
+
+The forest on the whole held to the level, open character,
+but there were swales and stream-beds breaking up its
+regular conformity.  Toward noon, however, it gradually
+changed, a fact that Helen believed she might have observed
+sooner had she been more keen.  The general lay of the land
+began to ascend, and the trees to grow denser.
+
+She made another discovery.  Ever since she had entered the
+forest she had become aware of a fullness in her head and a
+something affecting her nostrils.  She imagined, with regret,
+that she had taken cold.  But presently her head cleared
+somewhat and she realized that the thick pine odor of the
+forest had clogged her nostrils as if with a sweet pitch.
+The smell was overpowering and disagreeable because of its
+strength.  Also her throat and lungs seemed to burn.
+
+When she began to lose interest in the forest and her
+surroundings it was because of aches and pains which would
+no longer be denied recognition.  Thereafter she was not
+permitted to forget them and they grew worse.  One,
+especially, was a pain beyond all her experience.  It lay in
+the muscles of her side, above her hip, and it grew to be a
+treacherous thing, for it was not persistent.  It came and
+went.  After it did come, with a terrible flash, it could be
+borne by shifting or easing the body.  But it gave no
+warning.  When she expected it she was mistaken; when she
+dared to breathe again, then, with piercing swiftness, it
+returned like a blade in her side.  This, then, was one of
+the riding-pains that made a victim of a tenderfoot on a
+long ride.  It was almost too much to be borne.  The beauty of
+the forest, the living creatures to be seen scurrying away,
+the time, distance -- everything faded before that stablike
+pain.  To her infinite relief she found that it was the trot
+that caused this torture.  When Ranger walked she did not
+have to suffer it.  Therefore she held him to a walk as long
+as she dared or until Dale and Bo were almost out of sight;
+then she loped him ahead until he had caught up.
+
+So the hours passed, the sun got around low, sending golden
+shafts under the trees, and the forest gradually changed to
+a brighter, but a thicker, color.  This slowly darkened.
+Sunset was not far away.
+
+She heard the horses splashing in water, and soon she rode
+up to see the tiny streams of crystal water running swiftly
+over beds of green moss.  She crossed a number of these and
+followed along the last one into a more open place in the
+forest where the pines were huge, towering, and far apart.  A
+low, gray bluff of stone rose to the right, perhaps
+one-third as high as the trees.  From somewhere came the
+rushing sound of running water.
+
+"Big Spring," announced Dale.  "We camp here.  You girls have
+done well."
+
+Another glance proved to Helen that all those little streams
+poured from under this gray bluff.
+
+"I'm dying for a drink," cried Bo.  with her customary
+hyperbole.
+
+"I reckon you'll never forget your first drink here,"
+remarked Dale.
+
+Bo essayed to dismount, and finally fell off, and when she
+did get to the ground her legs appeared to refuse their
+natural function, and she fell flat.  Dale helped her up.
+
+"What's wrong with me, anyhow?" she demanded, in great
+amaze.
+
+"Just stiff, I reckon," replied Dale, as he led her a few
+awkward steps.
+
+"Bo, have you any hurts?" queried Helen, who still sat her
+horse, loath to try dismounting, yet wanting to beyond all
+words.
+
+Bo gave her an eloquent glance.
+
+"Nell, did you have one in your side, like a wicked, long
+darning-needle, punching deep when you weren't ready?"
+
+"That one I'll never get over!" exclaimed Helen, softly.
+Then, profiting by Bo's experience, she dismounted
+cautiously, and managed to keep upright.  Her legs felt like
+wooden things.
+
+Presently the girls went toward the spring.
+
+"Drink slow," called out Dale.
+
+Big Spring had its source somewhere deep under the gray,
+weathered bluff, from which came a hollow subterranean
+gurgle and roar of water.  Its fountainhead must have been a
+great well rushing up through the cold stone.
+
+Helen and Bo lay flat on a mossy bank, seeing their faces as
+they bent over, and they sipped a mouthful, by Dale's
+advice, and because they were so hot and parched and burning
+they wanted to tarry a moment with a precious opportunity.
+
+The water was so cold that it sent a shock over Helen, made
+her teeth ache, and a singular, revivifying current steal
+all through her, wonderful in its cool absorption of that
+dry heat of flesh, irresistible in its appeal to thirst.
+Helen raised her head to look at this water.  It was
+colorless as she had found it tasteless.
+
+"Nell -- drink!" panted Bo.  "Think of our -- old spring --
+in the orchard -- full of pollywogs!"
+
+And then Helen drank thirstily, with closed eyes, while a
+memory of home stirred from Bo's gift of poignant speech.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+The first camp duty Dale performed was to throw a pack off
+one of the horses, and, opening it, he took out tarpaulin
+and blankets, which he arranged on the ground under a
+pine-tree.
+
+"You girls rest," he said, briefly.
+
+"Can't we help?" asked Helen, though she could scarcely
+stand.
+
+"You'll be welcome to do all you like after you're broke
+in."
+
+"Broke in!" ejaculated Bo, with a little laugh.  "I'm all
+broke UP now."
+
+"Bo, it looks as if Mr.  Dale expects us to have quite a stay
+with him in the woods."
+
+"It does," replied Bo, as slowly she sat down upon the
+blankets, stretched out with a long sigh, and laid her head
+on a saddle.  "Nell, didn't he say not to call him Mister?"
+
+Dale was throwing the packs off the other horses.
+
+Helen lay down beside Bo, and then for once in her life she
+experienced the sweetness of rest.
+
+"Well, sister, what do you intend to call him?" queried
+Helen, curiously.
+
+"Milt, of course," replied Bo.
+
+Helen had to laugh despite her weariness and aches.
+
+"I suppose, then, when your Las Vegas cowboy comes along you
+will call him what he called you."
+
+Bo blushed, which was a rather unusual thing for her.
+
+"I will if I like," she retorted.  "Nell, ever since I could
+remember you've raved about the West.  Now you're OUT West,
+right in it good and deep.  So wake up!"
+
+That was Bo's blunt and characteristic way of advising the
+elimination of Helen's superficialities.  It sank deep.  Helen
+had no retort.  Her ambition, as far as the West was
+concerned, had most assuredly not been for such a wild,
+unheard-of jaunt as this.  But possibly the West -- a living
+from day to day -- was one succession of adventures, trials,
+tests, troubles, and achievements.  To make a place for
+others to live comfortably some day!  That might be Bo's
+meaning, embodied in her forceful hint.  But Helen was too
+tired to think it out then.  She found it interesting and
+vaguely pleasant to watch Dale.
+
+He hobbled the horses and turned them loose.  Then with ax in
+hand he approached a short, dead tree, standing among a few
+white-barked aspens.  Dale appeared to advantage swinging the
+ax.  With his coat off, displaying his wide shoulders,
+straight back, and long, powerful arms, he looked a young
+giant.  He was lithe and supple, brawny but not bulky.  The ax
+rang on the hard wood, reverberating through the forest.  A
+few strokes sufficed to bring down the stub.  Then he split
+it up.  Helen was curious to see how he kindled a fire.  First
+he ripped splinters out of the heart of the log, and laid
+them with coarser pieces on the ground.  Then from a
+saddlebag which hung on a near-by branch he took flint and
+steel and a piece of what Helen supposed was rag or
+buckskin, upon which powder had been rubbed.  At any rate,
+the first strike of the steel brought sparks, a blaze, and
+burning splinters.  Instantly the flame leaped a foot high.
+He put on larger pieces of wood crosswise, and the fire
+roared.
+
+That done, he stood erect, and, facing the north, he
+listened.  Helen remembered now that she had seen him do the
+same thing twice before since the arrival at Big Spring.  It
+was Roy for whom he was listening and watching.  The sun had
+set and across the open space the tips of the pines were
+losing their brightness.
+
+The camp utensils, which the hunter emptied out of a sack,
+gave forth a jangle of iron and tin.  Next he unrolled a
+large pack, the contents of which appeared to be numerous
+sacks of all sizes.  These evidently contained food supplies.
+The bucket looked as if a horse had rolled over it, pack and
+all.  Dale filled it at the spring.  Upon returning to the
+camp-fire he poured water into a washbasin, and, getting
+down to his knees, proceeded to wash his hands thoroughly.
+The act seemed a habit, for Helen saw that while he was
+doing it he gazed off into the woods and listened.  Then he
+dried his hands over the fire, and, turning to the
+spread-out pack, he began preparations for the meal.
+
+Suddenly Helen thought of the man and all that his actions
+implied.  At Magdalena, on the stage-ride, and last night,
+she had trusted this stranger, a hunter of the White
+Mountains, who appeared ready to befriend her.  And she had
+felt an exceeding gratitude.  Still, she had looked at him
+impersonally.  But it began to dawn upon her that chance had
+thrown her in the company of a remarkable man.  That
+impression baffled her.  It did not spring from the fact that
+he was brave and kind to help a young woman in peril, or
+that he appeared deft and quick at camp-fire chores.  Most
+Western men were brave, her uncle had told her, and many
+were roughly kind, and all of them could cook.  This hunter
+was physically a wonderful specimen of manhood, with
+something leonine about his stature.  But that did not give
+rise to her impression.  Helen had been a school-teacher and
+used to boys, and she sensed a boyish simplicity or vigor or
+freshness in this hunter.  She believed, however, that it was
+a mental and spiritual force in Dale which had drawn her to
+think of it.
+
+"Nell, I've spoken to you three times," protested Bo,
+petulantly.  "What 're you mooning over?"
+
+"I'm pretty tired -- and far away, Bo," replied Helen.  "What
+did you say?"
+
+"I said I had an e-normous appetite."
+
+"Really.  That's not remarkable for you.  I'm too tired to
+eat.  And afraid to shut my eyes.  They'd never come open.
+When did we sleep last, Bo?"
+
+"Second night before we left home," declared Bo.
+
+"Four nights!  Oh, we've slept some."
+
+"I'll bet I make mine up in this woods.  Do you suppose we'll
+sleep right here -- under this tree -- with no covering?"
+
+"It looks so," replied Helen, dubiously.
+
+"How perfectly lovely!" exclaimed Bo, in delight.  "We'll see
+the stars through the pines."
+
+"Seems to be clouding over.  Wouldn't it be awful if we had a
+storm?"
+
+"Why, I don't know," answered Bo, thoughtfully.  "It must
+storm out West."
+
+Again Helen felt a quality of inevitableness in Bo.  It was
+something that had appeared only practical in the humdrum
+home life in St.  Joseph.  All of a sudden Helen received a
+flash of wondering thought -- a thrilling consciousness that
+she and Bo had begun to develop in a new and wild
+environment.  How strange, and fearful, perhaps, to watch
+that growth!  Bo, being younger, more impressionable, with
+elemental rather than intellectual instincts, would grow
+stronger more swiftly.  Helen wondered if she could yield to
+her own leaning to the primitive.  But how could anyone with
+a thoughtful and grasping mind yield that way?  It was the
+savage who did not think.
+
+Helen saw Dale stand erect once more and gaze into the
+forest.
+
+"Reckon Roy ain't comin'," he soliloquized.  "An' that's
+good." Then he turned to the girls.  "Supper's ready."
+
+The girls responded with a spirit greater than their
+activity.  And they ate like famished children that had been
+lost in the woods.  Dale attended them with a pleasant light
+upon his still face.
+
+"To-morrow night we'll have meat," he said.
+
+"What kind?" asked Bo.
+
+"Wild turkey or deer.  Maybe both, if you like.  But it's well
+to take wild meat slow.  An' turkey -- that 'll melt in your
+mouth."
+
+"Uummm!" murmured Bo, greedily.  "I've heard of wild turkey."
+
+When they had finished Dale ate his meal, listening to the
+talk of the girls, and occasionally replying briefly to some
+query of Bo's.  It was twilight when he began to wash the
+pots and pans, and almost dark by the time his duties
+appeared ended.  Then he replenished the campfire and sat
+down on a log to gaze into the fire.  The girls leaned
+comfortably propped against the saddles.
+
+"Nell, I'll keel over in a minute," said Bo.  "And I oughtn't
+-- right on such a big supper."
+
+"I don't see how I can sleep, and I know I can't stay
+awake," rejoined Helen.
+
+Dale lifted his head alertly.
+
+"Listen."
+
+The girls grew tense and still.  Helen could not hear a
+sound, unless it was a low thud of hoof out in the gloom.
+The forest seemed sleeping.  She knew from Bo's eyes, wide
+and shining in the camp-fire light, that she, too, had
+failed to catch whatever it was Dale meant.
+
+"Bunch of coyotes comin'," he explained.
+
+Suddenly the quietness split to a chorus of snappy,
+high-strung, strange barks.  They sounded wild, yet they held
+something of a friendly or inquisitive note.  Presently gray
+forms could be descried just at the edge of the circle of
+light.  Soft rustlings of stealthy feet surrounded.  the camp,
+and then barks and yelps broke out all around.  It was a
+restless and sneaking pack of animals, thought Helen; she
+was glad after the chorus ended and with a few desultory,
+spiteful yelps the coyotes went away.
+
+Silence again settled down.  If it had not been for the
+anxiety always present in Helen's mind she would have
+thought this silence sweet and unfamiliarly beautiful.
+
+"Ah!  Listen to that fellow," spoke up Dale.  His voice was
+thrilling.
+
+Again the girls strained their ears.  That was not necessary,
+for presently, clear and cold out of the silence, pealed a
+mournful howl, long drawn, strange and full and wild.
+
+"Oh!  What's that?" whispered Bo.
+
+"That's a big gray wolf -- a timber-wolf, or lofer, as he's
+sometimes called," replied Dale.  "He's high on some rocky
+ridge back there.  He scents us, an' he doesn't like it. . .
+.  There he goes again.  Listen!  Ah, he's hungry."
+
+While Helen listened to this exceedingly wild cry -- so wild
+that it made her flesh creep and the most indescribable
+sensations of loneliness come over her -- she kept her
+glance upon Dale.
+
+"You love him?" she murmured involuntarily, quite without
+understanding the motive of her query.
+
+Assuredly Dale had never had that question asked of him
+before, and it seemed to Helen, as he pondered, that he had
+never even asked it of himself.
+
+"I reckon so," he replied, presently.
+
+"But wolves kill deer, and little fawns, and everything
+helpless in the forest," expostulated Bo.
+
+The hunter nodded his head.
+
+"Why, then, can you love him?" repeated Helen.
+
+"Come to think of it, I reckon it's because of lots of
+reasons," returned Dale.  "He kills clean.  He eats no
+carrion.  He's no coward.  He fights.  He dies game. . . .  An'
+he likes to be alone."
+
+"Kills clean.  What do you mean by that?"
+
+"A cougar, now, he mangles a deer.  An' a silvertip, when
+killin' a cow or colt, he makes a mess of it.  But a wolf
+kills clean, with sharp snaps."
+
+"What are a cougar and a silvertip?"
+
+"Cougar means mountain-lion or panther, an' a silvertip is a
+grizzly bear."
+
+"Oh, they're all cruel!" exclaimed Helen, shrinking.
+
+"I reckon.  Often I've shot wolves for relayin' a deer."
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"Sometimes two or more wolves will run a deer, an' while one
+of them rests the other will drive the deer around to his
+pardner, who'll, take up the chase.  That way they run the
+deer down.  Cruel it is, but nature, an' no worse than snow
+an' ice that starve deer, or a fox that kills turkey-chicks
+breakin' out of the egg, or ravens that pick the eyes out of
+new-born lambs an' wait till they die.  An' for that matter,
+men are crueler than beasts of prey, for men add to nature,
+an' have more than instincts."
+
+Helen was silenced, as well as shocked.  She had not only
+learned a new and striking viewpoint in natural history, but
+a clear intimation to the reason why she had vaguely
+imagined or divined a remarkable character in this man.  A
+hunter was one who killed animals for their fur, for their
+meat or horns, or for some lust for blood -- that was
+Helen's definition of a hunter, and she believed it was held
+by the majority of people living in settled states.  But the
+majority might be wrong.  A hunter might be vastly different,
+and vastly more than a tracker and slayer of game.  The
+mountain world of forest was a mystery to almost all men.
+Perhaps Dale knew its secrets, its life, its terror, its
+beauty, its sadness, and its joy; and if so, how full, how
+wonderful must be his mind!  He spoke of men as no better
+than wolves.  Could a lonely life in the wilderness teach a
+man that?  Bitterness, envy, jealousy, spite, greed, and hate
+-- these had no place in this hunter's heart.  It was not
+Helen's shrewdness, but a woman's intuition, which divined
+that.
+
+Dale rose to his feet and, turning his ear to the north,
+listened once more.
+
+"Are you expecting Roy still?" inquired Helen.
+
+"No, it ain't likely he'll turn up to-night," replied Dale,
+and then he strode over to put a hand on the pine-tree that
+soared above where the girls lay.  His action, and the way he
+looked up at the tree-top and then at adjacent trees, held
+more of that significance which so interested Helen.
+
+"I reckon he's stood there some five hundred years an' will
+stand through to-night," muttered Dale.
+
+This pine was the monarch of that wide-spread group.
+
+"Listen again," said Dale.
+
+Bo was asleep.  And Helen, listening, at once caught low,
+distant roar.
+
+"Wind.  It's goin' to storm," explained Dale.  "You'll hear
+somethin' worth while.  But don't be scared.  Reckon we'll be
+safe.  Pines blow down often.  But this fellow will stand any
+fall wind that ever was. . . .  Better slip under the
+blankets so I can pull the tarp up."
+
+Helen slid down, just as she was, fully dressed except for
+boots, which she and Bo had removed; and she laid her head
+close to Bo's.  Dale pulled the tarpaulin up and folded it
+back just below their heads.
+
+"When it rains you'll wake, an' then just pull the tarp up
+over you," he said.
+
+"Will it rain?" Helen asked.  But she was thinking that this
+moment was the strangest that had ever happened to her.  By
+the light of the camp-fire she saw Dale's face, just as
+usual, still, darkly serene, expressing no thought.  He was
+kind, but he was not thinking of these sisters as girls,
+alone with him in a pitch-black forest, helpless and
+defenseless.  He did not seem to be thinking at all.  But
+Helen had never before in her life been so keenly
+susceptible to experience.
+
+"I'll be close by an' keep the fire goin' all night," he
+said.
+
+She heard him stride off into the darkness.  Presently there
+came a dragging, bumping sound, then a crash of a log
+dropped upon the fire.  A cloud of sparks shot up, and many
+pattered down to hiss upon the damp ground.  Smoke again
+curled upward along the great, seamed tree-trunk, and flames
+sputtered and crackled.
+
+Helen listened again for the roar of wind.  It seemed to come
+on a breath of air that fanned her cheek and softly blew
+Bo's curls, and it was stronger.  But it died out presently,
+only to come again, and still stronger.  Helen realized then
+that the sound was that of an approaching storm.  Her heavy
+eyelids almost refused to stay open, and she knew if she let
+them close she would instantly drop to sleep.  And she wanted
+to hear the storm-wind in the pines.
+
+A few drops of cold rain fell upon her face, thrilling her
+with the proof that no roof stood between her and the
+elements.  Then a breeze bore the smell of burnt wood into
+her face, and somehow her quick mind flew to girlhood days
+when she burned brush and leaves with her little brothers.
+The memory faded.  The roar that had seemed distant was now
+back in the forest, coming swiftly, increasing in volume.
+Like a stream in flood it bore down.  Helen grew amazed,
+startled.  How rushing, oncoming, and heavy this storm-wind!
+She likened its approach to the tread of an army.  Then the
+roar filled the forest, yet it was back there behind her.
+Not a pine-needle quivered in the light of the camp-fire.
+But the air seemed to be oppressed with a terrible charge.
+The roar augmented till it was no longer a roar, but an
+on-sweeping crash, like an ocean torrent engulfing the
+earth.  Bo awoke to cling to Helen with fright.  The deafening
+storm-blast was upon them.  Helen felt the saddle-pillow move
+under her head.  The giant pine had trembled to its very
+roots.  That mighty fury of wind was all aloft, in the
+tree-tops.  And for a long moment it bowed the forest under
+its tremendous power.  Then the deafening crash passed to
+roar, and that swept on and on, lessening in volume,
+deepening in low detonation, at last to die in the distance.
+
+No sooner had it died than back to the north another low
+roar rose and ceased and rose again.  Helen lay there,
+whispering to Bo, and heard again the great wave of wind
+come and crash and cease.  That was the way of this
+storm-wind of the mountain forest.
+
+A soft patter of rain on the tarpaulin warned Helen to
+remember Dale's directions, and, pulling up the heavy
+covering, she arranged it hoodlike over the saddle.  Then,
+with Bo close and warm beside her, she closed her eyes, and
+the sense of the black forest and the wind and rain faded.
+Last of all sensations was the smell of smoke that blew
+under the tarpaulin.
+
+
+When she opened her eyes she remembered everything, as if
+only a moment had elapsed.  But it was daylight, though gray
+and cloudy.  The pines were dripping mist.  A fire crackled
+cheerily and blue smoke curled upward and a savory odor of
+hot coffee hung in the air.  Horses were standing near by,
+biting and kicking at one another.  Bo was sound asleep.  Dale
+appeared busy around the camp-fire.  As Helen watched the
+hunter she saw him pause in his task, turn his ear to
+listen, and then look expectantly.  And at that juncture a
+shout pealed from the forest.  Helen recognized Roy's voice.
+Then she heard a splashing of water, and hoof-beats coming
+closer.  With that the buckskin mustang trotted into camp,
+carrying Roy.
+
+"Bad mornin' for ducks, but good for us," he called.
+
+"Howdy, Roy!" greeted Dale, and his gladness was
+unmistakable.  "I was lookin' for you."
+
+Roy appeared to slide off the mustang without effort, and
+his swift hands slapped the straps as he unsaddled.  Buckskin
+was wet with sweat and foam mixed with rain.  He heaved.  And
+steam rose from him.
+
+"Must have rode hard," observed Dale.
+
+"I shore did," replied Roy.  Then he espied Helen, who had
+sat up, with hands to her hair, and eyes staring at him.
+
+"Mornin', miss.  It's good news."
+
+"Thank Heaven!" murmured Helen, and then she shook Bo.  That
+young lady awoke, but was loath to give up slumber.  "Bo!  Bo!
+Wake up!  Mr.  Roy is back."
+
+Whereupon Bo sat up, disheveled and sleepy-eyed.
+
+"Oh-h, but I ache!" she moaned.  But her eyes took in the
+camp scene to the effect that she added, "Is breakfast
+ready?"
+
+"Almost.  An' flapjacks this mornin'," replied Dale.
+
+Bo manifested active symptoms of health in the manner with
+which she laced her boots.  Helen got their traveling-bag,
+and with this they repaired to a flat stone beside the
+spring, not, however, out of earshot of the men.
+
+"How long are you goin' to hang around camp before tellin'
+me?" inquired Dale.
+
+"Jest as I figgered, Milt," replied Roy.  "Thet rider who
+passed you was a messenger to Anson.  He an' his gang got on
+our trail quick.  About ten o'clock I seen them comin'.  Then
+I lit out for the woods.  I stayed off in the woods close
+enough to see where they come in.  An' shore they lost your
+trail.  Then they spread through the woods, workin' off to
+the south, thinkin', of course, thet you would circle round
+to Pine on the south side of Old Baldy.  There ain't a
+hoss-tracker in Snake Anson's gang, thet's shore.  Wal, I
+follered them for an hour till they'd rustled some miles off
+our trail.  Then I went back to where you struck into the
+woods.  An' I waited there all afternoon till dark, expectin'
+mebbe they'd back-trail.  But they didn't.  I rode on a ways
+an' camped in the woods till jest before daylight."
+
+"So far so good," declared Dale.
+
+"Shore.  There's rough country south of Baldy an' along the
+two or three trails Anson an' his outfit will camp, you
+bet."
+
+"It ain't to be thought of," muttered Dale, at some idea
+that had struck him.
+
+"What ain't?"
+
+"Goin' round the north side of Baldy."
+
+"It shore ain't," rejoined Roy, bluntly.
+
+"Then I've got to hide tracks certain -- rustle to my camp
+an' stay there till you say it's safe to risk takin' the
+girls to Pine."
+
+"Milt, you're talkin' the wisdom of the prophets."
+
+"I ain't so sure we can hide tracks altogether.  If Anson had
+any eyes for the woods he'd not have lost me so soon.
+
+"No.  But, you see, he's figgerin' to cross your trail."
+
+"If I could get fifteen or twenty mile farther on an' hide
+tracks certain, I'd feel safe from pursuit, anyway," said
+the hunter, reflectively.
+
+"Shore an' easy," responded Roy, quickly.  "I jest met up
+with some greaser sheep-herders drivin' a big flock.  They've
+come up from the south an' are goin' to fatten up at Turkey
+Senacas.  Then they'll drive back south an' go on to Phenix.
+Wal, it's muddy weather.  Now you break camp quick an' make a
+plain trail out to thet sheep trail, as if you was travelin'
+south.  But, instead, you ride round ahead of thet flock of
+sheep.  They'll keep to the open parks an' the trails through
+them necks of woods out here.  An', passin' over your tracks,
+they'll hide 'em."
+
+"But supposin' Anson circles an' hits this camp?  He'll track
+me easy out to that sheep trail.  What then?"
+
+"Jest what you want.  Goin' south thet sheep trail is
+downhill an' muddy.  It's goin' to rain hard.  Your tracks
+would get washed out even if you did go south.  An' Anson
+would keep on thet way till he was clear off the scent.
+Leave it to me, Milt.  You're a hunter.  But I'm a
+hoss-tracker."
+
+"All right.  We'll rustle."
+
+Then he called the girls to hurry.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+Once astride the horse again, Helen had to congratulate
+herself upon not being so crippled as she had imagined.
+Indeed, Bo made all the audible complaints.
+
+Both girls had long water-proof coats, brand-new, and of
+which they were considerably proud.  New clothes had not been
+a common event in their lives.
+
+"Reckon I'll have to slit these," Dale had said, whipping
+out a huge knife.
+
+"What for?" had been Bo's feeble protest.
+
+"They wasn't made for ridin'.  An' you'll get wet enough even
+if I do cut them.  An' if I don't, you'll get soaked."
+
+"Go ahead," had been Helen's reluctant permission.
+
+So their long new coats were slit half-way up the back.  The
+exigency of the case was manifest to Helen, when she saw how
+they came down over the cantles of the saddles and to their
+boot-tops.
+
+The morning was gray and cold.  A fine, misty rain fell and
+the trees dripped steadily.  Helen was surprised to see the
+open country again and that apparently they were to leave
+the forest behind for a while.  The country was wide and flat
+on the right, and to the left it rolled and heaved along a
+black, scalloped timber-line.  Above this bordering of the
+forest low, drifting clouds obscured the mountains.  The wind
+was at Helen's back and seemed to be growing stronger.  Dale
+and Roy were ahead, traveling at a good trot, with the
+pack-animals bunched before them.  Helen and Bo had enough to
+do to keep up.
+
+The first hour's ride brought little change in weather or
+scenery, but it gave Helen an inkling of what she must
+endure if they kept that up all day.  She began to welcome
+the places where the horses walked, but she disliked the
+levels.  As for the descents, she hated those.  Ranger would
+not go down slowly and the shake-up she received was
+unpleasant.  Moreover, the spirited black horse insisted on
+jumping the ditches and washes.  He sailed over them like a
+bird.  Helen could not acquire the knack of sitting the
+saddle properly, and so, not only was her person bruised on
+these occasions, but her feelings were hurt.  Helen had never
+before been conscious of vanity.  Still, she had never
+rejoiced in looking at a disadvantage, and her exhibitions
+here must have been frightful.  Bo always would forge to the
+front, and she seldom looked back, for which Helen was
+grateful.
+
+Before long they struck into a broad, muddy belt, full of
+innumerable small hoof tracks.  This, then, was the sheep
+trail Roy had advised following.  They rode on it for three
+or four miles, and at length, coming to a gray-green valley,
+they saw a huge flock of sheep.  Soon the air was full of
+bleats and baas as well as the odor of sheep, and a low,
+soft roar of pattering hoofs.  The flock held a compact
+formation, covering several acres, and grazed along rapidly.
+There were three herders on horses and.  several pack-burros.
+Dale engaged one of the Mexicans in conversation, and passed
+something to him, then pointed northward and down along the
+trail.  The Mexican grinned from ear to ear, and Helen caught
+the quick "SI, SENYOR!  GRACIAS, SENYOR!" It was a pretty
+sight, that flock of sheep, as it rolled along like a
+rounded woolly stream of grays and browns and here and there
+a black.  They were keeping to a trail over the flats.  Dale
+headed into this trail and, if anything, trotted a little
+faster.
+
+Presently the clouds lifted and broke, showing blue sky and
+one streak of sunshine.  But the augury was without warrant.
+The wind increased.  A huge black pall bore down from the
+mountains and it brought rain that could be seen falling in
+sheets from above and approaching like a swiftly moving
+wall.  Soon it enveloped the fugitives.
+
+With head bowed, Helen rode along for what seemed ages in a
+cold, gray rain that blew almost on a level.  Finally the
+heavy downpour passed, leaving a fine mist.  The clouds
+scurried low and dark, hiding the mountains altogether and
+making the gray, wet plain a dreary sight.  Helen's feet and
+knees were as wet as if she had waded in water.  And they
+were cold.  Her gloves, too, had not been intended for rain,
+and they were wet through.  The cold bit at her fingers so
+that she had to beat her hands together.  Ranger
+misunderstood this to mean that he was to trot faster, which
+event was worse for Helen than freezing.
+
+She saw another black, scudding mass of clouds bearing down
+with its trailing sheets of rain, and this one appeared
+streaked with white.  Snow!  The wind was now piercingly cold.
+Helen's body kept warm, but her extremities and ears began
+to suffer exceedingly.  She gazed ahead grimly.  There was no
+help; she had to go on.  Dale and Roy were hunched down in
+their saddles, probably wet through, for they wore no
+rain-proof coats.  Bo kept close behind them, and plain it
+was that she felt the cold.
+
+This second storm was not so bad as the first, because there
+was less rain.  Still, the icy keenness of the wind bit into
+the marrow.  It lasted for an hour, during which the horses
+trotted on, trotted on.  Again the gray torrent roared away,
+the fine mist blew, the clouds lifted and separated, and,
+closing again, darkened for another onslaught.  This one
+brought sleet.  The driving pellets stung Helen's neck and
+cheeks, and for a while they fell so thick and so hard upon
+her back that she was afraid she could not hold up under
+them.  The bare places on the ground showed a sparkling
+coverlet of marbles of ice.
+
+Thus, storm after storm rolled over Helen's head.  Her feet
+grew numb and ceased to hurt.  But her fingers, because of
+her ceaseless efforts to keep up the circulation, retained
+the stinging pain.  And now the wind pierced right through
+her.  She marveled at her endurance, and there were many
+times that she believed she could not ride farther.  Yet she
+kept on.  All the winters she had ever lived had not brought
+such a day as this.  Hard and cold, wet and windy, at an
+increasing elevation -- that was the explanation.  The air
+did not have sufficient oxygen for her blood.
+
+Still, during all those interminable hours, Helen watched
+where she was traveling, and if she ever returned over that
+trail she would recognize it.  The afternoon appeared far
+advanced when Dale and Roy led down into an immense basin
+where a reedy lake spread over the flats.  They rode along
+its margin, splashing up to the knees of the horses.  Cranes
+and herons flew on with lumbering motion; flocks of ducks
+winged swift flight from one side to the other.  Beyond this
+depression the land sloped rather abruptly; outcroppings of
+rock circled along the edge of the highest ground, and again
+a dark fringe of trees appeared.
+
+How many miles!  wondered Helen.  They seemed as many and as
+long as the hours.  But at last, just as another hard rain
+came, the pines were reached.  They proved to be widely
+scattered and afforded little protection from the storm.
+
+Helen sat her saddle, a dead weight.  Whenever Ranger
+quickened his gait or crossed a ditch she held on to the
+pommel to keep from falling off.  Her mind harbored only
+sensations of misery, and a persistent thought -- why did
+she ever leave home for the West?  Her solicitude for Bo had
+been forgotten.  Nevertheless, any marked change in the
+topography of the country was registered, perhaps
+photographed on her memory by the torturing vividness of her
+experience.
+
+The forest grew more level and denser.  Shadows of twilight
+or gloom lay under the trees.  Presently Dale and Roy,
+disappeared, going downhill, and likewise Bo.  Then Helen's
+ears suddenly filled with a roar of rapid water.  Ranger
+trotted faster.  Soon Helen came to the edge of a great
+valley, black and gray, so full of obscurity that she could
+not see across or down into it.  But she knew there was a
+rushing river at the bottom.  The sound was deep, continuous,
+a heavy, murmuring roar, singularly musical.  The trail was
+steep.  Helen had not lost all feeling, as she had believed
+and hoped.  Her poor, mistreated body still responded
+excruciatingly to concussions, jars, wrenches, and all the
+other horrible movements making up a horse-trot.
+
+For long Helen did not look up.  When she did so there lay a
+green, willow-bordered, treeless space at the bottom of the
+valley, through which a brown-white stream rushed with
+steady, ear-filling roar.
+
+Dale and Roy drove the pack-animals across the stream, and
+followed, going deep to the flanks of their horses.  Bo rode
+into the foaming water as if she had been used to it all her
+days.  A slip, a fall, would have meant that Bo must drown in
+that mountain torrent.
+
+Ranger trotted straight to the edge, and there, obedient to
+Helen's clutch on the bridle, he halted.  The stream was
+fifty feet wide, shallow on the near side, deep on the
+opposite, with fast current and big waves.  Helen was simply
+too frightened to follow.
+
+"Let him come!" yelled Dale.  "Stick on now!  . . .  Ranger!"
+
+The big black plunged in, making the water fly.  That stream
+was nothing for him, though it seemed impassable to Helen.
+She had not the strength left to lift her stirrups and the
+water surged over them.  Ranger, in two more plunges,
+surmounted the bank, and then, trotting across the green to
+where the other horses stood steaming under some pines, he
+gave a great heave and halted.
+
+Roy reached up to help her off.
+
+"Thirty miles, Miss Helen," he said, and the way he spoke
+was a compliment.
+
+He had to lift her off and help her to the tree where Bo
+leaned.  Dale had ripped off a saddle and was spreading
+saddle-blankets on the ground under the pine.
+
+"Nell -- you swore -- you loved me!" was Bo's mournful
+greeting.  The girl was pale, drawn, blue-lipped, and she
+could not stand up.
+
+"Bo, I never did -- or I'd never have brought you to this --
+wretch that I am!" cried Helen.  "Oh, what a horrible ride!"
+
+Rain was falling, the trees were dripping, the sky was
+lowering.  All the ground was soaking wet, with pools and
+puddles everywhere.  Helen could imagine nothing but a
+heartless, dreary, cold prospect.  Just then home was vivid
+and poignant in her thoughts.  Indeed, so utterly miserable
+was she that the exquisite relief of sitting down, of a
+cessation of movement, of a release from that infernal
+perpetual-trotting horse, seemed only a mockery.  It could
+not be true that the time had come for rest.
+
+Evidently this place had been a camp site for hunters or
+sheep-herders, for there were remains of a fire.  Dale lifted
+the burnt end of a log and brought it down hard upon the
+ground, splitting off pieces.  Several times he did this.  It
+was amazing to see his strength, his facility, as he split
+off handfuls of splinters.  He collected a bundle of them,
+and, laying them down, he bent over them.  Roy wielded the ax
+on another log, and each stroke split off a long strip.  Then
+a tiny column of smoke drifted up over Dale's shoulder as he
+leaned, bareheaded, sheltering the splinters with his hat.  A
+blaze leaped up.  Roy came with an armful of strips all white
+and dry, out of the inside of a log.  Crosswise these were
+laid over the blaze, and it began to roar.  Then piece by
+piece the men built up a frame upon which they added heavier
+woods, branches and stumps and logs, erecting a pyramid
+through which flames and smoke roared upward.  It had not
+taken two minutes.  Already Helen felt the warmth on her icy
+face.  She held up her bare, numb hands.
+
+Both Dale and Roy were wet through to the skin, yet they did
+not tarry beside the fire.  They relieved the horses.  A lasso
+went up between two pines, and a tarpaulin over it, V-shaped
+and pegged down at the four ends.  The packs containing the
+baggage of the girls and the supplies and bedding were
+placed under this shelter.
+
+Helen thought this might have taken five minutes more.  In
+this short space of time the fire had leaped and flamed
+until it was huge and hot.  Rain was falling steadily all
+around, but over and near that roaring blaze, ten feet high,
+no water fell.  It evaporated.  The ground began to steam and
+to dry.  Helen suffered at first while the heat was driving
+out the cold.  But presently the pain ceased.
+
+"Nell, I never knew before how good a fire could feel,"
+declared Bo.
+
+And therein lay more food for Helen's reflection.
+
+In ten minutes Helen was dry and hot.  Darkness came down
+upon the dreary, sodden forest, but that great camp-fire
+made it a different world from the one Helen had
+anticipated.  It blazed and roared, cracked like a pistol,
+hissed and sputtered, shot sparks everywhere, and sent aloft
+a dense, yellow, whirling column of smoke.  It began to have
+a heart of gold.
+
+Dale took a long pole and raked out a pile of red embers
+upon which the coffee-pot and oven soon began to steam.
+
+"Roy, I promised the girls turkey to-night," said the
+hunter.
+
+"Mebbe to-morrow, if the wind shifts.  This 's turkey
+country."
+
+"Roy, a potato will do me!" exclaimed Bo.
+
+"Never again will I ask for cake and pie!  I never
+appreciated good things to eat.  And I've been a little pig,
+always.  I never -- never knew what it was to be hungry --
+until now."
+
+Dale glanced up quickly.
+
+"Lass, it's worth learnin'," he said.
+
+Helen's thought was too deep for words.  In such brief space
+had she been transformed from misery to comfort!
+
+The rain kept on falling, though it appeared to grow softer
+as night settled down black.  The wind died away and the
+forest was still, except for the steady roar of the stream.
+A folded tarpaulin was laid between the pine and the fire,
+well in the light and warmth, and upon it the men set
+steaming pots and plates and cups, the fragrance from which
+was strong and inviting.
+
+"Fetch the saddle-blanket an' set with your backs to the
+fire," said Roy.
+
+
+Later, when the girls were tucked away snugly in their
+blankets and sheltered from the rain, Helen remained awake
+after Bo had fallen asleep.  The big blaze made the
+improvised tent as bright as day.  She could see the smoke,
+the trunk of the big pine towering aloft, and a blank space
+of sky.  The stream hummed a song, seemingly musical at
+times, and then discordant and dull, now low, now roaring,
+and always rushing, gurgling, babbling, flowing, chafing in
+its hurry.
+
+Presently the hunter and his friend returned from hobbling
+the horses, and beside the fire they conversed in low tones.
+
+"Wal, thet trail we made to-day will be hid, I reckon," said
+Roy, with satisfaction.
+
+"What wasn't sheeped over would be washed out.  We've had
+luck.  An' now I ain't worryin'," returned Dale.
+
+"Worryin'?  Then it's the first I ever knowed you to do."
+
+"Man, I never had a job like this," protested the hunter.
+
+"Wal, thet's so."
+
+"Now, Roy, when old Al Auchincloss finds out about this
+deal, as he's bound to when you or the boys get back to
+Pine, he's goin' to roar."
+
+"Do you reckon folks will side with him against Beasley?"
+
+"Some of them.  But Al, like as not, will tell folks to go
+where it's hot.  He'll bunch his men an' strike for the
+mountains to find his nieces."
+
+"Wal, all you've got to do is to keep the girls hid till I
+can guide him up to your camp.  Or, failin' thet, till you
+can slip the girls down to Pine."
+
+"No one but you an' your brothers ever seen my senaca.  But
+it could be found easy enough."
+
+"Anson might blunder on it.  But thet ain't likely."
+
+"Why ain't it?"
+
+"Because I'll stick to thet sheep-thief's tracks like a wolf
+after a bleedin' deer.  An' if he ever gets near your camp
+I'll ride in ahead of him."
+
+"Good!" declared Dale.  "I was calculatin' you'd go down to
+Pine, sooner or later."
+
+"Not unless Anson goes.  I told John thet in case there was
+no fight on the stage to make a bee-line back to Pine.  He
+was to tell Al an' offer his services along with Joe an'
+Hal."
+
+"One way or another, then, there's bound to be blood spilled
+over this."
+
+"Shore!  An' high time.  I jest hope I get a look down my old
+'forty-four' at thet Beasley."
+
+"In that case I hope you hold straighter than times I've
+seen you."
+
+"Milt Dale, I'm a good shot," declared Roy, stoutly.
+
+"You're no good on movin' targets."
+
+"Wal, mebbe so.  But I'm not lookin' for a movin' target when
+I meet up with Beasley.  I'm a hossman, not a hunter.  You're
+used to shootin' flies off deer's horns, jest for practice."
+
+"Roy, can we make my camp by to-morrow night?" queried Dale,
+more seriously.
+
+"We will, if each of us has to carry one of the girls.  But
+they'll do it or die.  Dale, did you ever see a gamer girl
+than thet kid Bo?"
+
+"Me!  Where'd I ever see any girls?" ejaculated Dale.  "I
+remember some when I was a boy, but I was only fourteen
+then.  Never had much use for girls."
+
+"I'd like to have a wife like that Bo," declared Roy,
+fervidly.
+
+There ensued a moment's silence.
+
+"Roy, you're a Mormon an' you already got a wife," was
+Dale's reply.
+
+"Now, Milt, have you lived so long in the woods thet you
+never heard of a Mormon with two wives?" returned Roy, and
+then he laughed heartily.
+
+"I never could stomach what I did hear pertainin' to more
+than one wife for a man."
+
+"Wal, my friend, you go an' get yourself ONE.  An' see then
+if you wouldn't like to have TWO."
+
+"I reckon one 'd be more than enough for Milt Dale."
+
+"Milt, old man, let me tell you thet I always envied you
+your freedom," said Roy, earnestly.  "But it ain't life."
+
+"You mean life is love of a woman?"
+
+"No.  Thet's only part.  I mean a son -- a boy thet's like you
+-- thet you feel will go on with your life after you're
+gone."
+
+"I've thought of that -- thought it all out, watchin' the
+birds an' animals mate in the woods. . . .  If I have no son
+I'll never live hereafter."
+
+"Wal," replied Roy, hesitatingly, "I don't go in so deep as
+thet.  I mean a son goes on with your blood an' your work."
+
+"Exactly. . .  An', Roy, I envy you what you ve got, because
+it's out of all bounds for Milt Dale."
+
+Those words, sad and deep, ended the conversation.  Again the
+rumbling, rushing stream dominated the forest.  An owl hooted
+dismally.  A horse trod thuddingly near by and from that
+direction came a cutting tear of teeth on grass.
+
+
+A voice pierced Helen's deep dreams and, awaking, she found
+Bo shaking and calling her.
+
+"Are you dead?" came the gay voice.
+
+"Almost.  Oh, my back's broken," replied Helen.  The desire to
+move seemed clamped in a vise, and even if that came she
+believed the effort would be impossible.
+
+"Roy called us," said Bo.  "He said hurry.  I thought I'd die
+just sitting up, and I'd give you a million dollars to lace
+my boots.  Wait, sister, till you try to pull on one of those
+stiff boots!"
+
+With heroic and violent spirit Helen sat up to find that in
+the act her aches and pains appeared beyond number.  Reaching
+for her boots, she found them cold and stiff.  Helen unlaced
+one and, opening it wide, essayed to get her sore foot down
+into it.  But her foot appeared swollen and the boot appeared
+shrunken.  She could not get it half on, though she expended
+what little strength seemed left in her aching arms.  She
+groaned.
+
+Bo laughed wickedly.  Her hair was tousled, her eyes dancing,
+her cheeks red.
+
+"Be game!" she said.  "Stand up like a real Western girl and
+PULL your boot on."
+
+Whether Bo's scorn or advice made the task easier did not
+occur to Helen, but the fact was that she got into her
+boots.  Walking and moving a little appeared to loosen the
+stiff joints and ease that tired feeling.  The water of the
+stream where the girls washed was colder than any ice Helen
+had ever felt.  It almost paralyzed her hands.  Bo mumbled,
+and blew like a porpoise.  They had to run to the fire before
+being able to comb their hair.  The air was wonderfully keen.
+The dawn was clear, bright, with a red glow in the east
+where the sun was about to rise.
+
+"All ready, girls," called Roy.  "Reckon you can help
+yourselves.  Milt ain't comin' in very fast with the hosses.
+I'll rustle off to help him.  We've got a hard day before us.
+Yesterday wasn't nowhere to what to-day 'll be."
+
+"But the sun's going to shine?" implored Bo.
+
+"Wal, you bet," rejoined Roy, as he strode off.
+
+Helen and Bo ate breakfast and had the camp to themselves
+for perhaps half an hour; then the horses came thudding
+down, with Dale and Roy riding bareback.
+
+By the time all was in readiness to start the sun was up,
+melting the frost and ice, so that a dazzling, bright mist,
+full of rainbows, shone under the trees.
+
+Dale looked Ranger over, and tried the cinches of Bo's
+horse.
+
+"What's your choice -- a long ride behind the packs with me
+-- or a short cut over the hills with Roy?" he asked.
+
+"I choose the lesser of two rides," replied Helen, smiling.
+"Reckon that 'll be easier, but you'll know you've had a
+ride," said Dale, significantly.
+
+"What was that we had yesterday?" asked Bo, archly.
+
+"Only thirty miles, but cold an' wet.  To-day will be fine
+for ridin'."
+
+"Milt, I'll take a blanket an' some grub in case you don't
+meet us to-night," said Roy.  "An' I reckon we'll split up
+here where I'll have to strike out on thet short cut."
+
+Bo mounted without a helping hand, but Helen's limbs were so
+stiff that she could not get astride the high Ranger without
+assistance.  The hunter headed up the slope of the canuon,
+which on that side was not steep.  It was brown pine forest,
+with here and there a clump of dark, silver-pointed
+evergreens that Roy called spruce.  By the time this slope
+was surmounted Helen's aches were not so bad.  The saddle
+appeared to fit her better, and the gait of the horse was
+not so unfamiliar.  She reflected, however, that she always
+had done pretty well uphill.  Here it was beautiful
+forest-land, uneven and wilder.  They rode for a time along
+the rim, with the white rushing stream in plain sight far
+below, with its melodious roar ever thrumming in the ear.
+
+Dale reined in and peered down at the pine-mat.
+
+"Fresh deer sign all along here," he said, pointing.
+
+"Wal, I seen thet long ago," rejoined Roy.
+
+Helen's scrutiny was rewarded by descrying several tiny
+depressions in the pine-needles, dark in color and sharply
+defined.
+
+"We may never get a better chance," said Dale.  "Those deer
+are workin' up our way.  Get your rifle out."
+
+Travel was resumed then, with Roy a little in advance of the
+pack-train.  Presently he dismounted, threw his bridle, and
+cautiously peered ahead.  Then, turning, he waved his
+sombrero.  The pack-animals halted in a bunch.  Dale beckoned
+for the girls to follow and rode up to Roy's horse.  This
+point, Helen saw, was at the top of an intersecting canuon.
+Dale dismounted, without drawing his rifle from its
+saddle-sheath, and approached Roy.
+
+"Buck an' two does," he said, low-voiced.  "An' they've
+winded us, but don't see us yet. . . .  Girls, ride up
+closer."
+
+Following the directions indicated by Dale's long arm, Helen
+looked down the slope.  It was open, with tall pines here and
+there, and clumps of silver spruce, and aspens shining like
+gold in the morning sunlight.  Presently Bo exclaimed: "Oh,
+look!  I see!  I see!" Then Helen's roving glance passed
+something different from green and gold and brown.  Shifting
+back to it she saw a magnificent stag, with noble spreading
+antlers, standing like a statue, his head up in alert and
+wild posture.  His color was gray.  Beside him grazed two deer
+of slighter and more graceful build, without horns.
+
+"It's downhill," whispered Dale.  "An' you're goin' to
+overshoot."
+
+Then Helen saw that Roy had his rifle leveled.
+
+"Oh, don't!" she cried.
+
+Dale's remark evidently nettled Roy.  He lowered the rifle.
+
+"Milt, it's me lookin' over this gun.  How can you stand
+there an' tell me I'm goin' to shoot high?  I had a dead bead
+on him."
+
+"Roy, you didn't allow for downhill . . .  Hurry.  He sees us
+now."
+
+Roy leveled the rifle and, taking aim as before, he fired.
+The buck stood perfectly motionless, as if he had indeed
+been stone.  The does, however, jumped with a start, and
+gazed in fright in every direction.
+
+"Told you!  I seen where your bullet hit thet pine -- half a
+foot over his shoulder.  Try again an' aim at his legs."
+
+Roy now took a quicker aim and pulled trigger.  A puff of
+dust right at the feet of the buck showed where Roy's lead
+had struck this time.  With a single bound, wonderful to see,
+the big deer was out of sight behind trees and brush.  The
+does leaped after him.
+
+"Doggone the luck!" ejaculated Roy, red in the face, as he
+worked the lever of his rifle.  "Never could shoot downhill,
+nohow!"
+
+His rueful apology to the girls for missing brought a merry
+laugh from Bo.
+
+"Not for worlds would I have had you kill that beautiful
+deer!" she exclaimed.
+
+"We won't have venison steak off him, that's certain,"
+remarked Dale, dryly.  "An' maybe none off any deer, if Roy
+does the shootin'."
+
+They resumed travel, sheering off to the right and keeping
+to the edge of the intersecting canuon.  At length they rode
+down to the bottom, where a tiny brook babbled through
+willows, and they followed this for a mile or so down to
+where it flowed into the larger stream.  A dim trail
+overgrown with grass showed at this point.
+
+"Here's where we part," said Dale.  "You'll beat me into my
+camp, but I'll get there sometime after dark."
+
+"Hey, Milt, I forgot about thet darned pet cougar of yours
+an' the rest of your menagerie.  Reckon they won't scare the
+girls?  Especially old Tom?"
+
+"You won't see Tom till I get home," replied Dale.
+
+"Ain't he corralled or tied up?"
+
+"No.  He has the run of the place."
+
+"Wal, good-by, then, an' rustle along."
+
+Dale nodded to the girls, and, turning his horse, he drove
+the pack-train before him up the open space between the
+stream and the wooded slope.
+
+Roy stepped off his horse with that single action which
+appeared such a feat to Helen.
+
+"Guess I'd better cinch up," he said, as he threw a stirrup
+up over the pommel of his saddle.  "You girls are goin' to
+see wild country."
+
+"Who's old Tom?" queried Bo, curiously.
+
+"Why, he's Milt's pet cougar."
+
+"Cougar?  That's a panther -- a mountain-lion, didn't he
+say?"
+
+"Shore is.  Tom is a beauty.  An' if he takes a likin' to you
+he'll love you, play with you, maul you half to death."
+
+Bo was all eyes.
+
+"Dale has other pets, too?" she questioned, eagerly.
+
+"I never was up to his camp but what it was overrun with
+birds an' squirrels an' vermin of all kinds, as tame as tame
+as cows.  Too darn tame, Milt says.  But I can't figger thet.
+You girls will never want to leave thet senaca of his."
+
+"What's a senaca?" asked Helen, as she shifted her foot to
+let him tighten the cinches on her saddle.
+
+"Thet's Mexican for park, I guess," he replied.  "These
+mountains are full of parks; an', say, I don't ever want to
+see no prettier place till I get to heaven. . . .  There,
+Ranger, old boy, thet's tight."
+
+He slapped the horse affectionately, and, turning to his
+own, he stepped and swung his long length up.
+
+"It ain't deep crossin' here.  Come on," he called, and
+spurred his bay.
+
+The stream here was wide and it looked deep, but turned out
+to be deceptive.
+
+"Wal, girls, here beginneth the second lesson," he drawled,
+cheerily.  "Ride one behind the other -- stick close to me --
+do what I do -- an' holler when you want to rest or if
+somethin' goes bad."
+
+With that he spurred into the thicket.  Bo went next and
+Helen followed.  The willows dragged at her so hard that she
+was unable to watch Roy, and the result was that a
+low-sweeping branch of a tree knocked her hard on the head.
+It hurt and startled her, and roused her mettle.  Roy was
+keeping to the easy trot that covered ground so well, and he
+led up a slope to the open pine forest.  Here the ride for
+several miles was straight, level, and open.  Helen liked the
+forest to-day.  It was brown and green, with patches of gold
+where the sun struck.  She saw her first bird -- big blue
+grouse that whirred up from under her horse, and little
+checkered gray quail that appeared awkward on the wing.
+Several times Roy pointed out deer flashing gray across some
+forest aisle, and often when he pointed Helen was not quick
+enough to see.
+
+Helen realized that this ride would make up for the hideous
+one of yesterday.  So far she had been only barely conscious
+of sore places and aching bones.  These she would bear with.
+She loved the wild and the beautiful, both of which
+increased manifestly with every mile.  The sun was warm, the
+air fragrant and cool, the sky blue as azure and so deep
+that she imagined that she could look far up into it.
+
+Suddenly Roy reined in so sharply that he pulled the bay up
+short.
+
+"Look!" he called, sharply.
+
+Bo screamed.
+
+"Not thet way!  Here!  Aw, he's gone!"
+
+"Nell!  It was a bear!  I saw it!  Oh!  not like circus bears at
+all!" cried Bo.
+
+Helen had missed her opportunity.
+
+"Reckon he was a grizzly, an' I'm jest as well pleased thet
+he loped off," said Roy.  Altering his course somewhat, he
+led to an old rotten log that the bear had been digging in.
+"After grubs.  There, see his track.  He was a whopper shore
+enough."
+
+They rode on, out to a high point that overlooked canuon and
+range, gorge and ridge, green and black as far as Helen
+could see.  The ranges were bold and long, climbing to the
+central uplift, where a number of fringed peaks raised their
+heads to the vast bare dome of Old Baldy.  Far as vision
+could see, to the right lay one rolling forest of pine,
+beautiful and serene.  Somewhere down beyond must have lain
+the desert, but it was not in sight.
+
+"I see turkeys 'way down there," said Roy, backing away.
+"We'll go down and around an' mebbe I'll get a shot."
+
+Descent beyond a rocky point was made through thick brush.
+This slope consisted of wide benches covered with copses and
+scattered pines and many oaks.  Helen was delighted to see
+the familiar trees, although these were different from
+Missouri oaks.  Rugged and gnarled, but not tall, these trees
+spread wide branches, the leaves of which were yellowing.
+Roy led into a grassy glade, and, leaping off his horse,
+rifle in hand, he prepared to shoot at something.  Again Bo
+cried out, but this time it was in delight.  Then Helen saw
+an immense flock of turkeys, apparently like the turkeys she
+knew at home, but these had bronze and checks of white, and
+they looked wild.  There must have been a hundred in the
+flock, most of them hens.  A few gobblers on the far side
+began the flight, running swiftly off.  Helen plainly heard
+the thud of their feet.  Roy shot once -- twice -- three
+times.  Then rose a great commotion.  and thumping, and a loud
+roar of many wings.  Dust and leaves whirling in the air were
+left where the turkeys had been.
+
+"Wal, I got two," said Roy, and he strode forward to pick up
+his game.  Returning, he tied two shiny, plump gobblers back
+of his saddle and remounted his horse.  "We'll have turkey
+to-night, if Milt gets to camp in time."
+
+The ride was resumed.  Helen never would have tired riding
+through those oak groves, brown and sear and yellow, with
+leaves and acorns falling.
+
+"Bears have been workin' in here already," said Roy.  "I see
+tracks all over.  They eat acorns in the fall.  An' mebbe
+we'll run into one yet."
+
+The farther down he led the wilder and thicker grew the
+trees, so that dodging branches was no light task.  Ranger
+did not seem to care how close he passed a tree or under a
+limb, so that he missed them himself; but Helen thereby got
+some additional bruises.  Particularly hard was it, when
+passing a tree, to get her knee out of the way in time.
+
+Roy halted next at what appeared a large green pond full of
+vegetation and in places covered with a thick scum.  But it
+had a current and an outlet, proving it to be a huge,
+spring.  Roy pointed down at a muddy place.
+
+"Bear-wallow.  He heard us comin'.  Look at thet little track.
+Cub track.  An' look at these scratches on this tree, higher
+'n my head.  An old she-bear stood up, an' scratched them."
+
+Roy sat his saddle and reached up to touch fresh marks on
+the tree.
+
+"Woods's full of big bears," he said, grinning.  "An' I take
+it particular kind of this old she rustlin' off with her
+cub.  She-bears with cubs are dangerous."
+
+The next place to stir Helen to enthusiasm was the glen at
+the bottom of this canuon.  Beech-trees, maples, aspens,
+overtopped by lofty pines, made dense shade over a brook
+where trout splashed on the brown, swirling current, and
+leaves drifted down, and stray flecks of golden sunlight
+lightened the gloom.  Here was hard riding to and fro across
+the brook, between huge mossy boulders, and between aspens
+so close together that Helen could scarce squeeze her knees
+through.
+
+Once more Roy climbed out of that canuon, over a ridge into
+another, down long wooded slopes and through scrub-oak
+thickets, on and on till the sun stood straight overhead.
+Then he halted for a short rest, unsaddled the horses to let
+them roll, and gave the girls some cold lunch that he had
+packed.  He strolled off with his gun, and, upon returning,
+resaddled and gave the word to start.
+
+That was the last of rest and easy traveling for the girls.
+The forest that he struck into seemed ribbed like a
+washboard with deep ravines so steep of slope as to make
+precarious travel.  Mostly he kept to the bottom where dry
+washes afforded a kind of trail.  But it was necessary to
+cross these ravines when they were too long to be headed,
+and this crossing was work.
+
+The locust thickets characteristic of these slopes were
+thorny and close knit.  They tore and scratched and stung
+both horses and riders.  Ranger appeared to be the most
+intelligent of the horses and suffered less.  Bo's white
+mustang dragged her through more than one brambly place.  On
+the other hand, some of these steep slopes, were
+comparatively free of underbrush.  Great firs and pines
+loomed up on all sides.  The earth was soft and the hoofs
+sank deep.  Toward the bottom of a descent Ranger would brace
+his front feet and then slide down on his haunches.  This
+mode facilitated travel, but it frightened Helen.  The climb
+out then on the other side had to be done on foot.
+
+After half a dozen slopes surmounted in this way Helen's
+strength was spent and her breath was gone.  She felt
+light-headed.  She could not get enough air.  Her feet felt
+like lead, and her riding-coat was a burden.  A hundred
+times, hot and wet and throbbing, she was compelled to stop.
+Always she had been a splendid walker and climber.  And here,
+to break up the long ride, she was glad to be on her feet.
+But she could only drag one foot up after the other.  Then,
+when her nose began to bleed, she realized that it was the
+elevation which was causing all the trouble.  Her heart,
+however, did not hurt her, though she was conscious of an
+oppression on her breast.
+
+At last Roy led into a ravine so deep and wide and full of
+forest verdure that it appeared impossible to cross.
+Nevertheless, he started down, dismounting after a little
+way.  Helen found that leading Ranger down was worse than
+riding him.  He came fast and he would step right in her
+tracks.  She was not quick enough to get, away from him.
+Twice he stepped on her foot, and again his broad chest hit
+her shoulder and threw her flat.  When he began to slide,
+near the bottom, Helen had to run for her life.
+
+"Oh, Nell!  Isn't -- this -- great?" panted Bo, from
+somewhere ahead.
+
+"Bo -- your -- mind's -- gone," panted Helen, in reply.
+
+Roy tried several places to climb out, and failed in each.
+Leading down the ravine for a hundred yards or more, he
+essayed another attempt.  Here there had been a slide, and in
+part the earth was bare.  When he had worked up this, he
+halted above, and called:
+
+"Bad place!  Keep on the up side of the hosses!"
+
+This appeared easier said than done.  Helen could not watch
+Bo, because Ranger would not wait.  He pulled at the bridle
+and snorted.
+
+"Faster you come the better," called Roy.
+
+Helen could not see the sense of that, but she tried.  Roy
+and Bo had dug a deep trail zigzag up that treacherous
+slide.  Helen made the mistake of starting to follow in their
+tracks, and when she realized this Ranger was climbing fast,
+almost dragging her, and it was too late to get above.  Helen
+began to labor.  She slid down right in front of Ranger.  The
+intelligent animal, with a snort, plunged out of the trail
+to keep from stepping on her.  Then he was above her.
+
+"Lookout down there," yelled Roy, in warning.  "Get on the up
+side!"
+
+But that did not appear possible.  The earth began to slide
+under Ranger, and that impeded Helen's progress.  He got in
+advance of her, straining on the bridle.
+
+"Let go!" yelled Roy.
+
+Helen dropped the bridle just as a heavy slide began to move
+with Ranger.  He snorted fiercely, and, rearing high, in a
+mighty plunge he gained solid ground.  Helen was buried to
+her knees, but, extricating herself, she crawled to a safe
+point and rested before climbing farther.
+
+"Bad cave-in, thet," was Roy's comment, when at last she
+joined him and Bo at the top.
+
+Roy appeared at a loss as to which way to go.  He rode to
+high ground and looked in all directions.  To Helen, one way
+appeared as wild and rough as another, and all was yellow,
+green, and black under the westering sun.  Roy rode a short
+distance in one direction, then changed for another.
+
+Presently he stopped.
+
+"Wal, I'm shore turned round," he said.
+
+"You're not lost?" cried Bo.
+
+"Reckon I've been thet for a couple of hours," he replied,
+cheerfully.  "Never did ride across here I had the direction,
+but I'm blamed now if I can tell which way thet was."
+
+Helen gazed at him in consternation.
+
+"Lost!" she echoed.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+A silence ensued, fraught with poignant fear for Helen, as
+she gazed into Bo's whitening face.  She read her sister's
+mind.  Bo was remembering tales of lost people who never were
+found.
+
+"Me an' Milt get lost every day," said Roy.  "You don't
+suppose any man can know all this big country.  It's nothin'
+for us to be lost."
+
+"Oh!  . . .  I was lost when I was little," said Bo.
+
+"Wal, I reckon it'd been better not to tell you so offhand
+like," replied Roy, contritely.  "Don't feel bad, now.  All I
+need is a peek at Old Baldy.  Then I'll have my bearin'.  Come
+on."
+
+Helen's confidence returned as Roy led off at a fast trot.
+He rode toward the westering sun, keeping to the ridge they
+had ascended, until once more he came out upon a promontory.
+Old Baldy loomed there, blacker and higher and closer.  The
+dark forest showed round, yellow, bare spots like parks.
+
+"Not so far off the track," said Roy, as he wheeled his
+horse.  "We'll make camp in Milt's senaca to-night."
+
+He led down off the ridge into a valley and then up to
+higher altitude, where the character of the forest changed.
+The trees were no longer pines, but firs and spruce, growing
+thin and exceedingly tall, with few branches below the
+topmost foliage.  So dense was this forest that twilight
+seemed to have come.
+
+Travel was arduous.  Everywhere were windfalls that had to be
+avoided, and not a rod was there without a fallen tree.  The
+horses, laboring slowly, sometimes sank knee-deep into the
+brown duff.  Gray moss festooned the tree-trunks and an
+amber-green moss grew thick on the rotting logs.
+
+Helen loved this forest primeval.  It was so still, so dark,
+so gloomy, so full of shadows and shade, and a dank smell of
+rotting wood, and sweet fragrance of spruce.  The great
+windfalls, where trees were jammed together in dozens,
+showed the savagery of the storms.  Wherever a single monarch
+lay uprooted there had sprung up a number of ambitious sons,
+jealous of one another, fighting for place.  Even the trees
+fought one another!  The forest was a place of mystery, but
+its strife could be read by any eye.  The lightnings had
+split firs clear to the roots, and others it had circled
+with ripping tear from top to trunk.
+
+Time came, however, when the exceeding wildness of the
+forest, in density and fallen timber, made it imperative for
+Helen to put all her attention on the ground and trees in
+her immediate vicinity.  So the pleasure of gazing ahead at
+the beautiful wilderness was denied her.  Thereafter travel
+became toil and the hours endless.
+
+Roy led on, and Ranger followed, while the shadows darkened
+under the trees.  She was reeling in her saddle, half blind
+and sick, when Roy called out cheerily that they were almost
+there.
+
+Whatever his idea was, to Helen it seemed many miles that
+she followed him farther, out of the heavy-timbered forest
+down upon slopes of low spruce, like evergreen, which
+descended sharply to another level, where dark, shallow
+streams flowed gently and the solemn stillness held a low
+murmur of falling water, and at last the wood ended upon a
+wonderful park full of a thick, rich, golden light of
+fast-fading sunset.
+
+"Smell the smoke," said Roy.  "By Solomon!  if Milt ain't here
+ahead of me!"
+
+He rode on.  Helen's weary gaze took in the round senaca, the
+circling black slopes, leading up to craggy rims all gold
+and red in the last flare of the sun; then all the spirit
+left in her flashed up in thrilling wonder at this
+exquisite, wild, and colorful spot.
+
+Horses were grazing out in the long grass and there were
+deer grazing with them.  Roy led round a corner of the
+fringed, bordering woodland, and there, under lofty trees,
+shone a camp-fire.  Huge gray rocks loomed beyond, and then
+cliffs rose step by step to a notch in the mountain wall,
+over which poured a thin, lacy waterfall.  As Helen gazed in
+rapture the sunset gold faded to white and all the western
+slope of the amphitheater darkened.
+
+Dale's tall form appeared.
+
+"Reckon you're late," he said, as with a comprehensive flash
+of eye he took in the three.
+
+"Milt, I got lost," replied Roy.
+
+"I feared as much. . . .  You girls look like you'd done
+better to ride with me," went on Dale, as he offered a hand
+to help Bo off.  She took it, tried to get her foot out of
+the stirrups, and then she slid from the saddle into Dale's
+arms.  He placed her on her feet and, supporting her, said,
+solicitously: "A hundred-mile ride in three days for a
+tenderfoot is somethin' your uncle Al won't believe. . . .
+Come, walk if it kills you!"
+
+Whereupon he led Bo, very much as if he were teaching a
+child to walk.  The fact that the voluble Bo had nothing to
+say was significant to Helen, who was following, with the
+assistance of Roy.
+
+One of the huge rocks resembled a sea-shell in that it
+contained a hollow over which the wide-spreading shelf
+flared out.  It reached toward branches of great pines.  A
+spring burst from a crack in the solid rock.  The campfire
+blazed under a pine, and the blue column of smoke rose just
+in front of the shelving rock.  Packs were lying on the grass
+and some of them were open.  There were no signs here of a
+permanent habitation of the hunter.  But farther on were
+other huge rocks, leaning, cracked, and forming caverns,
+some of which perhaps he utilized.
+
+"My camp is just back," said Dale, as if he had read Helen's
+mind.  "To-morrow we'll fix up comfortable-like round here
+for you girls."
+
+Helen and Bo were made as easy as blankets and saddles could
+make them, and the men went about their tasks.
+
+"Nell -- isn't this -- a dream?" murmured Bo.
+
+"No, child.  It's real -- terribly real," replied Helen.  "Now
+that we're here -- with that awful ride over -- we can
+think."
+
+"It's so pretty -- here," yawned Bo.  "I'd just as lief Uncle
+Al didn't find us very soon."
+
+"Bo!  He's a sick man.  Think what the worry will be to him."
+
+"I'll bet if he knows Dale he won't be so worried."
+
+"Dale told us Uncle Al disliked him."
+
+"Pooh!  What difference does that make?  . . .  Oh, I don't
+know which I am -- hungrier or tireder!"
+
+"I couldn't eat to-night," said Helen, wearily.
+
+When she stretched out she had a vague, delicious sensation
+that that was the end of Helen Rayner, and she was glad.
+Above her, through the lacy, fernlike pine-needles, she saw
+blue sky and a pale star just showing.  Twilight was stealing
+down swiftly.  The silence was beautiful, seemingly
+undisturbed by the soft, silky, dreamy fall of water.  Helen
+closed her eyes, ready for sleep, with the physical
+commotion within her body gradually yielding.  In some places
+her bones felt as if they had come out through her flesh; in
+others throbbed deep-seated aches; her muscles appeared
+slowly to subside, to relax, with the quivering twinges
+ceasing one by one; through muscle and bone, through all her
+body, pulsed a burning current.
+
+Bo's head dropped on Helen's shoulder.  Sense became vague to
+Helen.  She lost the low murmur of the waterfall, and then
+the sound or feeling of some one at the campfire.  And her
+last conscious thought was that she tried to open her eyes
+and could not.
+
+When she awoke all was bright.  The sun shone almost directly
+overhead.  Helen was astounded.  Bo lay wrapped in deep sleep,
+her face flushed, with beads of perspiration on her brow and
+the chestnut curls damp.  Helen threw down the blankets, and
+then, gathering courage -- for she felt as if her back was
+broken -- she endeavored to sit up.  In vain!  Her spirit was
+willing, but her muscles refused to act.  It must take a
+violent spasmodic effort.  She tried it with shut eyes, and,
+succeeding, sat there trembling.  The commotion she had made
+in the blankets awoke Bo, and she blinked her surprised blue
+eyes in the sunlight.
+
+"Hello -- Nell!  do I have to -- get up?" she asked,
+sleepily.
+
+"Can you?" queried Helen.
+
+"Can I what?" Bo was now thoroughly awake and lay there
+staring at her sister.
+
+"Why -- get up."
+
+"I'd like to know why not," retorted Bo, as she made the
+effort.  She got one arm and shoulder up, only to flop back
+like a crippled thing.  And she uttered the most piteous
+little moan.  "I'm dead!  I know -- I am!"
+
+"Well, if you're going to be a Western girl you'd better
+have spunk enough to move."
+
+"A-huh!" ejaculated Bo.  Then she rolled over, not without
+groans, and, once upon her face, she raised herself on her
+hands and turned to a sitting posture.  "Where's everybody?  .
+. .  Oh, Nell, it's perfectly lovely here.  Paradise!"
+
+Helen looked around.  A fire was smoldering.  No one was in
+sight.  Wonderful distant colors seemed to strike her glance
+as she tried to fix it upon near-by objects.  A beautiful
+little green tent or shack had been erected out of spruce
+boughs.  It had a slanting roof that sloped all the way from
+a ridge-pole to the ground; half of the opening in front was
+closed, as were the sides.  The spruce boughs appeared all to
+be laid in the same direction, giving it a smooth, compact
+appearance, actually as if it had grown there.
+
+"That lean-to wasn't there last night?" inquired Bo.
+
+"I didn't see it.  Lean-to?  Where'd you get that name?"
+
+"It's Western, my dear.  I'll bet they put it up for us. . .
+.  Sure, I see our bags inside.  Let's get up.  It must be
+late."
+
+The girls had considerable fun as well as pain in getting up
+and keeping each other erect until their limbs would hold
+them firmly.  They were delighted with the spruce lean-to.  It
+faced the open and stood just under the wide-spreading shelf
+of rock.  The tiny outlet from the spring flowed beside it
+and spilled its clear water over a stone, to fall into a
+little pool.  The floor of this woodland habitation consisted
+of tips of spruce boughs to about a foot in depth, all laid
+one way, smooth and springy, and so sweetly odorous that the
+air seemed intoxicating.  Helen and Bo opened their baggage,
+and what with use of the cold water, brush and comb, and
+clean blouses, they made themselves feel as comfortable as
+possible, considering the excruciating aches.  Then they went
+out to the campfire.
+
+Helen's eye was attracted by moving objects near at hand.
+Then simultaneously with Bo's cry of delight Helen saw a
+beautiful doe approaching under the trees.  Dale walked
+beside it.
+
+"You sure had a long sleep," was the hunter's greeting.  "I
+reckon you both look better."
+
+"Good morning.  Or is it afternoon?  We're just able to move
+about," said Helen.
+
+"I could ride," declared Bo, stoutly.  "Oh, Nell, look at the
+deer!  It's coming to me."
+
+The doe had hung back a little as Dale reached the
+camp-fire.  It was a gray, slender creature, smooth as silk,
+with great dark eyes.  It stood a moment, long ears erect,
+and then with a graceful little trot came up to Bo and
+reached a slim nose for her outstretched hand.  All about it,
+except the beautiful soft eyes, seemed wild, and yet it was
+as tame as a kitten.  Then, suddenly, as Bo fondled the long
+ears, it gave a start and, breaking away, ran back out of
+sight under the pines.
+
+"What frightened it?" asked Bo.
+
+Dale pointed up at the wall under the shelving roof of rock.
+There, twenty feet from the ground, curled up on a ledge,
+lay a huge tawny animal with a face like that of a cat.
+
+"She's afraid of Tom," replied Dale.  "Recognizes him as a
+hereditary foe, I guess.  I can't make friends of them."
+
+"Oh!  So that's Tom -- the pet lion!" exclaimed Bo.  "Ugh!  No
+wonder that deer ran off!"
+
+"How long has he been up there?" queried Helen, gazing
+fascinated at Dale's famous pet.
+
+"I couldn't say.  Tom comes an' goes," replied Dale.  "But I
+sent him up there last night."
+
+"And he was there -- perfectly free -- right over us --
+while we slept!" burst out Bo.
+
+"Yes.  An' I reckon you slept the safer for that."
+
+"Of all things!  Nell, isn't he a monster?  But he doesn't
+look like a lion -- an African lion.  He's a panther.  I saw
+his like at the circus once."
+
+"He's a cougar," said Dale.  "The panther is long and slim.
+Tom is not only long, but thick an' round.  I've had him four
+years.  An' he was a kitten no bigger 'n my fist when I got
+him."
+
+"Is he perfectly tame -- safe?" asked Helen, anxiously.
+
+"I've never told anybody that Tom was safe, but he is,"
+replied Dale.  "You can absolutely believe it.  A wild cougar
+wouldn't attack a man unless cornered or starved.  An' Tom is
+like a big kitten."
+
+The beast raised his great catlike face, with its sleepy,
+half-shut eyes, and looked down upon them.
+
+"Shall I call him down?" inquired Dale.
+
+For once Bo did not find her voice.
+
+"Let us -- get a little more used to him -- at a distance,"
+replied Helen, with a little laugh.
+
+"If he comes to you, just rub his head an' you'll see how
+tame he is," said Dale.  "Reckon you're both hungry?"
+
+"Not so very," returned Helen, aware of his penetrating gray
+gaze upon her.
+
+"Well, I am," vouchsafed Bo.
+
+"Soon as the turkey's done we'll eat.  My camp is round
+between the rocks.  I'll call you."
+
+Not until his broad back was turned did Helen notice that
+the hunter looked different.  Then she saw he wore a lighter,
+cleaner suit of buckskin, with no coat, and instead of the
+high-heeled horseman's boots he wore moccasins and leggings.
+The change made him appear more lithe.
+
+"Nell, I don't know what you think, but _I_ call him
+handsome," declared Bo.
+
+Helen had no idea what she thought.
+
+"Let's try to walk some," she suggested.
+
+So they essayed that painful task and got as far as a pine
+log some few rods from their camp.  This point was close to
+the edge of the park, from which there was an unobstructed
+view.
+
+"My!  What a place!" exclaimed Bo, with eyes wide and round.
+
+"Oh, beautiful!" breathed Helen.
+
+An unexpected blaze of color drew her gaze first.  Out of the
+black spruce slopes shone patches of aspens, gloriously red
+and gold, and low down along the edge of timber troops of
+aspens ran out into the park, not yet so blazing as those
+above, but purple and yellow and white in the sunshine.
+Masses of silver spruce, like trees in moonlight, bordered
+the park, sending out here and there an isolated tree, sharp
+as a spear, with under-branches close to the ground.  Long
+golden-green grass, resembling half-ripe wheat, covered the
+entire floor of the park, gently waving to the wind.  Above
+sheered the black, gold-patched slopes, steep and
+unscalable, rising to buttresses of dark, iron-hued rock.
+And to the east circled the rows of cliff-bench, gray and
+old and fringed, splitting at the top in the notch where the
+lacy, slumberous waterfall, like white smoke, fell and
+vanished, to reappear in wider sheet of lace, only to fall
+and vanish again in the green depths.
+
+It was a verdant valley, deep-set in the mountain walls,
+wild and sad and lonesome.  The waterfall dominated the
+spirit of the place, dreamy and sleepy and tranquil; it
+murmured sweetly on one breath of wind, and lulled with
+another, and sometimes died out altogether, only to come
+again in soft, strange roar.
+
+"Paradise Park!" whispered Bo to herself.
+
+A call from Dale disturbed their raptures.  Turning, they
+hobbled with eager but painful steps in the direction of a
+larger camp-fire, situated to the right of the great rock
+that sheltered their lean-to.  No hut or house showed there
+and none was needed.  Hiding-places and homes for a hundred
+hunters were there in the sections of caverned cliffs, split
+off in bygone ages from the mountain wall above.  A few
+stately pines stood out from the rocks, and a clump of
+silver spruce ran down to a brown brook.  This camp was only
+a step from the lean-to, round the corner of a huge rock,
+yet it had been out of sight.  Here indeed was evidence of a
+hunter's home -- pelts and skins and antlers, a neat pile of
+split fire-wood, a long ledge of rock, well sheltered, and
+loaded with bags like a huge pantry-shelf, packs and ropes
+and saddles, tools and weapons, and a platform of dry brush
+as shelter for a fire around which hung on poles a various
+assortment of utensils for camp.
+
+"Hyar -- you git!" shouted Dale, and he threw a stick at
+something.  A bear cub scampered away in haste.  He was small
+and woolly and brown, and he grunted as he ran.  Soon he
+halted.
+
+"That's Bud," said Dale, as the girls came up.  "Guess he
+near starved in my absence.  An' now he wants everythin',
+especially the sugar.  We don't have sugar often up here."
+
+"Isn't he dear?  Oh, I love him!" cried Bo.  "Come back, Bud.
+Come, Buddie."
+
+The cub, however, kept his distance, watching Dale with
+bright little eyes.
+
+"Where's Mr.  Roy?" asked Helen.
+
+"Roy's gone.  He was sorry not to say good-by.  But it's
+important he gets down in the pines on Anson's trail.  He'll
+hang to Anson, an' in case they get near Pine he'll ride in
+to see where your uncle is."
+
+"What do you expect?" questioned Helen, gravely.
+
+"'Most anythin'," he replied.  "Al, I reckon, knows now.
+Maybe he's rustlin' into the mountains by this time.  If he
+meets up with Anson, well an' good, for Roy won't be far
+off.  An' sure if he runs across Roy, why they'll soon be
+here.  But if I were you I wouldn't count on seein' your
+uncle very soon.  I'm sorry.  I've done my best.  It sure is a
+bad deal."
+
+"Don't think me ungracious," replied Helen, hastily.  How
+plainly he had intimated that it must be privation and
+annoyance for her to be compelled to accept his hospitality!
+"You are good -- kind.  I owe you much.  I'll be eternally
+grateful."
+
+Dale straightened as he looked at her.  His glance was
+intent, piercing.  He seemed to be receiving a strange or
+unusual portent.  No need for him to say he had never before
+been spoken to like that!
+
+"You may have to stay here with me -- for weeks -- maybe
+months -- if we've the bad luck to get snowed in," he said,
+slowly, as if startled at this deduction.  "You're safe here.
+No sheep-thief could ever find this camp.  I'll take risks to
+get you safe into Al's hands.  But I'm goin' to be pretty
+sure about what I'm doin'. . . .  So -- there's plenty to eat
+an' it's a pretty place."
+
+"Pretty!  Why, it's grand!" exclaimed Bo.  "I've called it
+Paradise Park."
+
+"Paradise Park," he repeated, weighing the words.  "You've
+named it an' also the creek.  Paradise Creek!  I've been here
+twelve years with no fit name for my home till you said
+that."
+
+"Oh, that pleases me!" returned Bo, with shining eyes.
+
+"Eat now," said Dale.  "An' I reckon you'll like that
+turkey."
+
+There was a clean tarpaulin upon which were spread steaming,
+fragrant pans -- roast turkey, hot biscuits and gravy,
+mashed potatoes as white as if prepared at home, stewed
+dried apples, and butter and coffee.  This bounteous repast
+surprised and delighted the girls; when they had once tasted
+the roast wild turkey, then Milt Dale had occasion to blush
+at their encomiums.
+
+"I hope -- Uncle Al -- doesn't come for a month," declared
+Bo, as she tried to get her breath.  There was a brown spot
+on her nose and one on each cheek, suspiciously close to her
+mouth.
+
+Dale laughed.  It was pleasant to hear him, for his laugh
+seemed unused and deep, as if it came from tranquil depths.
+
+"Won't you eat with us?" asked Helen.
+
+"Reckon I will," he said.  "it'll save time, an' hot grub
+tastes better."
+
+Quite an interval of silence ensued, which presently was
+broken by Dale.
+
+"Here comes Tom."
+
+Helen observed with a thrill that the cougar was
+magnificent, seen erect on all-fours, approaching with slow,
+sinuous grace.  His color was tawny, with spots of whitish
+gray.  He had bow-legs, big and round and furry, and a huge
+head with great tawny eyes.  No matter how tame he was said
+to be, he looked wild.  Like a dog he walked right up, and it
+so happened that he was directly behind Bo, within reach of
+her when she turned.
+
+"Oh, Lord!" cried Bo, and up went both of her hands, in one
+of which was a huge piece of turkey.  Tom took it, not
+viciously, but nevertheless with a snap that made Helen
+jump.  As if by magic the turkey vanished.  And Tom took a
+closer step toward Bo.  Her expression of fright changed to
+consternation.
+
+"He stole my turkey!"
+
+"Tom, come here," ordered Dale, sharply.  The cougar glided
+round rather sheepishly.  "Now lie down an' behave."
+
+Tom crouched on all-fours, his head resting on his paws,
+with his beautiful tawny eyes, light and piercing, fixed
+upon the hunter.
+
+"Don't grab," said Dale, holding out a piece of turkey.
+Whereupon Tom took it less voraciously.
+
+As it happened, the little bear cub saw this transaction,
+and he plainly indicated his opinion of the preference shown
+to Tom.
+
+"Oh, the dear!" exclaimed Bo.  "He means it's not fair. . . .
+Come, Bud -- come on."
+
+But Bud would not approach the group until called by Dale.
+Then he scrambled to them with every manifestation of
+delight.  Bo almost forgot her own needs in feeding him and
+getting acquainted with him.  Tom plainly showed his jealousy
+of Bud, and Bud likewise showed his fear of the great cat.
+
+Helen could not believe the evidence of her eyes -- that she
+was in the woods calmly and hungrily partaking of sweet,
+wild-flavored meat -- that a full-grown mountain lion lay on
+one side of her and a baby brown bear sat on the other --
+that a strange hunter, a man of the forest, there in his
+lonely and isolated fastness, appealed to the romance in her
+and interested her as no one else she had ever met.
+
+When the wonderful meal was at last finished Bo enticed the
+bear cub around to the camp of the girls, and there soon
+became great comrades with him.  Helen, watching Bo play, was
+inclined to envy her.  No matter where Bo was placed, she
+always got something out of it.  She adapted herself.  She,
+who could have a good time with almost any one or anything,
+would find the hours sweet and fleeting in this beautiful
+park of wild wonders.
+
+But merely objective actions -- merely physical movements,
+had never yet contented Helen.  She could run and climb and
+ride and play with hearty and healthy abandon, but those
+things would not suffice long for her, and her mind needed
+food.  Helen was a thinker.  One reason she had desired to
+make her home in the West was that by taking up a life of
+the open, of action, she might think and dream and brood
+less.  And here she was in the wild West, after the three
+most strenuously active days of her career, and still the
+same old giant revolved her mind and turned it upon herself
+and upon all she saw.
+
+"What can I do?" she asked Bo, almost helplessly.
+
+"Why, rest, you silly!" retorted Bo.  "You walk like an old,
+crippled woman with only one leg."
+
+Helen hoped the comparison was undeserved, but the advice
+was sound.  The blankets spread out on the grass looked
+inviting and they felt comfortably warm in the sunshine.  The
+breeze was slow, languorous, fragrant, and it brought the
+low hum of the murmuring waterfall, like a melody of bees.
+Helen made a pillow and lay down to rest.  The green
+pine-needles, so thin and fine in their crisscross network,
+showed clearly against the blue sky.  She looked in vain for
+birds.  Then her gaze went.  wonderingly to the lofty fringed
+rim of the great amphitheater, and as she studied it she
+began to grasp its remoteness, how far away it was in the
+rarefied atmosphere.  A black eagle, sweeping along, looked
+of tiny size, and yet he was far under the heights above.
+How pleasant she fancied it to be up there!  And drowsy fancy
+lulled her to sleep.
+
+Helen slept all afternoon, and upon awakening, toward
+sunset, found Bo curled beside her.  Dale had thoughtfully
+covered them with a blanket; also he had built a camp-fire.
+The air was growing keen and cold.
+
+Later, when they had put their coats on and made comfortable
+seats beside the fire, Dale came over, apparently to visit
+them.
+
+"I reckon you can't sleep all the time," he said.  "An' bein'
+city girls, you'll get lonesome."
+
+"Lonesome!" echoed Helen.  The idea of her being lonesome
+here had not occurred to her.
+
+"I've thought that all out," went on Dale, as he sat down,
+Indian fashion, before the blaze.  "It's natural you'd find
+time drag up here, bein' used to lots of people an'
+goin's-on, an' work, an' all girls like."
+
+"I'd never be lonesome here," replied Helen, with her direct
+force.
+
+Dale did not betray surprise, but he showed that his mistake
+was something to ponder over.
+
+"Excuse me," he said, presently, as his gray eyes held hers.
+"That's how I had it.  As I remember girls -- an' it doesn't
+seem long since I left home -- most of them would die of
+lonesomeness up here." Then he addressed himself to Bo.  "How
+about you?  You see, I figured you'd be the one that liked
+it, an' your sister the one who wouldn't."
+
+"I won't get lonesome very soon," replied Bo.
+
+"I'm glad.  It worried me some -- not ever havin' girls as
+company before.  An' in a day or so, when you're rested, I'll
+help you pass the time."
+
+Bo's eyes were full of flashing interest, and Helen asked
+him, "How?"
+
+It was a sincere expression of her curiosity and not
+doubtful or ironic challenge of an educated woman to a man
+of the forest.  But as a challenge he took it.
+
+"How!" he repeated, and a strange smile flitted across his
+face.  "Why, by givin' you rides an' climbs to beautiful
+places.  An' then, if you're interested,' to show you how
+little so-called civilized people know of nature."
+
+Helen realized then that whatever his calling, hunter or
+wanderer or hermit, he was not uneducated, even if he
+appeared illiterate.
+
+"I'll be happy to learn from you," she said.
+
+"Me, too!" chimed in Bo.  "You can't tell too much to any one
+from Missouri."
+
+He smiled, and that warmed Helen to him, for then he seemed
+less removed from other people.  About this hunter there
+began to be something of the very nature of which he spoke
+-- a stillness, aloofness, an unbreakable tranquillity, a
+cold, clear spirit like that in the mountain air, a physical
+something not unlike the tamed wildness of his pets or the
+strength of the pines.
+
+"I'll bet I can tell you more 'n you'll ever remember," he
+said.
+
+"What 'll you bet?" retorted Bo.
+
+"Well, more roast turkey against -- say somethin' nice when
+you're safe an' home to your uncle Al's, runnin' his ranch."
+
+"Agreed.  Nell, you hear?"
+
+Helen nodded her head.
+
+"All right.  We'll leave it to Nell," began Dale, half
+seriously.  "Now I'll tell you, first, for the fun of passin'
+time we'll ride an' race my horses out in the park.  An'
+we'll fish in the brooks an' hunt in the woods.  There's an
+old silvertip around that you can see me kill.  An' we'll
+climb to the peaks an' see wonderful sights. . . .  So much
+for that.  Now, if you really want to learn -- or if you only
+want me to tell you -- well, that's no matter.  Only I'll win
+the bet!  . . .  You'll see how this park lies in the crater
+of a volcano an' was once full of water -- an' how the snow
+blows in on one side in winter, a hundred feet deep, when
+there's none on the other.  An' the trees -- how they grow
+an' live an' fight one another an' depend on one another,
+an' protect the forest from storm-winds.  An' how they hold
+the water that is the fountains of the great rivers.  An' how
+the creatures an' things that live in them or on them are
+good for them, an' neither could live without the other.  An'
+then I'll show you my pets tame an' untamed, an' tell you
+how it's man that makes any creature wild -- how easy they
+are to tame -- an' how they learn to love you.  An' there's
+the life of the forest, the strife of it -- how the bear
+lives, an' the cats, an' the wolves, an' the deer.  You'll
+see how cruel nature is how savage an' wild the wolf or
+cougar tears down the deer -- how a wolf loves fresh, hot
+blood, an' how a cougar unrolls the skin of a deer back from
+his neck.  An' you'll see that this cruelty of nature -- this
+work of the wolf an' cougar -- is what makes the deer so
+beautiful an' healthy an' swift an' sensitive.  Without his
+deadly foes the deer would deteriorate an' die out.  An'
+you'll see how this principle works out among all creatures
+of the forest.  Strife!  It's the meanin' of all creation, an'
+the salvation.  If you're quick to see, you'll learn that the
+nature here in the wilds is the same as that of men -- only
+men are no longer cannibals.  Trees fight to live -- birds
+fight -- animals fight -- men fight.  They all live off one
+another.  An' it's this fightin' that brings them all closer
+an' closer to bein' perfect.  But nothin' will ever be
+perfect."
+
+"But how about religion?" interrupted Helen, earnestly.
+
+"Nature has a religion, an' it's to live -- to grow -- to
+reproduce, each of its kind."
+
+"But that is not God or the immortality of the soul,"
+declared Helen.
+
+"Well, it's as close to God an' immortality as nature ever
+gets."
+
+"Oh, you would rob me of my religion!"
+
+"No, I just talk as I see life," replied Dale, reflectively,
+as he poked a stick into the red embers of the fire.  "Maybe
+I have a religion.  I don't know.  But it's not the kind you
+have -- not the Bible kind.  That kind doesn't keep the men
+in Pine an' Snowdrop an' all over -- sheepmen an' ranchers
+an' farmers an' travelers, such as I've known -- the
+religion they profess doesn't keep them from lyin',
+cheatin', stealin', an' killin'.  I reckon no man who lives
+as I do -- which perhaps is my religion -- will lie or cheat
+or steal or kill, unless it's to kill in self-defense or
+like I'd do if Snake Anson would ride up here now.  My
+religion, maybe, is love of life -- wild life as it was in
+the beginnin' -- an' the wind that blows secrets from
+everywhere, an' the water that sings all day an' night, an'
+the stars that shine constant, an' the trees that speak
+somehow, an' the rocks that aren't dead.  I'm never alone
+here or on the trails.  There's somethin' unseen, but always
+with me.  An' that's It!  Call it God if you like.  But what
+stalls me is -- where was that Spirit when this earth was a
+ball of fiery gas?  Where will that Spirit be when all life
+is frozen out or burned out on this globe an' it hangs dead
+in space like the moon?  That time will come.  There's no
+waste in nature.  Not the littlest atom is destroyed.  It
+changes, that's all, as you see this pine wood go up in
+smoke an' feel somethin' that's heat come out of it.  Where
+does that go?  It's not lost.  Nothin' is lost.  So, the
+beautiful an' savin' thought is, maybe all rock an' wood,
+water an' blood an' flesh, are resolved back into the
+elements, to come to life somewhere again sometime."
+
+"Oh, what you say is wonderful, but it's terrible!"
+exclaimed Helen.  He had struck deep into her soul.
+
+"Terrible?  I reckon," he replied, sadly.
+
+Then ensued a little interval of silence.
+
+"Milt Dale, I lose the bet," declared Bo, with earnestness
+behind her frivolity.
+
+"I'd forgotten that.  Reckon I talked a lot," he said,
+apologetically.  "You see, I don't get much chance to talk,
+except to myself or Tom.  Years ago, when I found the habit
+of silence settlin' down on me, I took to thinkin' out loud
+an' talkin' to anythin'."
+
+"I could listen to you all night," returned Bo, dreamily.
+
+"Do you read -- do you have books?" inquired Helen,
+suddenly.
+
+"Yes, I read tolerable well; a good deal better than I talk
+or write," he replied.  "I went to school till I was fifteen.
+Always hated study, but liked to read.  Years ago an old
+friend of mine down here at Pine -- Widow Cass -- she gave
+me a lot of old books.  An' I packed them up here.  Winter's
+the time I read."
+
+Conversation lagged after that, except for desultory
+remarks, and presently Dale bade the girls good night and
+left them.  Helen watched his tall form vanish in the gloom
+under the pines, and after he had disappeared she still
+stared.
+
+"Nell!" called Bo, shrilly.  "I've called you three times.  I
+want to go to bed."
+
+"Oh!  I -- I was thinking," rejoined Helen, half embarrassed,
+half wondering at herself.  "I didn't hear you."
+
+"I should smile you didn't," retorted Bo.  "Wish you could
+just have seen your eyes.  Nell, do you want me to tell you
+something?
+
+"Why -- yes," said Helen, rather feebly.  She did not at all,
+when Bo talked like that.
+
+"You're going to fall in love with that wild hunter,"
+declared Bo in a voice that rang like a bell.
+
+Helen was not only amazed, but enraged.  She caught her
+breath preparatory to giving this incorrigible sister a
+piece of her mind.  Bo went calmly on.
+
+"I can feel it in my bones."
+
+"Bo, you're a little fool -- a sentimental, romancing, gushy
+little fool!" retorted Helen.  "All you seem to hold in your
+head is some rot about love.  To hear you talk one would
+think there's nothing else in the world but love."
+
+Bo's eyes were bright, shrewd, affectionate, and laughing as
+she bent their steady gaze upon Helen.
+
+"Nell, that's just it.  There IS nothing else!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+The night of sleep was so short that it was difficult for
+Helen to believe that hours had passed.  Bo appeared livelier
+this morning, with less complaint of aches.
+
+"Nell, you've got color!" exclaimed Bo.  "And your eyes are
+bright.  Isn't the morning perfectly lovely?  . . .  Couldn't
+you get drunk on that air?  I smell flowers.  And oh!  I'm
+hungry!"
+
+"Bo, our host will soon have need of his hunting abilities
+if your appetite holds," said Helen, as she tried to keep
+her hair out of her eyes while she laced her boots.
+
+"Look!  there's a big dog -- a hound."
+
+Helen looked as Bo directed, and saw a hound of unusually
+large proportions, black and tan in color, with long,
+drooping ears.  Curiously he trotted nearer to the door of
+their hut and then stopped to gaze at them.  His head was
+noble, his eyes shone dark and sad.  He seemed neither
+friendly nor unfriendly.
+
+"Hello, doggie!  Come right in -- we won't hurt you," called
+Bo, but without enthusiasm.
+
+This made Helen laugh.  "Bo, you're simply delicious," she
+said.  "You're afraid of that dog."
+
+"Sure.  Wonder if he's Dale's.  Of course he must be."
+
+Presently the hound trotted away out of sight.  When the
+girls presented themselves at the camp-fire they espied
+their curious canine visitor lying down.  His ears were so
+long that half of them lay on the ground.
+
+"I sent Pedro over to wake you girls up," said Dale, after
+greeting them.  "Did he scare you?"
+
+"Pedro.  So that's his name.  No, he didn't exactly scare me.
+He did Nell, though.  She's an awful tenderfoot," replied Bo.
+
+"He's a splendid-looking dog," said Helen, ignoring her
+sister's sally.  "I love dogs.  Will he make friends?"
+
+"He's shy an' wild.  You see, when I leave camp he won't hang
+around.  He an' Tom are jealous of each other.  I had a pack
+of hounds an' lost all but Pedro on account of Tom.  I think
+you can make friends with Pedro.  Try it."
+
+Whereupon Helen made overtures to Pedro, and not wholly in
+vain.  The dog was matured, of almost stern aloofness, and
+manifestly not used to people.  His deep, wine-dark eyes
+seemed to search Helen's soul.  They were honest and wise,
+with a strange sadness.
+
+"He looks intelligent," observed Helen, as she smoothed the
+long, dark ears.
+
+"That hound is nigh human," responded Dale.  "Come, an' while
+you eat I'll tell you about Pedro."
+
+Dale had gotten the hound as a pup from a Mexican
+sheep-herder who claimed he was part California bloodhound.
+He grew up, becoming attached to Dale.  In his younger days
+he did not get along well with Dale's other pets and Dale
+gave him to a rancher down in the valley.  Pedro was back in
+Dale's camp next day.  From that day Dale began to care more
+for the hound, but he did not want to keep him, for various
+reasons, chief of which was the fact that Pedro was too fine
+a dog to be left alone half the time to shift for himself.
+That fall Dale had need to go to the farthest village,
+Snowdrop, where he left Pedro with a friend.  Then Dale rode
+to Show Down and Pine, and the camp of the Beemans' and with
+them he trailed some wild horses for a hundred miles, over
+into New Mexico.  The snow was flying when Dale got back to
+his camp in the mountains.  And there was Pedro, gaunt and
+worn, overjoyed to welcome him home.  Roy Beeman visited Dale
+that October and told that Dale's friend in Snowdrop had not
+been able to keep Pedro.  He broke a chain and scaled a
+ten-foot fence to escape.  He trailed Dale to Show Down,
+where one of Dale's friends, recognizing the hound, caught
+him, and meant to keep him until Dale's return.  But Pedro
+refused to eat.  It happened that a freighter was going out
+to the Beeman camp, and Dale's friend boxed Pedro up and put
+him on the wagon.  Pedro broke out of the box, returned to
+Show Down, took up Dale's trail to Pine, and then on to the
+Beeman camp.  That was as far as Roy could trace the
+movements of the hound.  But he believed, and so did Dale,
+that Pedro had trailed them out on the wild-horse hunt.  The
+following spring Dale learned more from the herder of a
+sheepman at whose camp he and the Beemans; had rested on the
+way into New Mexico.  It appeared that after Dale had left
+this camp Pedro had arrived, and another Mexican herder had
+stolen the hound.  But Pedro got away.
+
+"An' he was here when I arrived," concluded Dale, smiling.
+"I never wanted to get rid of him after that.  He's turned
+out to be the finest dog I ever knew.  He knows what I say.
+He can almost talk.  An' I swear he can cry.  He does whenever
+I start off without him."
+
+"How perfectly wonderful!" exclaimed Bo.  "Aren't animals
+great?  . . .  But I love horses best."
+
+It seemed to Helen that Pedro understood they were talking
+about him, for he looked ashamed, and swallowed hard, and
+dropped his gaze.  She knew something of the truth about the
+love of dogs for their owners.  This story of Dale's,
+however, was stranger than any she had ever heard.
+
+Tom, the cougar, put in an appearance then, and there was
+scarcely love in the tawny eyes he bent upon Pedro.  But the
+hound did not deign to notice him.  Tom sidled up to Bo, who
+sat on the farther side of the tarpaulin table-cloth, and
+manifestly wanted part of her breakfast.
+
+"Gee!  I love the look of him," she said.  "But when he's
+close he makes my flesh creep."
+
+"Beasts are as queer as people," observed Dale.  "They take
+likes an' dislikes.  I believe Tom has taken a shine to you
+an' Pedro begins to be interested in your sister.  I can
+tell."
+
+"Where's Bud?" inquired Bo.
+
+"He's asleep or around somewhere.  Now, soon as I get the
+work done, what would you girls like to do?"
+
+"Ride!" declared Bo, eagerly.
+
+"Aren't you sore an' stiff?"
+
+"I am that.  But I don't care.  Besides, when I used to go out
+to my uncle's farm near Saint Joe I always found riding to
+be a cure for aches."
+
+"Sure is, if you can stand it.  An' what will your sister
+like to do?" returned Dale, turning to Helen.
+
+"Oh, I'll rest, and watch you folks -- and dream," replied
+Helen.
+
+"But after you've rested you must be active," said Dale,
+seriously.  "You must do things.  It doesn't matter what, just
+as long as you don't sit idle."
+
+"Why?" queried Helen, in surprise.  "Why not be idle here in
+this beautiful, wild place?  just to dream away the hours --
+the days!  I could do it."
+
+"But you mustn't.  It took me years to learn how bad that was
+for me.  An' right now I would love nothin' more than to
+forget my work, my horses an' pets -- everythin', an' just
+lay around, seein' an' feelin'."
+
+"Seeing and feeling?  Yes, that must be what I mean.  But why
+-- what is it?  There are the beauty and color -- the wild,
+shaggy slopes -- the gray cliffs -- the singing wind -- the
+lulling water -- the clouds -- the sky.  And the silence,
+loneliness, sweetness of it all."
+
+"It's a driftin' back.  What I love to do an' yet fear most.
+It's what makes a lone hunter of a man.  An' it can grow so
+strong that it binds a man to the wilds."
+
+"How strange!" murmured Helen.  "But that could never bind
+ME.  Why, I must live and fulfil my mission, my work in the
+civilized world."
+
+It seemed to Helen that Dale almost imperceptibly shrank at
+her earnest words.
+
+"The ways of Nature are strange," he said.  "I look at it
+different.  Nature's just as keen to wean you back to a
+savage state as you are to be civilized.  An' if Nature won,
+you would carry out her design all the better."
+
+This hunter's talk shocked Helen and yet stimulated her
+mind.
+
+"Me -- a savage?  Oh no!" she exclaimed.  "But, if that were
+possible, what would Nature's design be?"
+
+"You spoke of your mission in life," he replied.  "A woman's
+mission is to have children.  The female of any species has
+only one mission -- to reproduce its kind.  An' Nature has
+only one mission -- toward greater strength, virility,
+efficiency -- absolute perfection, which is unattainable."
+
+"What of mental and spiritual development of man and woman?"
+asked Helen.
+
+"Both are direct obstacles to the design of Nature.  Nature
+is physical.  To create for limitless endurance for eternal
+life.  That must be Nature's inscrutable design.  An' why she
+must fail."
+
+"But the soul!" whispered Helen.
+
+"Ah!  When you speak of the soul an' I speak of life we mean
+the same.  You an' I will have some talks while you're here.
+I must brush up my thoughts."
+
+"So must I, it seems," said Helen, with a slow smile.  She
+had been rendered grave and thoughtful.  "But I guess I'll
+risk dreaming under the pines."
+
+Bo had been watching them with her keen blue eyes.
+
+"Nell, it'd take a thousand years to make a savage of you,"
+she said.  "But a week will do for me."
+
+"Bo, you were one before you left Saint Joe," replied Helen.
+"Don't you remember that school-teacher Barnes who said you
+were a wildcat and an Indian mixed?  He spanked you with a
+ruler."
+
+"Never!  He missed me," retorted Bo, with red in her cheeks.
+"Nell, I wish you'd not tell things about me when I was a
+kid."
+
+"That was only two years ago," expostulated Helen, in mild
+surprise.
+
+"Suppose it was.  I was a kid all right.  I'll bet you -" Bo
+broke up abruptly, and, tossing her head, she gave Tom a pat
+and then ran away around the corner of cliff wall.
+
+Helen followed leisurely.
+
+"Say, Nell," said Bo, when Helen arrived at their little
+green ledge-pole hut, "do you know that hunter fellow will
+upset some of your theories?"
+
+"Maybe.  I'll admit he amazes me -- and affronts me, too, I'm
+afraid," replied Helen.  "What surprises me is that in spite
+of his evident lack of schooling he's not raw or crude.  He's
+elemental."
+
+"Sister dear, wake up.  The man's wonderful.  You can learn
+more from him than you ever learned in your life.  So can I.
+I always hated books, anyway."
+
+When, a little later, Dale approached carrying some bridles,
+the hound Pedro trotted at his heels.
+
+"I reckon you'd better ride the horse you had," he said to
+Bo.
+
+"Whatever you say.  But I hope you let me ride them all, by
+and by."
+
+"Sure.  I've a mustang out there you'll like.  But he pitches
+a little," he rejoined, and turned away toward the park.  The
+hound looked after him and then at Helen.
+
+"Come, Pedro.  Stay with me," called Helen.
+
+Dale, hearing her, motioned the hound back.  Obediently Pedro
+trotted to her, still shy and soberly watchful, as if not
+sure of her intentions, but with something of friendliness
+about him now.  Helen found a soft, restful seat in the sun
+facing the park, and there composed herself for what she
+felt would be slow, sweet, idle hours.  Pedro curled down
+beside her.  The tall form of Dale stalked across the park,
+out toward the straggling horses.  Again she saw a deer
+grazing among them.  How erect and motionless it stood
+watching Dale!  Presently it bounded away toward the edge of
+the forest.  Some of the horses whistled and ran, kicking
+heels high in the air.  The shrill whistles rang clear in the
+stillness.
+
+"Gee!  Look at them go!" exclaimed Bo, gleefully, coming up
+to where Helen sat.  Bo threw herself down upon the fragrant
+pine-needles and stretched herself languorously, like a lazy
+kitten.  There was something feline in her lithe, graceful
+outline.  She lay flat and looked up through the pines.
+
+"Wouldn't it be great, now," she murmured, dreamily, half to
+herself, "if that Las Vegas cowboy would happen somehow to
+come, and then an earthquake would shut us up here in this
+Paradise valley so we'd never get out?"
+
+"Bo!  What would mother say to such talk as that?" gasped
+Helen.
+
+"But, Nell, wouldn't it be great?"
+
+"It would be terrible."
+
+"Oh, there never was any romance in you, Nell Rayner,"
+replied Bo.  "That very thing has actually happened out here
+in this wonderful country of wild places.  You need not tell
+me!  Sure it's happened.  With the cliff-dwellers and the
+Indians and then white people.  Every place I look makes me
+feel that.  Nell, you'd have to see people in the moon
+through a telescope before you'd believe that."
+
+"I'm practical and sensible, thank goodness!"
+
+"But, for the sake of argument," protested Bo, with flashing
+eyes, "suppose it MIGHT happen.  Just to please me, suppose
+we DID get shut up here with Dale and that cowboy we saw
+from the train.  Shut in without any hope of ever climbing
+out. . . .  What would you do?  Would you give up and pine
+away and die?  Or would you fight for life and whatever joy
+it might mean?"
+
+"Self-preservation is the first instinct," replied Helen,
+surprised at a strange, deep thrill in the depths of her.
+"I'd fight for life, of course."
+
+"Yes.  Well, really, when I think seriously I don't want
+anything like that to happen.  But, just the same, if it DID
+happen I would glory in it."
+
+While they were talking Dale returned with the horses.
+
+"Can you bridle an' saddle your own horse?" he asked.
+
+"No.  I'm ashamed to say I can't," replied Bo.
+
+"Time to learn then.  Come on.  Watch me first when I saddle
+mine."
+
+Bo was all eyes while Dale slipped off the bridle from his
+horse and then with slow, plain action readjusted it.  Next
+he smoothed the back of the horse, shook out the blanket,
+and, folding it half over, he threw it in place, being
+careful to explain to Bo just the right position.  He lifted
+his saddle in a certain way and put that in place, and then
+he tightened the cinches.
+
+"Now you try," he said.
+
+According to Helen's judgment Bo might have been a Western
+girl all her days.  But Dale shook his head and made her do
+it over.
+
+"That was better.  Of course, the saddle is too heavy for you
+to sling it up.  You can learn that with a light one.  Now put
+the bridle on again.  Don't be afraid of your hands.  He won't
+bite.  Slip the bit in sideways. . . .  There.  Now let's see
+you mount."
+
+When Bo got into the saddle Dale continued: "You went up
+quick an' light, but the wrong way.  Watch me."
+
+Bo had to mount several times before Dale was satisfied.
+Then he told her to ride off a little distance.  When Bo had
+gotten out of earshot Dale said to Helen: "She'll take to a
+horse like a duck takes to water." Then, mounting, he rode
+out after her.
+
+Helen watched them trotting and galloping and running the
+horses round the grassy park, and rather regretted she had
+not gone with them.  Eventually Bo rode back, to dismount and
+fling herself down, red-cheeked and radiant, with disheveled
+hair, and curls damp on her temples.  How alive she seemed!
+Helen's senses thrilled with the grace and charm and
+vitality of this surprising sister, and she was aware of a
+sheer physical joy in her presence.  Bo rested, but she did
+not rest long.  She was soon off to play with Bud.  Then she
+coaxed the tame doe to eat out of her hand.  She dragged
+Helen off for wild flowers, curious and thoughtless by
+turns.  And at length she fell asleep, quickly, in a way that
+reminded Helen of the childhood now gone forever.
+
+Dale called them to dinner about four o'clock, as the sun
+was reddening the western rampart of the park.  Helen
+wondered where the day had gone.  The hours had flown
+swiftly, serenely, bringing her scarcely a thought of her
+uncle or dread of her forced detention there or possible
+discovery by those outlaws supposed to be hunting for her.
+After she realized the passing of those hours she had an
+intangible and indescribable feeling of what Dale had meant
+about dreaming the hours away.  The nature of Paradise Park
+was inimical to the kind of thought that had habitually been
+hers, She found the new thought absorbing, yet when she
+tried to name it she found that, after all, she had only
+felt.  At the meal hour she was more than usually quiet.  She
+saw that Dale noticed it and was trying to interest her or
+distract her attention.  He succeeded, but she did not choose
+to let him see that.  She strolled away alone to her seat
+under the pine.  Bo passed her once, and cried,
+tantalizingly:
+
+"My, Nell, but you're growing romantic!"
+
+Never before in Helen's life had the beauty of the evening
+star seemed so exquisite or the twilight so moving and
+shadowy or the darkness so charged with loneliness.  It was
+their environment -- the accompaniment of wild wolf-mourn,
+of the murmuring waterfall, of this strange man of the
+forest and the unfamiliar elements among which he made his home.
+
+
+Next morning, her energy having returned, Helen shared Bo's
+lesson in bridling and saddling her horse, and in riding.
+Bo, however, rode so fast and so hard that for Helen to
+share her company was impossible.  And Dale, interested and
+amused, yet anxious, spent most of his time with Bo.  It was
+thus that Helen rode all over the park alone.  She was
+astonished at its size, when from almost any point it looked
+so small.  The atmosphere deceived her.  How clearly she could
+see!  And she began to judge distance by the size of familiar
+things.  A horse, looked at across the longest length of the
+park, seemed very small indeed.  Here and there she rode upon
+dark, swift, little brooks, exquisitely clear and
+amber-colored and almost hidden from sight by the long
+grass.  These all ran one way, and united to form a deeper
+brook that apparently wound under the cliffs at the west
+end, and plunged to an outlet in narrow clefts.  When Dale
+and Bo came to her once she made inquiry, and she was
+surprised to learn from Dale that this brook disappeared in
+a hole in the rocks and had an outlet on the other side of
+the mountain.  Sometime he would take them to the lake it
+formed.
+
+"Over the mountain?" asked Helen, again remembering that she
+must regard herself as a fugitive.  "Will it be safe to leave
+our hiding-place?  I forget so often why we are here."
+
+"We would be better hidden over there than here," replied
+Dale.  "The valley on that side is accessible only from that
+ridge.  An' don't worry about bein' found.  I told you Roy
+Beeman is watchin' Anson an' his gang.  Roy will keep between
+them an' us."
+
+Helen was reassured, yet there must always linger in the
+background of her mind a sense of dread.  In spite of this,
+she determined to make the most of her opportunity.  Bo was a
+stimulus.  And so Helen spent the rest of that day riding and
+tagging after her sister.
+
+The next day was less hard on Helen.  Activity, rest, eating,
+and sleeping took on a wonderful new meaning to her.  She had
+really never known them as strange joys.  She rode, she
+walked, she climbed a little, she dozed under her pine-tree,
+she worked helping Dale at camp-fire tasks, and when night
+came she said she did not know herself.  That fact haunted
+her in vague, deep dreams.  Upon awakening she forgot her
+resolve to study herself.  That day passed.  And then several
+more went swiftly before she adapted herself to a situation
+she had reason to believe might last for weeks and even months.
+
+
+It was afternoon that Helen loved best of all the time of
+the day.  The sunrise was fresh, beautiful; the morning was
+windy, fragrant; the sunset was rosy, glorious; the twilight
+was sad, changing; and night seemed infinitely sweet with
+its stars and silence and sleep.  But the afternoon, when
+nothing changed, when all was serene, when time seemed to
+halt, that was her choice, and her solace.
+
+One afternoon she had camp all to herself.  Bo was riding.
+Dale had climbed the mountain to see if he could find any
+trace of tracks or see any smoke from camp-fire.  Bud was
+nowhere to be seen, nor any of the other pets.  Tom had gone
+off to some sunny ledge where he could bask in the sun,
+after the habit of the wilder brothers of his species.  Pedro
+had not been seen for a night and a day, a fact that Helen
+had noted with concern.  However, she had forgotten him, and
+therefore was the more surprised to see him coming limping
+into camp on three legs.
+
+"Why, Pedro!  You have been fighting.  Come here," she called.
+
+The hound did not look guilty.  He limped to her and held up
+his right fore paw.  The action was unmistakable.  Helen
+examined the injured member and presently found a piece of
+what looked like mussel-shell embedded deeply between the
+toes.  The wound was swollen, bloody, and evidently very
+painful.  Pedro whined.  Helen had to exert all the strength
+of her fingers to pull it out.  Then Pedro howled.  But
+immediately he showed his gratitude by licking her hand.
+Helen bathed his paw and bound it up.
+
+When Dale returned she related the incident and, showing the
+piece of shell, she asked: "Where did that come from ?  Are
+there shells in the mountains?"
+
+"Once this country was under the sea," replied Dale.  "I've
+found things that 'd make you wonder."
+
+"Under the sea!" ejaculated Helen.  It was one thing to have
+read of such a strange fact, but a vastly different one to
+realize it here among these lofty peaks.  Dale was always
+showing her something or telling her something that
+astounded her.
+
+"Look here," he said one day.  "What do you make of that
+little bunch of aspens?"
+
+They were on the farther side of the park and were resting
+under a pine-tree.  The forest here encroached upon the park
+with its straggling lines of spruce and groves of aspen.  The
+little clump of aspens did not differ from hundreds Helen
+had seen.
+
+"I don't make anything particularly of it," replied Helen,
+dubiously.  "Just a tiny grove of aspens -- some very small,
+some larger, but none very big.  But it's pretty with its
+green and yellow leaves fluttering and quivering."
+
+"It doesn't make you think of a fight?"
+
+"Fight?  No, it certainly does not," replied Helen.
+
+"Well, it's as good an example of fight, of strife, of
+selfishness, as you will find in the forest," he said.  "Now
+come over, you an' Bo, an' let me show you what I mean."
+
+"Come on, Nell," cried Bo, with enthusiasm.  "He'll open our
+eyes some more."
+
+Nothing loath, Helen went with them to the little clump of
+aspens.
+
+"About a hundred altogether," said Dale.  "They're pretty
+well shaded by the spruces, but they get the sunlight from
+east an' south.  These little trees all came from the same
+seedlings.  They're all the same age.  Four of them stand,
+say, ten feet or more high an' they're as large around as my
+wrist.  Here's one that's largest.  See how full-foliaged he
+is -- how he stands over most of the others, but not so much
+over these four next to him.  They all stand close together,
+very close, you see.  Most of them are no larger than my
+thumb.  Look how few branches they have, an' none low down.
+Look at how few leaves.  Do you see how all the branches
+stand out toward the east an' south -- how the leaves, of
+course, face the same way?  See how one branch of one tree
+bends aside one from another tree.  That's a fight for the
+sunlight.  Here are one -- two -- three dead trees.  Look, I
+can snap them off .  An' now look down under them.  Here are
+little trees five feet high -- four feet high -- down to
+these only a foot high.  Look how pale, delicate, fragile,
+unhealthy!  They get so little sunshine.  They were born with
+the other trees, but did not get an equal start.  Position
+gives the advantage, perhaps."
+
+Dale led the girls around the little grove, illustrating his
+words by action.  He seemed deeply in earnest.
+
+"You understand it's a fight for water an' sun.  But mostly
+sun, because, if the leaves can absorb the sun, the tree an'
+roots will grow to grasp the needed moisture.  Shade is death
+-- slow death to the life of trees.  These little aspens are
+fightin' for place in the sunlight.  It is a merciless
+battle.  They push an' bend one another's branches aside an'
+choke them.  Only perhaps half of these aspens will survive,
+to make one of the larger clumps, such as that one of
+full-grown trees over there.  One season will give advantage
+to this saplin' an' next year to that one.  A few seasons'
+advantage to one assures its dominance over the others.  But
+it is never sure of holdin' that dominance.  An 'if wind or
+storm or a strong-growin' rival does not overthrow it, then
+sooner or later old age will.  For there is absolute and
+continual fight.  What is true of these aspens is true of all
+the trees in the forest an' of all plant life in the forest.
+What is most wonderful to me is the tenacity of life."
+
+And next day Dale showed them an even more striking example
+of this mystery of nature.
+
+He guided them on horseback up one of the thick,
+verdant-wooded slopes, calling their attention at various
+times to the different growths, until they emerged on the
+summit of the ridge where the timber grew scant and dwarfed.
+At the edge of timber-line he showed a gnarled and knotted
+spruce-tree, twisted out of all semblance to a beautiful
+spruce, bent and storm-blasted, with almost bare branches,
+all reaching one' way.  The tree was a specter.  It stood
+alone.  It had little green upon it.  There seemed something
+tragic about its contortions.  But it was alive and strong.
+It had no rivals to take sun or moisture.  Its enemies were
+the snow and wind and cold of the heights.
+
+Helen felt, as the realization came to her, the knowledge
+Dale wished to impart, that it was as sad as wonderful, and
+as mysterious as it was inspiring.  At that moment there were
+both the sting and sweetness of life -- the pain and the joy
+-- in Helen's heart.  These strange facts were going to teach
+her -- to transform her.  And even if they hurt, she welcomed
+them.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+"I'll ride you if it breaks -- my neck!" panted Bo,
+passionately, shaking her gloved fist at the gray pony.
+
+Dale stood near with a broad smile on his face.  Helen was
+within earshot, watching from the edge of the park, and she
+felt so fascinated and frightened that she could not call
+out for Bo to stop.  The little gray mustang was a beauty,
+clean-limbed and racy, with long black mane and tail, and a
+fine, spirited head.  There was a blanket strapped on his
+back, but no saddle.  Bo held the short halter that had been
+fastened in a hackamore knot round his nose.  She wore no
+coat; her blouse was covered with grass and seeds, and it
+was open at the neck; her hair hung loose and disheveled;
+one side of her face bore a stain of grass and dirt and a
+suspicion of blood; the other was red and white; her eyes
+blazed; beads of sweat stood out on her brow and wet places
+shone on her cheeks.  As she began to strain on the halter,
+pulling herself closer to the fiery pony, the outline of her
+slender shape stood out lithe and strong.
+
+Bo had been defeated in her cherished and determined
+ambition to ride Dale's mustang, and she was furious.  The
+mustang did not appear to be vicious or mean.  But he was
+spirited, tricky, mischievous, and he had thrown her six
+times.  The scene of Bo's defeat was at the edge of the park,
+where thick moss and grass afforded soft places for her to
+fall.  It also afforded poor foothold for the gray mustang,
+obviously placing him at a disadvantage.  Dale did not bridle
+him, because he had not been broken to a bridle; and though
+it was harder for Bo to try to ride him bareback, there was
+less risk of her being hurt.  Bo had begun in all eagerness
+and enthusiasm, loving and petting the mustang, which she
+named "Pony." She had evidently anticipated an adventure,
+but her smiling, resolute face had denoted confidence.  Pony
+had stood fairly well to be mounted, and then had pitched
+and tossed until Bo had slid off or been upset or thrown.
+After each fall Bo bounced up with less of a smile, and more
+of spirit, until now the Western passion to master a horse
+had suddenly leaped to life within her.  It was no longer
+fun, no more a daring circus trick to scare Helen and rouse
+Dale's admiration.  The issue now lay between Bo and the
+mustang.
+
+Pony reared, snorting, tossing his head, and pawing with
+front feet.
+
+"Pull him down!" yelled Dale.
+
+Bo did not have much weight, but she had strength, an she
+hauled with all her might, finally bringing him down.
+
+"Now hold hard an' take up rope an' get in to him," called
+Dale.  "Good!  You're sure not afraid of him.  He sees that.
+Now hold him, talk to him, tell him you're goin' to ride
+him.  Pet him a little.  An' when he quits shakin', grab his
+mane an' jump up an' slide a leg over him.  Then hook your
+feet under him, hard as you can, an' stick on."
+
+If Helen had not been so frightened for Bo she would have
+been able to enjoy her other sensations.  Creeping, cold
+thrills chased over her as Bo, supple and quick, slid an arm
+and a leg over Pony and straightened up on him with a
+defiant cry.  Pony jerked his head down, brought his feet
+together in one jump, and began to bounce.  Bo got the swing
+of him this time and stayed on.
+
+"You're ridin' him," yelled Dale.  "Now squeeze hard with
+your knees.  Crack him over the head with your rope. . . .
+That's the way.  Hang on now an' you'll have him beat."
+
+The mustang pitched all over the space adjacent to Dale and
+Helen, tearing up the moss and grass.  Several times he
+tossed Bo high, but she slid back to grip him again with her
+legs, and he could not throw her.  Suddenly he raised his
+head and bolted.  Dale answered Bo's triumphant cry.  But Pony
+had not run fifty feet before he tripped and fell, throwing
+Bo far over his head.  As luck would have it -- good luck,
+Dale afterward said -- she landed in a boggy place and the
+force of her momentum was such that she slid several yards,
+face down, in wet moss and black ooze.
+
+Helen uttered a scream and ran forward.  Bo was getting to
+her knees when Dale reached her.  He helped her up and half
+led, half carried her out of the boggy place.  Bo was not
+recognizable.  From head to foot she was dripping black ooze.
+
+"Oh, Bo!  Are you hurt?" cried Helen.
+
+Evidently Bo's mouth was full of mud.
+
+"Pp--su--tt!  Ough!  Whew!" she sputtered.  "Hurt?  No!  Can't
+you see what I lit in?  Dale, the sun-of-a-gun didn't throw
+me.  He fell, and I went over his head."
+
+"Right.  You sure rode him.  An' he tripped an' slung you a
+mile," replied Dale.  "It's lucky you lit in that bog."
+
+"Lucky!  With eyes and nose stopped up?  Oooo!  I'm full of
+mud.  And my nice -- new riding-suit!"
+
+Bo's tones indicated that she was ready to cry.  Helen,
+realizing Bo had not been hurt, began to laugh.  Her sister
+was the funniest-looking object that had ever come before
+her eyes.
+
+"Nell Rayner -- are you -- laughing -- at me?" demanded Bo,
+in most righteous amaze and anger.
+
+"Me laugh-ing?  N-never, Bo, "replied Helen.  "Can't you see
+I'm just -- just --"
+
+"See?  You idiot!  my eyes are full of mud!" flashed Bo.  "But
+I hear you.  I'll -- I'll get even."
+
+Dale was laughing, too, but noiselessly, and Bo, being blind
+for the moment, could not be aware of that.  By this time
+they had reached camp.  Helen fell flat and laughed as she
+had never laughed before.  When Helen forgot herself so far
+as to roll on the ground it was indeed a laughing matter.
+Dale's big frame shook as he possessed himself of a towel
+and, wetting it at the spring, began to wipe the mud off
+Bo's face.  But that did not serve.  Bo asked to be led to the
+water, where she knelt and, with splashing, washed out her
+eyes, and then her face, and then the bedraggled strands of
+hair.
+
+"That mustang didn't break my neck, but he rooted my face in
+the mud.  I'll fix him," she muttered, as she got up.  "Please
+let me have the towel, now. . . .  Well!  Milt Dale, you're
+laughing!"
+
+"Ex-cuse me, Bo.  I -- Haw!  haw!  haw!" Then Dale lurched off,
+holding his sides.
+
+Bo gazed after him and then back at Helen.
+
+"I suppose if I'd been kicked and smashed and killed you'd
+laugh," she said.  And then she melted.  "Oh, my pretty
+riding-suit!  What a mess!  I must be a sight. . . .  Nell, I
+rode that wild pony -- the sun-of-a-gun!  I rode him!  That's
+enough for me.  YOU try it.  Laugh all you want.  It was funny.
+But if you want to square yourself with me, help me clean my
+clothes."
+
+
+Late in the night Helen heard Dale sternly calling Pedro.
+She felt some little alarm.  However, nothing happened, and
+she soon went to sleep again.  At the morning meal Dale
+explained.
+
+"Pedro an' Tom were uneasy last night.  I think there are
+lions workin' over the ridge somewhere.  I heard one scream."
+
+"Scream?" inquired Bo, with interest.
+
+"Yes, an' if you ever hear a lion scream you will think it a
+woman in mortal agony.  The cougar cry, as Roy calls it, is
+the wildest to be heard in the woods.  A wolf howls.  He is
+sad.  hungry, and wild.  But a cougar seems human an' dyin'
+an' wild.  We'll saddle up an' ride over there.  Maybe Pedro
+will tree a lion.  Bo, if he does will you shoot it?"
+
+"Sure," replied Bo, with her mouth full of biscuit.
+
+That was how they came to take a long, slow, steep ride
+under cover of dense spruce.  Helen liked the ride after they
+got on the heights.  But they did not get to any point where
+she could indulge in her pleasure of gazing afar over the
+ranges.  Dale led up and down, and finally mostly down, until
+they came out within sight of sparser wooded ridges with
+parks lying below and streams shining in the sun.
+
+More than once Pedro had to be harshly called by Dale.  The
+hound scented game.
+
+"Here's an old kill," said Dale, halting to point at some
+bleached bones scattered under a spruce.  Tufts of
+grayish-white hair lay strewn around.
+
+"What was it?" asked Bo.
+
+"Deer, of course.  Killed there an' eaten by a lion.  Sometime
+last fall.  See, even the skull is split.  But I could not say
+that the lion did it."
+
+Helen shuddered.  She thought of the tame deer down at Dale's
+camp.  How beautiful and graceful, and responsive to
+kindness!
+
+They rode out of the woods into a grassy swale with rocks
+and clumps of some green bushes bordering it.  Here Pedro
+barked, the first time Helen had heard him.  The hair on his
+neck bristled, and it required stern calls from Dale to hold
+him in.  Dale dismounted.
+
+"Hyar, Pede, you get back," he ordered.  "I'll let you go
+presently. . . .  Girls, you're goin' to see somethin'.  But
+stay on your horses."
+
+Dale, with the hound tense and bristling beside him, strode
+here and there at the edge of the swale.  Presently he halted
+on a slight elevation and beckoned for the girls to ride
+over.
+
+"Here, see where the grass is pressed down all nice an'
+round," he said, pointing.  "A lion made that.  He sneaked
+there, watchin' for deer.  That was done this mornin'.  Come
+on, now.  Let's see if we can trail him."
+
+Dale stooped now, studying the grass, and holding Pedro.
+Suddenly he straightened up with a flash in his gray eyes.
+
+"Here's where he jumped."
+
+But Helen could not see any reason why Dale should say that.
+The man of the forest took a long stride then another.
+
+"An' here's where that lion lit on the back of the deer.  It
+was a big jump.  See the sharp hoof tracks of the deer." Dale
+pressed aside tall grass to show dark, rough, fresh tracks
+of a deer, evidently made by violent action.
+
+"Come on," called Dale, walking swiftly.  "You're sure goin'
+to see somethin' now. . . .  Here's where the deer bounded,
+carryin' the lion."
+
+"What!" exclaimed Bo, incredulously.
+
+"The deer was runnin' here with the lion on his back.  I'll
+prove it to you.  Come on, now.  Pedro, you stay with me.
+Girls, it's a fresh trail." Dale walked along, leading his
+horse, and occasionally he pointed down into the grass.
+"There!  See that!  That's hair."
+
+Helen did see some tufts of grayish hair scattered on the
+ground, and she believed she saw little, dark separations in
+the grass, where an animal had recently passed.  All at once
+Dale halted.  When Helen reached him Bo was already there and
+they were gazing down at a wide, flattened space in the
+grass.  Even Helen's inexperienced eyes could make out
+evidences of a struggle.  Tufts of gray-white hair lay upon
+the crushed grass.  Helen did not need to see any more, but
+Dale silently pointed to a patch of blood.  Then he spoke:
+
+"The lion brought the deer down here an' killed him.
+Probably broke his neck.  That deer ran a hundred yards with
+the lion.  See, here's the trail left where the lion dragged
+the deer off."
+
+A well-defined path showed across the swale.
+
+"Girls, you'll see that deer pretty quick," declared Dale,
+starting forward.  "This work has just been done.  Only a few
+minutes ago."
+
+"How can you tell?" queried Bo.
+
+"Look!  See that grass.  It has been bent down by the deer
+bein' dragged over it.  Now it's springin' up."
+
+Dale's next stop was on the other side of the swale, under a
+spruce with low, spreading branches.  The look of Pedro
+quickened Helen's pulse.  He was wild to give chase.
+Fearfully Helen looked where Dale pointed, expecting to see
+the lion.  But she saw instead a deer lying prostrate with
+tongue out and sightless eyes and bloody hair.
+
+"Girls, that lion heard us an' left.  He's not far," said
+Dale, as he stooped to lift the head of the deer.  "Warm!
+Neck broken.  See the lion's teeth an' claw marks. . . .  It's
+a doe.  Look here.  Don't be squeamish, girls.  This is only an
+hourly incident of everyday life in the forest.  See where
+the lion has rolled the skin down as neat as I could do it,
+an' he'd just begun to bite in there when he heard us."
+
+"What murderous work, The sight sickens me!" exclaimed
+Helen.
+
+"It is nature," said Dale, simply.
+
+"Let's kill the lion," added Bo.
+
+For answer Dale took a quick turn at their saddle-girths,
+and then, mounting, he called to the hound.  "Hunt him up,
+Pedro."
+
+Like a shot the hound was off.
+
+"Ride in my tracks an' keep close to me," called Dale, as he
+wheeled his horse.
+
+"We're off!" squealed Bo, in wild delight, and she made her
+mount plunge.
+
+Helen urged her horse after them and they broke across a
+comer of the swale to the woods.  Pedro was running straight,
+with his nose high.  He let out one short bark.  He headed
+into the woods, with Dale not far behind.  Helen was on one
+of Dale's best horses, but that fact scarcely manifested
+itself, because the others began to increase their lead.
+They entered the woods.  It was open, and fairly good going.
+Bo's horse ran as fast in the woods as he did in the open.
+That frightened Helen and she yelled to Bo to hold him in.
+She yelled to deaf ears.  That was Bo's great risk -- she did
+not intend to be careful.  Suddenly the forest rang with
+Dale's encouraging yell, meant to aid the girls in following
+him.  Helen's horse caught the spirit of the chase.  He gained
+somewhat on Bo, hurdling logs, sometimes two at once.
+Helen's blood leaped with a strange excitement, utterly
+unfamiliar and as utterly resistless.  Yet her natural fear,
+and the intelligence that reckoned with the foolish risk of
+this ride, shared alike in her sum of sensations.  She tried
+to remember Dale's caution about dodging branches and snags,
+and sliding her knees back to avoid knocks from trees.  She
+barely missed some frightful reaching branches.  She received
+a hard knock, then another, that unseated her, but
+frantically she held on and slid back, and at the end of a
+long run through comparatively open forest she got a
+stinging blow in the face from a far-spreading branch of
+pine.  Bo missed, by what seemed only an inch, a solid snag
+that would have broken her in two.  Both Pedro and Dale got
+out of Helen's sight.  Then Helen, as she began to lose Bo,
+felt that she would rather run greater risks than be left
+behind to get lost in the forest, and she urged her horse.
+Dale's yell pealed back.  Then it seemed even more thrilling
+to follow by sound than by sight.  Wind and brush tore at
+her.  The air was heavily pungent with odor of pine.  Helen
+heard a wild, full bay of the hound, ringing back, full of
+savage eagerness, and she believed Pedro had roused out the
+lion from some covert.  It lent more stir to her blood and it
+surely urged her horse on faster.
+
+Then the swift pace slackened.  A windfall of timber delayed
+Helen.  She caught a glimpse of Dale far ahead, climbing a
+slope.  The forest seemed full of his ringing yell.  Helen
+strangely wished for level ground and the former swift
+motion.  Next she saw Bo working down to the right, and
+Dale's yell now came from that direction.  Helen followed,
+got out of the timber, and made better time on a gradual
+slope down to another park.
+
+When she reached the open she saw Bo almost across this
+narrow open ground.  Here Helen did not need to urge her
+mount.  He snorted and plunged at the level and he got to
+going so fast that Helen would have screamed aloud in
+mingled fear and delight if she had not been breathless.
+
+Her horse had the bad luck to cross soft ground.  He went to
+his knees and Helen sailed out of the saddle over his head.
+Soft willows and wet grass broke her fall.  She was surprised
+to find herself unhurt.  Up she bounded and certainly did not
+know this new Helen Rayner.  Her horse was coming, and he had
+patience with her, but he wanted to hurry.  Helen made the
+quickest mount of her experience and somehow felt a pride in
+it.  She would tell Bo that.  But just then Bo flashed into
+the woods out of sight.  Helen fairly charged into that green
+foliage, breaking brush and branches.  She broke through into
+open forest.  Bo was inside, riding down an aisle between
+pines and spruces.  At that juncture Helen heard Dale's
+melodious yell near at hand.  Coming into still more open
+forest, with rocks here and there, she saw Dale dismounted
+under a pine, and Pedro standing with fore paws upon the
+tree-trunk, and then high up on a branch a huge tawny
+colored lion, just like Tom.
+
+Bo's horse slowed up and showed fear, but he kept on as far
+as Dale's horse.  But Helen's refused to go any nearer.  She
+had difficulty in halting him.  Presently she dismounted and,
+throwing her bridle over a stump, she ran on, panting and
+fearful, yet tingling all over, up to her sister and Dale.
+
+"Nell, you did pretty good for a tenderfoot," was Bo's
+greeting.
+
+"It was a fine chase," said Dale.  "You both rode well.  I
+wish you could have seen the lion on the ground.  He bounded
+-- great long bounds with his tail up in the air -- very
+funny.  An' Pedro almost caught up with him.  That scared me,
+because he would have killed the hound.  Pedro was close to
+him when he treed.  An' there he is -- the yellow
+deer-killer.  He's a male an' full grown."
+
+With that Dale pulled his rifle from its saddle-sheath and
+looked expectantly at Bo.  But she was gazing with great
+interest and admiration up at the lion.
+
+"Isn't he just beautiful?" she burst out.  "Oh, look at him
+spit!  Just like a cat!  Dale, he looks afraid he might fall
+off."
+
+"He sure does.  Lions are never sure of their balance in a
+tree.  But I never saw one make a misstep.  He knows he
+doesn't belong there."
+
+To Helen the lion looked splendid perched up there.  He was
+long and round and graceful and tawny.  His tongue hung out
+and his plump sides heaved, showing what a quick, hard run
+he had been driven to.  What struck Helen most forcibly about
+him was something in his face as he looked down at the
+hound.  He was scared.  He realized his peril.  It was not
+possible for Helen to watch him killed, yet she could not
+bring herself to beg Bo not to shoot.  Helen confessed she
+was a tenderfoot.
+
+"Get down, Bo, an' let's see how good a shot you are, said
+Dale.  Bo slowly withdrew her fascinated gaze from the lion
+and looked with a rueful smile at Dale.
+
+"I've changed my mind.  I said I would kill him, but now I
+can't.  He looks so -- so different from what I'd imagined."
+
+Dale's answer was a rare smile of understanding and approval
+that warmed Helen's heart toward him.  All the same, he was
+amused.  Sheathing the gun, he mounted his horse.
+
+"Come on, Pedro," he called.  "Come, I tell you," he added,
+sharply, "Well, girls, we treed him, anyhow, an, it was fun.
+Now we'll ride back to the deer he killed an' pack a haunch
+to camp for our own use."
+
+"Will the lion go back to his -- his kill, I think you
+called it?" asked Bo.
+
+"I've chased one away from his kill half a dozen times.
+Lions are not plentiful here an' they don't get overfed.  I
+reckon the balance is pretty even."
+
+This last remark made Helen inquisitive.  And as they slowly
+rode on the back-trail Dale talked.
+
+"You girls, bein' tender-hearted an' not knowin' the life of
+the forest, what's good an' what's bad, think it was a pity
+the poor deer was killed by a murderous lion.  But you're
+wrong.  As I told you, the lion is absolutely necessary to
+the health an' joy of wild life -- or deer's wild life, so
+to speak.  When deer were created or came into existence,
+then the lion must have come, too.  They can't live without
+each other.  Wolves, now, are not particularly deer-killers.
+They live off elk an' anythin' they can catch.  So will
+lions, for that matter.  But I mean lions follow the deer to
+an' fro from winter to summer feedin'-grounds.  Where there's
+no deer you will find no lions.  Well, now, if left alone
+deer would multiply very fast.  In a few years there would be
+hundreds where now there's only one.  An' in time, as the
+generations passed, they'd lose the fear, the alertness, the
+speed an' strength, the eternal vigilance that is love of
+life -- they'd lose that an' begin to deteriorate, an'
+disease would carry them off.  I saw one season of
+black-tongue among deer.  It killed them off, an' I believe
+that is one of the diseases of over-production.  The lions,
+now, are forever on the trail of the deer.  They have
+learned.  Wariness is an instinct born in the fawn.  It makes
+him keen, quick, active, fearful, an' so he grows up strong
+an' healthy to become the smooth, sleek, beautiful,
+soft-eyed, an' wild-lookin' deer you girls love to watch.
+But if it wasn't for the lions, the deer would not thrive.
+Only the strongest an' swiftest survive.  That is the meanin'
+of nature.  There is always a perfect balance kept by nature.
+It may vary in different years, but on the whole, in the
+long years, it averages an even balance."
+
+"How wonderfully you put it!" exclaimed Bo, with all her
+impulsiveness.  "Oh, I'm glad I didn't kill the lion."
+
+"What you say somehow hurts me," said Helen, wistfully, to
+the hunter.  "I see -- I feel how true -- how inevitable it
+is.  But it changes my -- my feelings.  Almost I'd rather not
+acquire such knowledge as yours.  This balance of nature --
+how tragic -- how sad!"
+
+"But why?" asked Dale.  "You love birds, an' birds are the
+greatest killers in the forest."
+
+"Don't tell me that -- don't prove it," implored Helen.  It
+is not so much the love of life in a deer or any creature,
+and the terrible clinging to life, that gives me distress.
+It is suffering.  I can't bear to see pain.  I can STAND pain
+myself, but I can't BEAR to see or think of it."
+
+"Well," replied.  Dale, thoughtfully, "There you stump me
+again.  I've lived long in the forest an' when a man's alone
+he does a heap of thinkin'.  An' always I couldn't understand
+a reason or a meanin' for pain.  Of all the bafflin' things
+of life, that is the hardest to understand an' to forgive --
+pain!"
+
+
+That evening, as they sat in restful places round the
+camp-fire, with the still twilight fading into night, Dale
+seriously asked the girls what the day's chase had meant to
+them.  His manner of asking was productive of thought.  Both
+girls were silent for a moment.
+
+"Glorious!" was Bo's brief and eloquent reply.
+
+"Why?" asked.  Dale, curiously.  "You are a girl.  You've been
+used to home, people, love, comfort, safety, quiet."
+
+"Maybe that is just why it was glorious," said Bo,
+earnestly.  "I can hardly explain.  I loved the motion of the
+horse, the feel of wind in my face, the smell of the pine,
+the sight of slope and forest glade and windfall and rocks,
+and the black shade under the spruces.  My blood beat and
+burned.  My teeth clicked.  My nerves all quivered.  My heart
+sometimes, at dangerous moments, almost choked me, and all
+the time it pounded hard.  Now my skin was hot and then it
+was cold.  But I think the best of that chase for me was that
+I was on a fast horse, guiding him, controlling him.  He was
+alive.  Oh, how I felt his running!"
+
+"Well, what you say is as natural to me as if I felt it,"
+said Dale.  "I wondered.  You're certainly full of fire, An',
+Helen, what do you say?"
+
+"Bo has answered you with her feelings," replied Helen, "I
+could not do that and be honest.  The fact that Bo wouldn't
+shoot the lion after we treed him acquits her.  Nevertheless,
+her answer is purely physical.  You know, Mr.  Dale, how you
+talk about the physical.  I should say my sister was just a
+young, wild, highly sensitive, hot-blooded female of the
+species.  She exulted in that chase as an Indian.  Her
+sensations were inherited ones -- certainly not acquired by
+education.  Bo always hated study.  The ride was a revelation
+to me.  I had a good many of Bo's feelings -- though not so
+strong.  But over against them was the opposition of reason,
+of consciousness.  A new-born side of my nature confronted
+me, strange, surprising, violent, irresistible.  It was as if
+another side of my personality suddenly said: 'Here I am.
+Reckon with me now!' And there was no use for the moment to
+oppose that strange side.  I -- the thinking Helen Rayner,
+was powerless.  Oh yes, I had such thoughts even when the
+branches were stinging my face and I was thrilling to the
+bay of the hound.  Once my horse fell and threw me. . . .  You
+needn't look alarmed.  It was fine.  I went into a soft place
+and was unhurt.  But when I was sailing through the air a
+thought flashed: this is the end of me!  It was like a dream
+when you are falling dreadfully.  Much of what I felt and
+thought on that chase must have been because of what I have
+studied and read and taught.  The reality of it, the action
+and flash, were splendid.  But fear of danger, pity for the
+chased lion, consciousness of foolish risk, of a reckless
+disregard for the serious responsibility I have taken -- all
+these worked in my mind and held back what might have been a
+sheer physical, primitive joy of the wild moment."
+
+Dale listened intently, and after Helen had finished he
+studied the fire and thoughtfully poked the red embers with
+his stick.  His face was still and serene, untroubled and
+unlined, but to Helen his eyes seemed sad, pensive,
+expressive of an unsatisfied yearning and wonder.  She had
+carefully and earnestly spoken, because she was very curious
+to hear what he might say.
+
+"I understand you," he replied, presently.  "An' I'm sure
+surprised that I can.  I've read my books -- an' reread them,
+but no one ever talked like that to me.  What I make of it is
+this.  You've the same blood in you that's in Bo.  An' blood
+is stronger than brain.  Remember that blood is life.  It
+would be good for you to have it run an' beat an' burn, as
+Bo's did.  Your blood did that a thousand years or ten
+thousand before intellect was born in your ancestors.
+Instinct may not be greater than reason, but it's a million
+years older.  Don't fight your instincts so hard.  If they
+were not good the God of Creation would not have given them
+to you.  To-day your mind was full of self-restraint that did
+not altogether restrain.  You couldn't forget yourself.  You
+couldn't FEEL only, as Bo did.  You couldn't be true to your
+real nature."
+
+"I don't agree with you," replied Helen, quickly.  "I don't
+have to be an Indian to be true to myself."
+
+"Why, yes you do," said Dale.
+
+"But I couldn't be an Indian," declared Helen, spiritedly.
+"I couldn't FEEL only, as you say Bo did.  I couldn't go back
+in the scale, as you hint.  What would all my education
+amount to -- though goodness knows it's little enough -- if
+I had no control over primitive feelings that happened to be
+born in me?"
+
+"You'll have little or no control over them when the right
+time comes," replied Dale.  "Your sheltered life an'
+education have led you away from natural instincts.  But
+they're in you an' you'll learn the proof of that out here."
+
+"No.  Not if I lived a hundred years in the West," asserted
+Helen.
+
+"But, child, do you know what you're talkin' about?"
+
+Here Bo let out a blissful peal of laughter.
+
+"Mr.  Dale!" exclaimed Helen, almost affronted.  She was
+stirred.  "I know MYSELF, at least."
+
+"But you do not.  You've no idea of yourself.  You've
+education, yes, but not in nature an' life.  An' after all,
+they are the real things.  Answer me, now -- honestly, will
+you?"
+
+"Certainly, if I can.  Some of your questions are hard to
+answer."
+
+"Have you ever been starved?" he asked.
+
+"No," replied Helen.
+
+"Have you ever been lost away from home ?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Have you ever faced death -- real stark an' naked death,
+close an' terrible?"
+
+"No, indeed."
+
+"Have you ever wanted to kill any one with your bare hands?"
+
+"Oh, Mr.  Dale, you -- you amaze me.  No!  . . .  No!"
+
+"I reckon I know your answer to my last question, but I'll
+ask it, anyhow. . . .  Have you ever been so madly in love
+with a man that you could not live without him?"
+
+Bo fell off her seat with a high, trilling laugh.  "Oh, you
+two are great!"
+
+"Thank Heaven, I haven't been," replied Helen, shortly.
+
+"Then you don't know anythin' about life," declared Dale,
+with finality.
+
+Helen was not to be put down by that, dubious and troubled
+as it made her.
+
+"Have you experienced all those things?" she queried,
+stubbornly.
+
+"All but the last one.  Love never came my way.  How could it?
+I live alone.  I seldom go to the villages where there are
+girls.  No girl would ever care for me.  I have nothin'. . . .
+But, all the same, I understand love a little, just by
+comparison with strong feelin's I've lived."
+
+Helen watched the hunter and marveled at his simplicity.  His
+sad and penetrating gaze was on the fire, as if in its white
+heart to read the secret denied him.  He had said that no
+girl would ever love him.  She imagined he might know
+considerably less about the nature of girls than of the
+forest.
+
+"To come back to myself," said Helen, wanting to continue
+the argument.  "You declared I didn't know myself.  That I
+would have no self-control.  I will!"
+
+"I meant the big things of life," he said, patiently.
+
+"What things?"
+
+"I told you.  By askin' what had never happened to you I
+learned what will happen."
+
+"Those experiences to come to ME!" breathed Helen,
+incredulously.  "Never!"
+
+"Sister Nell, they sure will -- particularly the last-named
+one -- the mad love," chimed in Bo, mischievously, yet
+believingly.
+
+Neither Dale nor Helen appeared to hear her interruption.
+
+"Let me put it simpler," began Dale, evidently racking his
+brain for analogy.  His perplexity appeared painful to him,
+because he had a great faith, a great conviction that he
+could not make clear.  "Here I am, the natural physical man,
+livin' in the wilds.  An' here you come, the complex,
+intellectual woman.  Remember, for my argument's sake, that
+you're here.  An' suppose circumstances forced you to stay
+here.  You'd fight the elements with me an' work with me to
+sustain life.  There must be a great change in either you or
+me, accordin' to the other's influence.  An' can't you see
+that change must come in you, not because of anythin'
+superior in me -- I'm really inferior to you -- but because
+of our environment?  You'd lose your complexity.  An' in years
+to come you'd be a natural physical woman, because you'd
+live through an' by the physical."
+
+"Oh dear, will not education be of help to the Western
+woman?" queried Helen, almost in despair.
+
+"Sure it will," answered Dale, promptly.  "What the West
+needs is women who can raise an' teach children.  But you
+don't understand me.  You don't get under your skin.  I reckon
+I can't make you see my argument as I feel it.  You take my
+word for this, though.  Sooner or later you WILL wake up an'
+forget yourself.  Remember."
+
+"Nell, I'll bet you do, too," said Bo, seriously for her.
+"It may seem strange to you, but I understand Dale.  I feel
+what he means.  It's a sort of shock.  Nell, we're not what we
+seem.  We're not what we fondly imagine we are.  We've lived
+too long with people -- too far away from the earth.  You
+know the Bible says something like this: 'Dust thou art and
+to dust thou shalt return.' Where DO we come from?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+Days passed.
+
+Every morning Helen awoke with a wondering question as to
+what this day would bring forth, especially with regard to
+possible news from her uncle.  It must come sometime and she
+was anxious for it.  Something about this simple, wild camp
+life had begun to grip her.  She found herself shirking daily
+attention to the clothes she had brought West.  They needed
+it, but she had begun to see how superficial they really
+were.  On the other hand, camp-fire tasks had come to be a
+pleasure.  She had learned a great deal more about them than
+had Bo.  Worry and dread were always impinging upon the
+fringe of her thoughts -- always vaguely present, though
+seldom annoying.  They were like shadows in dreams.  She
+wanted to get to her uncle's ranch, to take up the duties of
+her new life.  But she was not prepared to believe she would
+not regret this wild experience.  She must get away from that
+in order to see it clearly, and she began to have doubts of
+herself.
+
+Meanwhile the active and restful outdoor life went on.  Bo
+leaned more and more toward utter reconciliation to it.  Her
+eyes had a wonderful flash, like blue lightning; her cheeks
+were gold and brown; her hands tanned dark as an Indian's.
+
+She could vault upon the gray mustang, or, for that matter,
+clear over his back.  She learned to shoot a rifle accurately
+enough to win Dale's praise, and vowed she would like to
+draw a bead upon a grizzly bear or upon Snake Anson.
+
+"Bo, if you met that grizzly Dale said has been prowling
+round camp lately you'd run right up a tree," declared
+Helen, one morning, when Bo seemed particularly boastful.
+
+"Don't fool yourself," retorted Bo.
+
+"But I've seen you run from a mouse!"
+
+"Sister, couldn't I be afraid of a mouse and not a bear?"
+
+"I don't see how."
+
+"Well, bears, lions, outlaws, and other wild beasts are to
+be met with here in the West, and my mind's made up," said
+Bo, in slow-nodding deliberation.
+
+They argued as they had always argued, Helen for reason and
+common sense and restraint, Bo on the principle that if she
+must fight it was better to get in the first blow.
+
+The morning on which this argument took place Dale was a
+long time in catching the horses.  When he did come in he
+shook his head seriously.
+
+"Some varmint's been chasin' the horses," he said, as he
+reached for his saddle.  "Did you hear them snortin' an'
+runnin' last night?"
+
+Neither of the girls had been awakened.
+
+"I missed one of the colts," went on Dale, "an' I'm goin' to
+ride across the park."
+
+Dale's movements were quick and stern.  It was significant
+that he chose his heavier rifle, and, mounting, with a sharp
+call to Pedro, he rode off without another word to the
+girls.
+
+Bo watched him for a moment and then began to saddle the
+mustang.
+
+"You won't follow him?" asked Helen, quickly.
+
+"I sure will," replied Bo.  "He didn't forbid it."
+
+"But he certainly did not want us."
+
+"He might not want you, but I'll bet he wouldn't object to
+me, whatever's up," said Bo, shortly.
+
+"Oh!  So you think --" exclaimed Helen, keenly hurt.  She bit
+her tongue to keep back a hot reply.  And it was certain that
+a bursting gush of anger flooded over her.  Was she, then,
+such a coward?  Did Dale think this slip of a sister, so wild
+and wilful, was a stronger woman than she?  A moment's silent
+strife convinced her that no doubt he thought so and no
+doubt he was right.  Then the anger centered upon herself,
+and Helen neither understood nor trusted herself.
+
+The outcome proved an uncontrollable impulse.  Helen began to
+saddle her horse.  She had the task half accomplished when
+Bo's call made her look up.
+
+"Listen!"
+
+Helen heard a ringing, wild bay of the hound.
+
+"That's Pedro," she said, with a thrill.
+
+"Sure.  He's running.  We never heard him bay like that
+before."
+
+"Where's Dale?"
+
+"He rode out of sight across there," replied Bo, pointing.
+"And Pedro's running toward us along that slope.  He must be
+a mile -- two miles from Dale."
+
+"But Dale will follow."
+
+"Sure.  But he'd need wings to get near that hound now.  Pedro
+couldn't have gone across there with him. . . .  just
+listen."
+
+The wild note of the hound manifestly stirred Bo to
+irrepressible action.  Snatching up Dale's lighter rifle, she
+shoved it into her saddle-sheath, and, leaping on the
+mustang, she ran him over brush and brook, straight down the
+park toward the place Pedro was climbing.  For an instant
+Helen stood amazed beyond speech.  When Bo sailed over a big
+log, like a steeple-chaser, then Helen answered to further
+unconsidered impulse by frantically getting her saddle
+fastened.  Without coat or hat she mounted.  The nervous horse
+bolted almost before she got into the saddle.  A strange,
+trenchant trembling coursed through all her veins.  She
+wanted to scream for Bo to wait.  Bo was out of sight, but
+the deep, muddy tracks in wet places and the path through
+the long grass afforded Helen an easy trail to follow.  In
+fact, her horse needed no guiding.  He ran in and out of the
+straggling spruces along the edge of the park, and suddenly
+wheeled around a corner of trees to come upon the gray
+mustang standing still.  Bo was looking up and listening.
+
+"There he is!" cried Bo, as the hound bayed ringingly,
+closer to them this time, and she spurred away.
+
+Helen's horse followed without urging.  He was excited.  His
+ears were up.  Something was in the wind.  Helen had never
+ridden along this broken end of the park, and Bo was not
+easy to keep up with.  She led across bogs, brooks, swales,
+rocky little ridges, through stretches of timber and groves
+of aspen so thick Helen could scarcely squeeze through.  Then
+Bo came out into a large open offshoot of the park, right
+under the mountain slope, and here she sat, her horse
+watching and listening.  Helen rode up to her, imagining once
+that she had heard the hound.
+
+"Look!  Look!" Bo's scream made her mustang stand almost
+straight up.
+
+Helen gazed up to see a big brown bear with a frosted coat
+go lumbering across an opening on the slope.
+
+"It's a grizzly!  He'll kill Pedro!  Oh, where is Dale!" cried
+Bo, with intense excitement.
+
+"Bo!  That bear is running down!  We -- we must get -- out of
+his road," panted Helen, in breathless alarm.
+
+"Dale hasn't had time to be close. . . .  Oh, I wish he'd
+come!  I don't know what to do."
+
+"Ride back.  At least wait for him."
+
+Just then Pedro spoke differently, in savage barks, and
+following that came a loud growl and crashings in the brush.
+These sounds appeared to be not far up the slope.
+
+"Nell!  Do you hear?  Pedro's fighting the bear," burst out
+Bo.  Her face paled, her eyes flashed like blue steel.  "The
+bear 'll kill him!"
+
+"Oh, that would be dreadful!" replied Helen, in distress.
+"But what on earth can we do?"
+
+"HEL-LO, DALE!" called Bo, at the highest pitch of her
+piercing voice.
+
+No answer came.  A heavy crash of brush, a rolling of stones,
+another growl from the slope told Helen that the hound had
+brought the bear to bay.
+
+"Nell, I'm going up," said Bo, deliberately.
+
+"No-no!  Are you mad?" returned Helen.
+
+"The bear will kill Pedro."
+
+"He might kill you."
+
+"You ride that way and yell for Dale," rejoined Bo.
+
+"What will -- you do?" gasped Helen.
+
+"I'll shoot at the bear -- scare him off.  If he chases me he
+can't catch me coming downhill.  Dale said that."
+
+"You're crazy!" cried Helen, as Bo looked up the slope,
+searching for open ground.  Then she pulled the rifle from
+its sheath.
+
+But Bo did not hear or did not care.  She spurred the
+mustang, and he, wild to run, flung grass and dirt from his
+heels.  What Helen would have done then she never knew, but
+the fact was that her horse bolted after the mustang.  In an
+instant, seemingly, Bo had disappeared in the gold and green
+of the forest slope.  Helen's mount climbed on a run,
+snorting and heaving, through aspens, brush, and timber, to
+come out into a narrow, long opening extending lengthwise up
+the slope.
+
+A sudden prolonged crash ahead alarmed Helen and halted her
+horse.  She saw a shaking of aspens.  Then a huge brown beast
+leaped as a cat out of the woods.  It was a bear of enormous
+size.  Helen's heart stopped -- her tongue clove to the roof
+of her mouth.  The bear turned.  His mouth was open, red and
+dripping.  He looked shaggy, gray.  He let out a terrible
+bawl.  Helen's every muscle froze stiff.  Her horse plunged
+high and sidewise, wheeling almost in the air, neighing his
+terror.  Like a stone she dropped from the saddle.  She did
+not see the horse break into the woods, but she heard him.
+Her gaze never left the bear even while she was falling, and
+it seemed she alighted in an upright position with her back
+against a bush.  It upheld her.  The bear wagged his huge head
+from side to side.  Then, as the hound barked close at hand,
+he turned to run heavily uphill and out of the opening.
+
+The instant of his disappearance was one of collapse for
+Helen.  Frozen with horror, she had been unable to move or
+feel or think.  All at once she was a quivering mass of cold,
+helpless flesh, wet with perspiration, sick with a
+shuddering, retching, internal convulsion, her mind
+liberated from paralyzing shock.  The moment was as horrible
+as that in which the bear had bawled his frightful rage.  A
+stark, icy, black emotion seemed in possession of her.  She
+could not lift a hand, yet all of her body appeared shaking.
+There was a fluttering, a strangling in her throat.  The
+crushing weight that surrounded her heart eased before she
+recovered use of her limbs.  Then, the naked and terrible
+thing was gone, like a nightmare giving way to
+consciousness.  What blessed relief!  Helen wildly gazed about
+her.  The bear and hound were out of sight, and so was her
+horse.  She stood up very dizzy and weak.  Thought of Bo then
+seemed to revive her, to shock different life and feeling
+throughout all her cold extremities.  She listened.
+
+She heard a thudding of hoofs down the slope, then Dale's
+clear, strong call.  She answered.  It appeared long before he
+burst out of the woods, riding hard and leading her horse.
+In that time she recovered fully, and when he reached her,
+to put a sudden halt upon the fiery Ranger, she caught the
+bridle he threw and swiftly mounted her horse.  The feel of
+the saddle seemed different.  Dale's piercing gray glance
+thrilled her strangely.
+
+"You're white.  Are you hurt?" he said.
+
+"No.  I was scared."
+
+"But he threw you?"
+
+"Yes, he certainly threw me."
+
+"What happened?"
+
+"We heard the hound and we rode along the timber.  Then we
+saw the bear -- a monster -- white -- coated --"
+
+"I know.  It's a grizzly.  He killed the colt -- your pet.
+Hurry now.  What about Bo?"
+
+"Pedro was fighting the bear.  Bo said he'd be killed.  She
+rode right up here.  My horse followed.  I couldn't have
+stopped him.  But we lost Bo.  Right there the bear came out.
+He roared.  My horse threw me and ran off.  Pedro's barking
+saved me -- my life, I think.  Oh!  that was awful!  Then the
+bear went up -- there. . . .  And you came."
+
+"Bo's followin' the hound!" ejaculated Dale.  And, lifting
+his hands to his mouth, he sent out a stentorian yell that
+rolled up the slope, rang against the cliffs, pealed and
+broke and died away.  Then he waited, listening.  From far up
+the slope came a faint, wild cry, high-pitched and sweet, to
+create strange echoes, floating away to die in the ravines.
+
+"She's after him!" declared Dale, grimly.
+
+"Bo's got your rifle," said Helen.  "Oh, we must hurry."
+
+"You go back," ordered Dale, wheeling his horse.
+
+"No!" Helen felt that word leave her lips with the force of
+a bullet.
+
+Dale spurred Ranger and took to the open slope.  Helen kept
+at his heels until timber was reached.  Here a steep trail
+led up.  Dale dismounted.
+
+"Horse tracks -- bear tracks -- dog tracks," he said,
+bending over.  "We'll have to walk up here.  It'll save our
+horses an' maybe time, too."
+
+"Is Bo riding up there?" asked Helen, eying the steep
+ascent.
+
+"She sure is." With that Dale started up, leading his horse.
+Helen followed.  It was rough and hard work.  She was lightly
+clad, yet soon she was hot, laboring, and her heart began to
+hurt.  When Dale halted to rest Helen was just ready to drop.
+The baying of the hound, though infrequent, inspirited her.
+But presently that sound was lost.  Dale said bear and hound
+had gone over the ridge and as soon as the top was gained he
+would hear them again.
+
+"Look there," he said, presently, pointing to fresh tracks,
+larger than those made by Bo's mustang.  "Elk tracks.  We've
+scared a big bull an' he's right ahead of us.  Look sharp an'
+you'll see him."
+
+Helen never climbed so hard and fast before, and when they
+reached the ridge-top she was all tuckered out.  It was all
+she could do to get on her horse.  Dale led along the crest
+of this wooded ridge toward the western end, which was
+considerably higher.  In places open rocky ground split the
+green timber.  Dale pointed toward a promontory.
+
+Helen saw a splendid elk silhouetted against the sky.  He was
+a light gray over all his hindquarters, with shoulders and
+head black.  His ponderous, wide-spread antlers towered over
+him, adding to the wildness of his magnificent poise as he
+stood there, looking down into the valley, no doubt
+listening for the bay of the hound.  When he heard Dale's
+horse he gave one bound, gracefully and wonderfully carrying
+his antlers, to disappear in the green.
+
+Again on a bare patch of ground Dale pointed down.  Helen saw
+big round tracks, toeing in a little, that gave her a chill.
+She knew these were grizzly tracks.
+
+Hard riding was not possible on this ridge crest, a fact
+that gave Helen time to catch her breath.  At length, coming
+out upon the very summit of the mountain, Dale heard the
+hound.  Helen's eyes feasted afar upon a wild scene of rugged
+grandeur, before she looked down on this western slope at
+her feet to see bare, gradual descent, leading down to
+sparsely wooded bench and on to deep-green canuon.
+
+"Ride hard now!" yelled Dale.  "I see Bo, an' I'll have to
+ride to catch her."
+
+Dale spurred down the slope.  Helen rode in his tracks and,
+though she plunged so fast that she felt her hair stand up
+with fright, she saw him draw away from her.  Sometimes her
+horse slid on his haunches for a few yards, and at these
+hazardous moments she got her feet out of the stirrups so as
+to fall free from him if he went down.  She let him choose
+the way, while she gazed ahead at Dale, and then farther on,
+in the hope of seeing Bo.  At last she was rewarded.  Far Down
+the wooded bench she saw a gray flash of the little mustang
+and a bright glint of Bo's hair.  Her heart swelled.  Dale
+would soon overhaul Bo and come between her and peril.  And
+on the instant, though Helen was unconscious of it then, a
+remarkable change came over her spirit.  Fear left her.  And a
+hot, exalting, incomprehensible something took possession of
+her.
+
+She let the horse run, and when he had plunged to the foot
+of that slope of soft ground he broke out across the open
+bench at a pace that made the wind bite Helen's cheeks and
+roar in her ears.  She lost sight of Dale.  It gave her a
+strange, grim exultance.  She bent her eager gaze to find the
+tracks of his horse, and she found them.  Also she made out
+the tracks of Bo's mustang and the bear and the hound.  Her
+horse, scenting game, perhaps, and afraid to be left alone,
+settled into a fleet and powerful stride, sailing over logs
+and brush.  That open bench had looked short, but it was
+long, and Helen rode down the gradual descent at breakneck
+speed.  She would not be left behind.  She had awakened to a
+heedlessness of risk.  Something burned steadily within her.
+A grim, hard anger of joy!  When she saw, far down another
+open, gradual descent, that Dale had passed Bo and that Bo
+was riding the little mustang as never before, then Helen
+flamed with a madness to catch her, to beat her in that
+wonderful chase, to show her and Dale what there really was
+in the depths of Helen Rayner.
+
+Her ambition was to be short-lived, she divined from the lay
+of the land ahead, but the ride she lived then for a flying
+mile was something that would always blanch her cheeks and
+prick her skin in remembrance.
+
+The open ground was only too short.  That thundering pace
+soon brought Helen's horse to the timber.  Here it took all
+her strength to check his headlong flight over deadfalls and
+between small jack-pines.  Helen lost sight of Bo, and she
+realized it would take all her wits to keep from getting
+lost.  She had to follow the trail, and in some places it was
+hard to see from horseback.
+
+Besides, her horse was mettlesome, thoroughly aroused, and
+he wanted a free rein and his own way.  Helen tried that,
+only to lose the trail and to get sundry knocks from trees
+and branches.  She could not hear the hound, nor Dale.  The
+pines were small, close together, and tough.  They were hard
+to bend.  Helen hurt her hands, scratched her face, barked
+her knees.  The horse formed a habit suddenly of deciding to
+go the way he liked instead of the way Helen guided him, and
+when he plunged between saplings too close to permit easy
+passage it was exceedingly hard on her.  That did not make
+any difference to Helen.  Once worked into a frenzy, her
+blood stayed at high pressure.  She did not argue with
+herself about a need of desperate hurry.  Even a blow on the
+head that nearly blinded her did not in the least retard
+her.  The horse could hardly be held, and not at all in the
+few open places.
+
+At last Helen reached another slope.  Coming out upon canuon
+rim, she heard Dale's clear call, far down, and Bo's
+answering peal, high and piercing, with its note of exultant
+wildness.  Helen also heard the bear and the hound fighting
+at the bottom of this canuon.
+
+Here Helen again missed the tracks made by Dale and Bo.  The
+descent looked impassable.  She rode back along the rim, then
+forward.  Finally she found where the ground had been plowed
+deep by hoofs, down over little banks.  Helen's horse balked
+at these jumps.  When she goaded him over them she went
+forward on his neck.  It seemed like riding straight
+downhill.  The mad spirit of that chase grew more stingingly
+keen to Helen as the obstacles grew.  Then, once more the bay
+of the hound and the bawl of the bear made a demon of her
+horse.  He snorted a shrill defiance.  He plunged with fore
+hoofs in the air.  He slid and broke a way down the steep,
+soft banks, through the thick brush and thick clusters of
+saplings, sending loose rocks and earth into avalanches
+ahead of him.  He fell over one bank, but a thicket of aspens
+upheld him so that he rebounded and gained his feet.  The
+sounds of fight ceased, but Dale's thrilling call floated up
+on the pine-scented air.
+
+Before Helen realized it she was at the foot of the slope,
+in a narrow canuon-bed, full of rocks and trees, with a soft
+roar of running water filling her ears.  Tracks were
+everywhere, and when she came to the first open place she
+saw where the grizzly had plunged off a sandy bar into the
+water.  Here he had fought Pedro.  Signs of that battle were
+easy to read.  Helen saw where his huge tracks, still wet,
+led up the opposite sandy bank.
+
+Then down-stream Helen did some more reckless and splendid
+riding.  On level ground the horse was great.  Once he leaped
+clear across the brook.  Every plunge, every turn Helen
+expected to come upon Dale and Bo facing the bear.  The canuon
+narrowed, the stream-bed deepened.  She had to slow down to
+get through the trees and rocks.  Quite unexpectedly she rode
+pell-mell upon Dale and Bo and the panting Pedro.  Her horse
+plunged to a halt, answering the shrill neighs of the other
+horses.
+
+Dale gazed in admiring amazement at Helen.
+
+"Say, did you meet the bear again?" he queried, blankly.
+
+"No.  Didn't -- you -- kill him?" panted Helen, slowly
+sagging in her saddle.
+
+"He got away in the rocks.  Rough country down here.
+
+Helen slid off her horse and fell with a little panting cry
+of relief.  She saw that she was bloody, dirty, disheveled,
+and wringing wet with perspiration.  Her riding habit was
+torn into tatters.  Every muscle seemed to burn and sting,
+and all her bones seemed broken.  But it was worth all this
+to meet Dale's penetrating glance, to see Bo's utter,
+incredulous astonishment.
+
+"Nell -- Rayner!" gasped Bo.
+
+"If -- my horse 'd been -- any good -- in the woods," panted
+Helen, "I'd not lost -- so much time -- riding down this
+mountain.  And I'd caught you -- beat you."
+
+"Girl, did you RIDE down this last slope?" queried Dale.
+
+"I sure did," replied Helen, smiling.
+
+"We walked every step of the way, and was lucky to get down
+at that," responded Dale, gravely.  "No horse should have
+been ridden down there.  Why, he must have slid down."
+
+"We slid -- yes.  But I stayed on him."
+
+Bo's incredulity changed to wondering, speechless
+admiration.  And Dale's rare smile changed his gravity.
+
+"I'm sorry.  It was rash of me.  I thought you'd go back. . .
+.  But all's well that ends well. . . .  Helen, did you wake
+up to-day?"
+
+She dropped her eyes, not caring to meet the questioning
+gaze upon her.
+
+"Maybe -- a little," she replied, and she covered her face
+with her hands.  Remembrance of his questions -- of his
+assurance that she did not know the real meaning of life --
+of her stubborn antagonism -- made her somehow ashamed.  But
+it was not for long.
+
+"The chase was great," she said.  "I did not know myself.  You
+were right."
+
+"In how many ways did you find me right?" he asked.
+
+"I think all -- but one," she replied, with a laugh and a
+shudder.  "I'm near starved NOW -- I was so furious at Bo
+that I could have choked her.  I faced that horrible brute. .
+. .  Oh, I know what it is to fear death!  . . .  I was lost
+twice on the ride -- absolutely lost.  That's all."
+
+Bo found her tongue.  "The last thing was for you to fall
+wildly in love, wasn't it?"
+
+"According to Dale, I must add that to my new experiences of
+to-day -- before I can know real life," replied Helen,
+demurely.
+
+The hunter turned away.  "Let us go," he said, soberly.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+After more days of riding the grassy level of that
+wonderfully gold and purple park, and dreamily listening by
+day to the ever-low and ever-changing murmur of the
+waterfall, and by night to the wild, lonely mourn of a
+hunting wolf, and climbing to the dizzy heights where the
+wind stung sweetly, Helen Rayner lost track of time and
+forgot her peril.
+
+Roy Beeman did not return.  If occasionally Dale mentioned
+Roy and his quest, the girls had little to say beyond a
+recurrent anxiety for the old uncle, and then they forgot
+again.  Paradise Park, lived in a little while at that season
+of the year, would have claimed any one, and ever afterward
+haunted sleeping or waking dreams.
+
+Bo gave up to the wild life, to the horses and rides, to the
+many pets, and especially to the cougar, Tom.  The big cat
+followed her everywhere, played with her, rolling and
+pawing, kitten-like, and he would lay his massive head in
+her lap to purr his content.  Bo had little fear of anything,
+and here in the wilds she soon lost that.
+
+Another of Dale's pets was a half-grown black bear named
+Muss.  He was abnormally jealous of little Bud and he had a
+well-developed hatred of Tom, otherwise he was a very
+good-tempered bear, and enjoyed Dale's impartial regard.
+Tom, however, chased Muss out of camp whenever Dale's back
+was turned, and sometimes Muss stayed away, shifting for
+himself.  With the advent of Bo, who spent a good deal of
+time on the animals, Muss manifestly found the camp more
+attractive.  Whereupon, Dale predicted trouble between Tom
+and Muss.
+
+Bo liked nothing better than a rough-and-tumble frolic with
+the black bear.  Muss was not very big nor very heavy, and in
+a wrestling bout with the strong and wiry girl he sometimes
+came out second best.  It spoke well of him that he seemed to
+be careful not to hurt Bo.  He never bit or scratched, though
+he sometimes gave her sounding slaps with his paws.
+Whereupon, Bo would clench her gauntleted fists and sail
+into him in earnest.
+
+One afternoon before the early supper they always had, Dale
+and Helen were watching Bo teasing the bear.  She was in her
+most vixenish mood, full of life and fight.  Tom lay his long
+length on the grass, watching with narrow, gleaming eyes.
+
+When Bo and Muss locked in an embrace and went down to roll
+over and over, Dale called Helen's attention to the cougar.
+
+"Tom's jealous.  It's strange how animals are like people.
+Pretty soon I'll have to corral Muss, or there'll be a
+fight."
+
+Helen could not see anything wrong with Tom except that he
+did not look playful.
+
+During supper-time both bear and cougar disappeared, though
+this was not remarked until afterward.  Dale whistled and
+called, but the rival pets did not return.  Next morning Tom
+was there, curled up snugly at the foot of Bo's bed, and
+when she arose he followed her around as usual.  But Muss did
+not return.
+
+The circumstance made Dale anxious.  He left camp, taking Tom
+with him, and upon returning stated that he had followed
+Muss's track as far as possible, and then had tried to put
+Tom on the trail, but the cougar would not or could not
+follow it.  Dale said Tom never liked a bear trail, anyway,
+cougars and bears being common enemies.  So, whether by
+accident or design, Bo lost one of her playmates.
+
+The hunter searched some of the slopes next day and even
+went up on one of the mountains.  He did not discover any
+sign of Muss, but he said he had found something else.
+
+"Bo you girls want some more real excitement?" he asked.
+
+Helen smiled her acquiescence and Bo replied with one of her
+forceful speeches.
+
+"Don't mind bein' good an' scared?" he went on.
+
+"You can't scare me," bantered Bo.  But Helen looked
+doubtful.
+
+"Up in one of the parks I ran across one of my horses -- a
+lame bay you haven't seen.  Well, he had been killed by that
+old silvertip.  The one we chased.  Hadn't been dead over an
+hour.  Blood was still runnin' an' only a little meat eaten.
+That bear heard me or saw me an' made off into the woods.
+But he'll come back to-night.  I'm goin' up there, lay for
+him, an' kill him this time.  Reckon you'd better go, because
+I don't want to leave you here alone at night."
+
+"Are you going to take Tom?" asked Bo.
+
+"No.  The bear might get his scent.  An', besides, Tom ain't
+reliable on bears.  I'll leave Pedro home, too."
+
+When they had hurried supper, and Dale had gotten in the
+horses, the sun had set and the valley was shadowing low
+down, while the ramparts were still golden.  The long zigzag
+trail Dale followed up the slope took nearly an hour to
+climb, so that when that was surmounted and he led out of
+the woods twilight had fallen.  A rolling park extended as
+far as Helen could see, bordered by forest that in places
+sent out straggling stretches of trees.  Here and there, like
+islands, were isolated patches of timber.
+
+At ten thousand feet elevation the twilight of this clear
+and cold night was a rich and rare atmospheric effect.  It
+looked as if it was seen through perfectly clear smoked
+glass.  Objects were singularly visible, even at long range,
+and seemed magnified.  In the west, where the afterglow of
+sunset lingered over the dark, ragged, spruce-speared
+horizon-line, there was such a transparent golden line
+melting into vivid star-fired blue that Helen could only
+gaze and gaze in wondering admiration.
+
+Dale spurred his horse into a lope and the spirited mounts
+of the girls kept up with him.  The ground was rough, with
+tufts of grass growing close together, yet the horses did
+not stumble.  Their action and snorting betrayed excitement.
+Dale led around several clumps of timber, up a long grassy
+swale, and then straight westward across an open flat toward
+where the dark-fringed forest-line raised itself wild and
+clear against the cold sky.  The horses went swiftly, and the
+wind cut like a blade of ice.  Helen could barely get her
+breath and she panted as if she had just climbed a laborsome
+hill.  The stars began to blink out of the blue, and the gold
+paled somewhat, and yet twilight lingered.  It seemed long
+across that flat, but really was short.  Coming to a thin
+line of trees that led down over a slope to a deeper but
+still isolated patch of woods, Dale dismounted and tied his
+horse.  When the girls got off he haltered their horses also.
+
+"Stick close to me an' put your feet down easy," he
+whispered.  How tall and dark he loomed in the fading light!
+Helen thrilled, as she had often of late, at the strange,
+potential force of the man.  Stepping softly, without the
+least sound, Dale entered this straggly bit of woods, which
+appeared to have narrow byways and nooks.  Then presently he
+came to the top of a well-wooded slope, dark as pitch,
+apparently.  But as Helen followed she perceived the trees,
+and they were thin dwarf spruce, partly dead.  The slope was
+soft and springy, easy to step upon without noise.  Dale went
+so cautiously that Helen could not hear him, and sometimes
+in the gloom she could not see him.  Then the chill thrills
+ran over her.  Bo kept holding on to Helen, which fact
+hampered Helen as well as worked somewhat to disprove Bo's
+boast.  At last level ground was reached.  Helen made out a
+light-gray background crossed by black bars.  Another glance
+showed this to be the dark tree-trunks against the open
+park.
+
+Dale halted, and with a touch brought Helen to a straining
+pause.  He was listening.  It seemed wonderful to watch him
+bend his head and stand as silent and motionless as one of
+the dark trees.
+
+"He's not there yet," Dale whispered, and he stepped forward
+very slowly.  Helen and Bo began to come up against thin dead
+branches that were invisible and then cracked.  Then Dale
+knelt down, seemed to melt into the ground.
+
+"You'll have to crawl," he whispered.
+
+How strange and thrilling that was for Helen, and hard work!
+The ground bore twigs and dead branches, which had to be
+carefully crawled over; and lying flat, as was necessary, it
+took prodigious effort to drag her body inch by inch.  Like a
+huge snake, Dale wormed his way along.
+
+Gradually the wood lightened.  They were nearing the edge of
+the park.  Helen now saw a strip of open with a high, black
+wall of spruce beyond.  The afterglow flashed or changed,
+like a dimming northern light, and then failed.  Dale crawled
+on farther to halt at length between two tree-trunks at the
+edge of the wood.
+
+"Come up beside me," he whispered.
+
+Helen crawled on, and presently Bo was beside her panting,
+with pale face and great, staring eyes, plain to be seen in
+the wan light.
+
+"Moon's comin' up.  We're just in time.  The old grizzly's not
+there yet, but I see coyotes.  Look."
+
+Dale pointed across the open neck of park to a dim blurred
+patch standing apart some little distance from the black
+wall.
+
+"That's the dead horse," whispered Dale.  "An' if you watch
+close you can see the coyotes.  They're gray an' they move. .
+. .  Can't you hear them?"
+
+Helen's excited ears, so full of throbs and imaginings,
+presently registered low snaps and snarls.  Bo gave her arm a
+squeeze.
+
+"I hear them.  They're fighting.  Oh, gee!" she panted, and
+drew a long, full breath of unutterable excitement.
+
+"Keep quiet now an' watch an' listen," said the hunter.
+
+Slowly the black, ragged forest-line seemed to grow blacker
+and lift; slowly the gray neck of park lightened under some
+invisible influence; slowly the stars paled and the sky
+filled over.  Somewhere the moon was rising.  And slowly that
+vague blurred patch grew a little clearer.
+
+Through the tips of the spruce, now seen to be rather close
+at hand, shone a slender, silver crescent moon, darkening,
+hiding, shining again, climbing until its exquisite
+sickle-point topped the trees, and then, magically, it
+cleared them, radiant and cold.  While the eastern black wall
+shaded still blacker, the park blanched and the border-line
+opposite began to stand out as trees.
+
+"Look!  Look!" cried Bo, very low and fearfully, as she
+pointed.
+
+"Not so loud," whispered Dale.
+
+"But I see something!"
+
+"Keep quiet," he admonished.
+
+Helen, in the direction Bo pointed, could not see anything
+but moon-blanched bare ground, rising close at hand to a
+little ridge.
+
+"Lie still," whispered Dale.  "I'm goin' to crawl around to
+get a look from another angle.  I'll be right back."
+
+He moved noiselessly backward and disappeared.  With him
+gone, Helen felt a palpitating of her heart and a prickling
+of her skin.
+
+"Oh, my!  Nell!  Look!" whispered Bo, in fright.  "I know I saw
+something."
+
+On top of the little ridge a round object moved slowly,
+getting farther out into the light.  Helen watched with
+suspended breath.  It moved out to be silhouetted against the
+sky -- apparently a huge, round, bristling animal, frosty in
+color.  One instant it seemed huge -- the next small -- then
+close at hand -- and far away.  It swerved to come directly
+toward them.  Suddenly Helen realized that the beast was not
+a dozen yards distant.  She was just beginning a new
+experience -- a real and horrifying terror in which her
+blood curdled, her heart gave a tremendous leap and then
+stood still, and she wanted to fly, but was rooted to the
+spot -- when Dale returned to her side.
+
+"That's a pesky porcupine," he whispered.  "Almost crawled
+over you.  He sure would have stuck you full of quills."
+
+Whereupon he threw a stick at the animal.  It bounced
+straight up to turn round with startling quickness, and it
+gave forth a rattling sound; then it crawled out of sight.
+
+"Por -- cu -- pine!" whispered Bo, pantingly.  "It might --
+as well -- have been -- an elephant!"
+
+Helen uttered a long, eloquent sigh.  She would not have
+cared to describe her emotions at sight of a harmless
+hedgehog.
+
+"Listen!" warned Dale, very low.  His big hand closed over
+Helen's gauntleted one.  "There you have -- the real cry of
+the wild."
+
+Sharp and cold on the night air split the cry of a wolf,
+distant, yet wonderfully distinct.  How wild and mournful and
+hungry!  How marvelously pure!  Helen shuddered through all
+her frame with the thrill of its music, the wild and
+unutterable and deep emotions it aroused.  Again a sound of
+this forest had pierced beyond her life, back into the dim
+remote past from which she had come.
+
+The cry was not repeated.  The coyotes were still.  And
+silence fell, absolutely unbroken.
+
+Dale nudged Helen, and then reached over to give Bo a tap.
+He was peering keenly ahead and his strained intensity could
+be felt.  Helen looked with all her might and she saw the
+shadowy gray forms of the coyotes skulk away, out of the
+moonlight into the gloom of the woods, where they
+disappeared.  Not only Dale's intensity, but the very
+silence, the wildness of the moment and place, seemed
+fraught with wonderful potency.  Bo must have felt it, too,
+for she was trembling all over, and holding tightly to
+Helen, and breathing quick and fast.
+
+"A-huh!" muttered Dale, under his breath.
+
+Helen caught the relief and certainty in his exclamation,
+and she divined, then, something of what the moment must
+have been to a hunter.
+
+Then her roving, alert glance was arrested by a looming gray
+shadow coming out of the forest.  It moved, but surely that
+huge thing could not be a bear.  It passed out of gloom into
+silver moonlight.  Helen's heart bounded.  For it was a great
+frosty-coated bear lumbering along toward the dead horse.
+Instinctively Helen's hand sought the arm of the hunter.  It
+felt like iron under a rippling surface.  The touch eased
+away the oppression over her lungs, the tightness of her
+throat.  What must have been fear left her, and only a
+powerful excitement remained.  A sharp expulsion of breath
+from Bo and a violent jerk of her frame were signs that she
+had sighted the grizzly.
+
+In the moonlight he looked of immense size, and that wild
+park with the gloomy blackness of forest furnished a fit
+setting for him.  Helen's quick mind, so taken up with
+emotion, still had a thought for the wonder and the meaning
+of that scene.  She wanted the bear killed, yet that seemed a
+pity.
+
+He had a wagging, rolling, slow walk which took several
+moments to reach his quarry.  When at length he reached it he
+walked around with sniffs plainly heard and then a cross
+growl.  Evidently he had discovered that his meal had been
+messed over.  As a whole the big bear could be seen
+distinctly, but only in outline and color.  The distance was
+perhaps two hundred yards.  Then it looked as if he had begun
+to tug at the carcass.  Indeed, he was dragging it, very
+slowly, but surely.
+
+"Look at that!" whispered Dale.  "If he ain't strong!  . . .
+Reckon I'll have to stop him."
+
+The grizzly, however, stopped of his own accord, just
+outside of the shadow-line of the forest.  Then he hunched in
+a big frosty heap over his prey and began to tear and rend.
+
+"Jess was a mighty good horse," muttered Dale, grimly; "too
+good to make a meal for a hog silvertip."
+
+Then the hunter silently rose to a kneeling position,
+swinging the rifle in front of him.  He glanced up into the
+low branches of the tree overhead.
+
+"Girls, there's no tellin' what a grizzly will do.  If I
+yell, you climb up in this tree, an' do it quick."
+
+With that he leveled the rifle, resting his left elbow on
+his knee.  The front end of the rifle, reaching out of the
+shade, shone silver in the moonlight.  Man and weapon became
+still as stone.  Helen held her breath.  But Dale relaxed,
+lowering the barrel.
+
+"Can't see the sights very well," he whispered, shaking his
+head.  "Remember, now -- if I yell you climb!"
+
+Again he aimed and slowly grew rigid.  Helen could not take
+her fascinated eyes off him.  He knelt, bareheaded, and in
+the shadow she could make out the gleam of his clear-cut
+profile, stern and cold.
+
+A streak of fire and a heavy report startled her.  Then she
+heard the bullet hit.  Shifting her glance, she saw the bear
+lurch with convulsive action, rearing on his hind legs.  Loud
+clicking snaps must have been a clashing of his jaws in
+rage.  But there was no other sound.  Then again Dale's heavy
+gun boomed.  Helen heard again that singular spatting thud of
+striking lead.  The bear went down with a flop as if he had
+been dealt a terrific blow.  But just as quickly he was up on
+all-fours and began to whirl with hoarse, savage bawls of
+agony and fury.  His action quickly carried him out of the
+moonlight into the shadow, where he disappeared.  There the
+bawls gave place to gnashing snarls, and crashings in the
+brush, and snapping of branches, as he made his way into the
+forest.
+
+"Sure he's mad," said Dale, rising to his feet.  "An' I
+reckon hard hit.  But I won't follow him to-night."
+
+Both the girls got up, and Helen found she was shaky on her
+feet and very cold.
+
+"Oh-h, wasn't -- it -- won-wonder-ful!" cried Bo.
+
+"Are you scared?  Your teeth are chatterin'," queried Dale.
+
+"I'm -- cold."
+
+"Well, it sure is cold, all right," he responded.  "Now the
+fun's over, you'll feel it. . . .  Nell, you're froze, too?"
+
+Helen nodded.  She was, indeed, as cold as she had ever been
+before.  But that did not prevent a strange warmness along
+her veins and a quickened pulse, the cause of which she did
+not conjecture.
+
+"Let's rustle," said Dale, and led the way out of the wood
+and skirted its edge around to the slope.  There they climbed
+to the flat, and went through the straggling line of trees
+to where the horses were tethered.
+
+Up here the wind began to blow, not hard through the forest,
+but still strong and steady out in the open, and bitterly
+cold.  Dale helped Bo to mount, and then Helen.
+
+"I'm -- numb," she said.  "I'll fall off -- sure."
+
+"No.  You'll be warm in a jiffy," he replied, "because we'll
+ride some goin' back.  Let Ranger pick the way an' you hang
+on."
+
+With Ranger's first jump Helen's blood began to run.  Out he
+shot, his lean, dark head beside Dale's horse.  The wild park
+lay clear and bright in the moonlight, with strange, silvery
+radiance on the grass.  The patches of timber, like spired
+black islands in a moon-blanched lake, seemed to harbor
+shadows, and places for bears to hide, ready to spring out.
+As Helen neared each little grove her pulses shook and her
+heart beat.  Half a mile of rapid riding burned out the cold.
+And all seemed glorious -- the sailing moon, white in a
+dark-blue sky, the white, passionless stars, so solemn, so
+far away, the beckoning fringe of forest-land at once
+mysterious and friendly, and the fleet horses, running with
+soft, rhythmic thuds over the grass, leaping the ditches and
+the hollows, making the bitter wind sting and cut.  Coming up
+that park the ride had been long; going back was as short as
+it was thrilling.  In Helen, experiences gathered realization
+slowly, and it was this swift ride, the horses neck and
+neck, and all the wildness and beauty, that completed the
+slow, insidious work of years.  The tears of excitement froze
+on her cheeks and her heart heaved full.  All that pertained
+to this night got into her blood.  It was only to feel, to
+live now, but it could be understood and remembered forever
+afterward.
+
+Dale's horse, a little in advance, sailed over a ditch.
+Ranger made a splendid leap, but he alighted among some
+grassy tufts and fell.  Helen shot over his head.  She struck
+lengthwise, her arms stretched, and slid hard to a shocking
+impact that stunned her.
+
+Bo's scream rang in her ears; she felt the wet grass under
+her face and then the strong hands that lifted her.  Dale
+loomed over her, bending down to look into her face; Bo was
+clutching her with frantic hands.  And Helen could only gasp.
+Her breast seemed caved in.  The need to breathe was torture.
+
+"Nell!  -- you're not hurt.  You fell light, like a feather.
+All grass here. . . .  You can't be hurt!" said Dale,
+sharply.
+
+His anxious voice penetrated beyond her hearing, and his
+strong hands went swiftly over her arms and shoulders,
+feeling for broken bones.
+
+"Just had the wind knocked out of you," went on Dale.  It
+feels awful, but it's nothin'."
+
+Helen got a little air, that was like hot pin-points in her
+lungs, and then a deeper breath, and then full, gasping
+respiration.
+
+"I guess -- I'm not hurt -- not a bit," she choked out.
+
+"You sure had a header.  Never saw a prettier spill.  Ranger
+doesn't do that often.  I reckon we were travelin' too fast.
+But it was fun, don't you think?"
+
+It was Bo who answered.  "Oh, glorious!  . . .  But, gee!  I was
+scared."
+
+Dale still held Helen's hands.  She released them while
+looking up at him.  The moment was realization for her of
+what for days had been a vague, sweet uncertainty, becoming
+near and strange, disturbing and present.  This accident had
+been a sudden, violent end to the wonderful ride.  But its
+effect, the knowledge of what had got into her blood, would
+never change.  And inseparable from it was this man of the
+forest.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+On the next morning Helen was awakened by what she imagined
+had been a dream of some one shouting.  With a start she sat
+up.  The sunshine showed pink and gold on the ragged spruce
+line of the mountain rims.  Bo was on her knees, braiding her
+hair with shaking hands, and at the same time trying to peep
+out.
+
+And the echoes of a ringing cry were cracking back from the
+cliffs.  That had been Dale's voice.
+
+"Nell!  Nell!  Wake up!" called Bo, wildly.  "Oh, some one's
+come!  Horses and men!"
+
+Helen got to her knees and peered out over Bo's shoulder.
+Dale, standing tall and striking beside the campfire, was
+waving his sombrero.  Away down the open edge of the park
+came a string of pack-burros with mounted men behind.  In the
+foremost rider Helen recognized Roy Beeman.
+
+"That first one's Roy!" she exclaimed.  "I'd never forget him
+on a horse. . . .  Bo, it must mean Uncle Al's come!"
+
+"Sure!  We're born lucky.  Here we are safe and sound -- and
+all this grand camp trip. . . .  Look at the cowboys. . . .
+LOOK!  Oh, maybe this isn't great!" babbled Bo.
+
+Dale wheeled to see the girls peeping out.
+
+"It's time you're up!" he called.  "Your uncle Al is here."
+
+For an instant after Helen sank back out of Dale's sight she
+sat there perfectly motionless, so struck was she by the
+singular tone of Dale's voice.  She imagined that he
+regretted what this visiting cavalcade of horsemen meant --
+they had come to take her to her ranch in Pine.  Helen's
+heart suddenly began to beat fast, but thickly, as if
+muffled within her breast.
+
+"Hurry now, girls," called Dale.
+
+Bo was already out, kneeling on the flat stone at the little
+brook, splashing water in a great hurry.  Helen's hands
+trembled so that she could scarcely lace her boots or brush
+her hair, and she was long behind Bo in making herself
+presentable.  When Helen stepped out, a short, powerfully
+built man in coarse garb and heavy boots stood holding Bo's
+hands.
+
+"Wal, wal!  You favor the Rayners," he was saying I remember
+your dad, an' a fine feller he was."
+
+Beside them stood Dale and Roy, and beyond was a group of
+horses and riders.
+
+"Uncle, here comes Nell," said Bo, softly.
+
+"Aw!" The old cattle-man breathed hard as he turned.
+
+Helen hurried.  She had not expected to remember this uncle,
+but one look into the brown, beaming face, with the blue
+eyes flashing, yet sad, and she recognized him, at the same
+instant recalling her mother.
+
+He held out his arms to receive her.
+
+"Nell Auchincloss all over again!" he exclaimed, in deep
+voice, as he kissed her.  "I'd have knowed you anywhere!"
+
+"Uncle Al!" murmured Helen.  "I remember you -- though I was
+only four."
+
+"Wal, wal, -- that's fine," he replied.  "I remember you
+straddled my knee once, an' your hair was brighter -- an'
+curly.  It ain't neither now. . . .  Sixteen years!  An' you're
+twenty now?  What a fine, broad-shouldered girl you are!  An',
+Nell, you're the handsomest Auchincloss I ever seen!"
+
+Helen found herself blushing, and withdrew her hands from
+his as Roy stepped forward to pay his respects.  He stood
+bareheaded, lean and tall, with neither his clear eyes nor
+his still face, nor the proffered hand expressing anything
+of the proven quality of fidelity, of achievement, that
+Helen sensed in him.
+
+"Howdy, Miss Helen?  Howdy, Bo?" he said.  "You all both look
+fine an' brown. . . .  I reckon I was shore slow rustlin'
+your uncle Al up here.  But I was figgerin' you'd like Milt's
+camp for a while."
+
+"We sure did," replied Bo, archly.
+
+"Aw!" breathed Auchincloss, heavily.  "Lemme set down."
+
+He drew the girls to the rustic seat Dale had built for them
+under the big pine.
+
+"Oh, you must be tired!  How -- how are you?" asked Helen,
+anxiously.
+
+"Tired!  Wal, if I am it's jest this here minit.  When Joe
+Beeman rode in on me with thet news of you -- wal, I jest
+fergot I was a worn-out old hoss.  Haven't felt so good in
+years.  Mebbe two such young an' pretty nieces will make a
+new man of me."
+
+"Uncle Al, you look strong and well to me," said Bo.  "And
+young, too, and --"
+
+"Haw!  Haw!  Thet 'll do," interrupted Al.  "I see through you.
+What you'll do to Uncle Al will be aplenty. . . .  Yes,
+girls, I'm feelin' fine.  But strange -- strange!  Mebbe
+thet's my joy at seein' you safe -- safe when I feared so
+thet damned greaser Beasley --"
+
+In Helen's grave gaze his face changed swiftly -- and all
+the serried years of toil and battle and privation showed,
+with something that was not age, nor resignation, yet as
+tragic as both.
+
+"Wal, never mind him -- now," he added, slowly, and the
+warmer light returned to his face.  "Dale -- come here."
+
+The hunter stepped closer.
+
+"I reckon I owe you more 'n I can ever pay," said
+Auchincloss, with an arm around each niece.
+
+"No, Al, you don't owe me anythin'," returned Dale,
+thoughtfully, as he looked away.
+
+"A-huh!" grunted Al.  "You hear him, girls. . . .  Now listen,
+you wild hunter.  An' you girls listen. . . .  Milt, I never
+thought you much good, 'cept for the wilds.  But I reckon
+I'll have to swallow thet.  I do.  Comin' to me as you did --
+an' after bein' druv off -- keepin' your council an' savin'
+my girls from thet hold-up, wal, it's the biggest deal any
+man ever did for me. . . .  An' I'm ashamed of my hard
+feelin's, an' here's my hand."
+
+"Thanks, Al," replied Dale, with his fleeting smile, and he
+met the proffered hand.  "Now, will you be makin' camp here?"
+
+"Wal, no.  I'll rest a little, an' you can pack the girls'
+outfit -- then we'll go.  Sure you're goin' with us?"
+
+"I'll call the girls to breakfast," replied Dale, and he
+moved away without answering Auchincloss's query.
+
+Helen divined that Dale did not mean to go down to Pine with
+them, and the knowledge gave her a blank feeling of
+surprise.  Had she expected him to go?
+
+"Come here, Jeff," called Al, to one of his men.
+
+A short, bow-legged horseman with dusty garb and
+sun-bleached face hobbled forth from the group.  He was not
+young, but he had a boyish grin and bright little eyes.
+Awkwardly he doffed his slouch sombrero.
+
+"Jeff, shake hands with my nieces," said Al.  "This 's Helen,
+an' your boss from now on.  An' this 's Bo, fer short.  Her
+name was Nancy, but when she lay a baby in her cradle I
+called her Bo-Peep, an' the name's stuck. . . .  Girls, this
+here's my foreman, Jeff Mulvey, who's been with me twenty
+years."
+
+The introduction caused embarrassment to all three
+principals, particularly to Jeff.
+
+"Jeff, throw the packs an' saddles fer a rest," was Al's
+order to his foreman.
+
+"Nell, reckon you'll have fun bossin' thet outfit," chuckled
+Al.  "None of 'em's got a wife.  Lot of scalawags they are; no
+women would have them!"
+
+"Uncle, I hope I'll never have to be their boss," replied
+Helen.
+
+"Wal, you're goin' to be, right off," declared Al.  "They
+ain't a bad lot, after all.  An' I got a likely new man."
+
+With that he turned to Bo, and, after studying her pretty
+face, he asked, in apparently severe tone, "Did you send a
+cowboy named Carmichael to ask me for a job?"
+
+Bo looked quite startled.
+
+"Carmichael!  Why, Uncle, I never heard that name before,"
+replied Bo, bewilderedly.
+
+"A-huh!  Reckoned the young rascal was lyin'," said
+Auchincloss.  "But I liked the fellar's looks an' so let him
+stay."
+
+Then the rancher turned to the group of lounging riders.
+
+"Las Vegas, come here," he ordered, in a loud voice.
+
+Helen thrilled at sight of a tall, superbly built cowboy
+reluctantly detaching himself from the group.  He had a
+red-bronze face, young like a boy's.  Helen recognized it,
+and the flowing red scarf, and the swinging gun, and the
+slow, spur-clinking gait.  No other than Bo's Las Vegas
+cowboy admirer!
+
+Then Helen flashed a look at Bo, which look gave her a
+delicious, almost irresistible desire to laugh.  That young
+lady also recognized the reluctant individual approaching
+with flushed and downcast face.  Helen recorded her first
+experience of Bo's utter discomfiture.  Bo turned white then
+red as a rose.
+
+"Say, my niece said she never heard of the name Carmichael,"
+declared Al, severely, as the cowboy halted before him.
+Helen knew her uncle had the repute of dealing hard with his
+men, but here she was reassured and pleased at the twinkle
+in his eye.
+
+"Shore, boss, I can't help thet," drawled the cowboy.  "It's
+good old Texas stock."
+
+He did not appear shamefaced now, but just as cool, easy,
+clear-eyed, and lazy as the day Helen had liked his warm
+young face and intent gaze.
+
+"Texas!  You fellars from the Pan Handle are always hollerin'
+Texas.  I never seen thet Texans had any one else beat -- say
+from Missouri," returned Al, testily.
+
+Carmichael maintained a discreet silence, and carefully
+avoided looking at the girls.
+
+"Wal, reckon we'll all call you Las Vegas, anyway,"
+continued the rancher.  "Didn't you say my niece sent you to
+me for a job?"
+
+Whereupon Carmichael's easy manner vanished.
+
+"Now, boss, shore my memory's pore," he said.  "I only says
+--"
+
+"Don't tell me thet.  My memory's not p-o-r-e," replied Al,
+mimicking the drawl.  "What you said was thet my niece would
+speak a good word for you."
+
+Here Carmichael stole a timid glance at Bo, the result of
+which was to render him utterly crestfallen.  Not improbably
+he had taken Bo's expression to mean something it did not,
+for Helen read it as a mingling of consternation and fright.
+Her eyes were big and blazing; a red spot was growing in
+each cheek as she gathered strength from his confusion.
+
+"Well, didn't you?" demanded Al.
+
+From the glance the old rancher shot from the cowboy to the
+others of his employ it seemed to Helen that they were
+having fun at Carmichael's expense.
+
+"Yes, sir, I did," suddenly replied the cowboy.
+
+"A-huh!  All right, here's my niece.  Now see thet she speaks
+the good word."
+
+Carmichael looked at Bo and Bo looked at him.  Their glances
+were strange, wondering, and they grew shy.  Bo dropped hers.
+The cowboy apparently forgot what had been demanded of him.
+
+Helen put a hand on the old rancher's arm.
+
+"Uncle, what happened was my fault," she said.  "The train
+stopped at Las Vegas.  This young man saw us at the open
+window.  He must have guessed we were lonely, homesick girls,
+getting lost in the West.  For he spoke to us -- nice and
+friendly.  He knew of you.  And he asked, in what I took for
+fun, if we thought you would give him a job.  And I replied,
+just to tease Bo, that she would surely speak a good word
+for him."
+
+"Haw!  Haw!  So thet's it," replied Al, and he turned to Bo
+with merry eyes.  "Wal, I kept this here Las Vegas Carmichael
+on his say-so.  Come on with your good word, unless you want
+to see him lose his job."
+
+Bo did not grasp her uncle's bantering, because she was
+seriously gazing at the cowboy.  But she had grasped
+something.
+
+"He -- he was the first person -- out West -- to speak
+kindly to us," she said, facing her uncle.
+
+"Wal, thet's a pretty good word, but it ain't enough,"
+responded Al.
+
+Subdued laughter came from the listening group.  Carmichael
+shifted from side to side.
+
+"He -- he looks as if he might ride a horse well," ventured
+Bo.
+
+"Best hossman I ever seen," agreed Al, heartily.
+
+"And -- and shoot?" added Bo, hopefully.
+
+"Bo, he packs thet gun low, like Jim Wilson an' all them
+Texas gun-fighters.  Reckon thet ain't no good word."
+
+"Then -- I'll vouch for him," said Bo, with finality.
+
+"Thet settles it." Auchincloss turned to the cowboy.  "Las
+Vegas, you're a stranger to us.  But you're welcome to a
+place in the outfit an' I hope you won't never disappoint
+us."
+
+Auchincloss's tone, passing from jest to earnest, betrayed
+to Helen the old rancher's need of new and true men, and
+hinted of trying days to come.
+
+Carmichael stood before Bo, sombrero in hand, rolling it
+round and round, manifestly bursting with words he could not
+speak.  And the girl looked very young and sweet with her
+flushed face and shining eyes.  Helen saw in the moment more
+than that little by-play of confusion.
+
+"Miss -- Miss Rayner -- I shore -- am obliged," he
+stammered, presently.
+
+"You're very welcome," she replied, softly.  "I -- I got on
+the next train," he added.
+
+When he said that Bo was looking straight at him, but she
+seemed not to have heard.
+
+"What's your name?" suddenly she asked.
+
+"Carmichael."
+
+"I heard that.  But didn't uncle call you Las Vegas?"
+
+"Shore.  But it wasn't my fault.  Thet cow-punchin' outfit
+saddled it on me, right off .  They Don't know no better.
+Shore I jest won't answer to thet handle. . . .  Now -- Miss
+Bo -- my real name is Tom."
+
+"I simply could not call you -- any name but Las Vegas,"
+replied Bo, very sweetly.
+
+"But -- beggin' your pardon -- I -- I don't like thet,"
+blustered Carmichael.
+
+"People often get called names -- they don't like," she
+said, with deep intent.
+
+The cowboy blushed scarlet.  Helen as well as he got Bo's
+inference to that last audacious epithet he had boldly
+called out as the train was leaving Las Vegas.  She also
+sensed something of the disaster in store for Mr.
+Carmichael.  Just then the embarrassed young man was saved by
+Dale's call to the girls to come to breakfast.
+
+That meal, the last for Helen in Paradise Park, gave rise to
+a strange and inexplicable restraint.  She had little to say.
+Bo was in the highest spirits, teasing the pets, joking with
+her uncle and Roy, and even poking fun at Dale.  The hunter
+seemed somewhat somber.  Roy was his usual dry, genial self.
+And Auchincloss, who sat near by, was an interested
+spectator.  When Tom put in an appearance, lounging with his
+feline grace into the camp, as if he knew he was a
+privileged pet, the rancher could scarcely contain himself.
+
+"Dale, it's thet damn cougar!" he ejaculated.
+
+"Sure, that's Tom."
+
+"He ought to be corralled or chained.  I've no use for
+cougars," protested Al.
+
+"Tom is as tame an' safe as a kitten."
+
+"A-huh!  Wal, you tell thet to the girls if you like.  But not
+me!  I'm an old hoss, I am."
+
+"Uncle Al, Tom sleeps curled up at the foot of my bed," said
+Bo.
+
+"Aw -- what?"
+
+"Honest Injun," she responded.  "Well, isn't it so?"
+
+Helen smilingly nodded her corroboration.  Then Bo called Tom
+to her and made him lie with his head on his stretched paws,
+right beside her, and beg for bits to eat.
+
+"Wal!  I'd never have believed thet!" exclaimed Al, shaking
+his big head.  "Dale, it's one on me.  I've had them big cats
+foller me on the trails, through the woods, moonlight an'
+dark.  An' I've heard 'em let out thet awful cry.  They ain't
+any wild sound on earth thet can beat a cougar's.  Does this
+Tom ever let out one of them wails?"
+
+"Sometimes at night," replied Dale.
+
+"Wal, excuse me.  Hope you don't fetch the yaller rascal down
+to Pine."
+
+"I won't."
+
+"What'll you do with this menagerie?"
+
+Dale regarded the rancher attentively.  "Reckon, Al, I'll
+take care of them."
+
+"But you're goin' down to my ranch."
+
+"What for?"
+
+Al scratched his head and gazed perplexedly at the hunter.
+"Wal, ain't it customary to visit friends?"
+
+"Thanks, Al.  Next time I ride down Pine way -- in the
+spring, perhaps -- I'll run over an' see how you are."
+
+"Spring!" ejaculated Auchincloss.  Then he shook his head
+sadly and a far-away look filmed his eyes.  "Reckon you'd
+call some late."
+
+"Al, you'll get well now.  These, girls -- now -- they'll
+cure you.  Reckon I never saw you look so good."
+
+Auchincloss did not press his point farther at that time,
+but after the meal, when the other men came to see Dale's
+camp and pets, Helen's quick ears caught the renewal of the
+subject.
+
+"I'm askin' you -- will you come?" Auchincloss said, low and
+eagerly.
+
+"No.  I wouldn't fit in down there," replied Dale.
+
+"Milt, talk sense.  You can't go on forever huntin' bear an'
+tamin' cats," protested the old rancher.
+
+"Why not?" asked the hunter, thoughtfully.
+
+Auchincloss stood up and, shaking himself as if to ward off
+his testy temper, he put a hand on Dale's arm.
+
+"One reason is you're needed in Pine."
+
+"How?  Who needs me?"
+
+"I do.  I'm playin' out fast.  An' Beasley's my enemy.  The
+ranch an' all I got will go to Nell.  Thet ranch will have to
+be run by a man an' HELD by a man.  Do you savvy?  It's a big
+job.  An' I'm offerin' to make you my foreman right now."
+
+"Al, you sort of take my breath," replied Dale.  "An' I'm
+sure grateful.  But the fact is, even if I could handle the
+job, I -- I don't believe I'd want to."
+
+"Make yourself want to, then.  Thet 'd soon come.  You'd get
+interested.  This country will develop.  I seen thet years
+ago.  The government is goin' to chase the Apaches out of
+here.  Soon homesteaders will be flockin' in.  Big future,
+Dale.  You want to get in now.  An' --"
+
+Here Auchincloss hesitated, then spoke lower:
+
+"An' take your chance with the girl!  . . .  I'll be on your
+side."
+
+A slight vibrating start ran over Dale's stalwart form.
+
+"Al -- you're plumb dotty!" he exclaimed.
+
+"Dotty!  Me?  Dotty!" ejaculated Auchincloss.  Then he swore.
+"In a minit I'll tell you what you are."
+
+"But, Al, that talk's so -- so -- like an old fool's."
+
+"Huh!  An' why so?"
+
+"Because that -- wonderful girl would never look at me,"
+Dale replied, simply.
+
+"I seen her lookin' already," declared Al, bluntly.
+
+Dale shook his head as if arguing with the old rancher was
+hopeless.
+
+"Never mind thet," went on Al.  "Mebbe I am a dotty old fool
+-- 'specially for takin' a shine to you.  But I say again --
+will you come down to Pine and be my foreman?"
+
+"No," replied Dale.
+
+"Milt, I've no son -- an' I'm -- afraid of Beasley." This
+was uttered in an agitated whisper.
+
+"Al, you make me ashamed," said Dale, hoarsely.  "I can't
+come.  I've no nerve."
+
+"You've no what?"
+
+"Al, I don't know what's wrong with me.  But I'm afraid I'd
+find out if I came down there."
+
+"A-huh!  It's the girl!"
+
+"I don't know, but I'm afraid so.  An' I won't come."
+
+"Aw yes, you will --"
+
+Helen rose with beating heart and tingling ears, and moved
+away out of hearing.  She had listened too long to what had
+not been intended for her ears, yet she could not be sorry.
+She walked a few rods along the brook, out from under the
+pines, and, standing in the open edge of the park, she felt
+the beautiful scene still her agitation.  The following
+moments, then, were the happiest she had spent in Paradise
+Park, and the profoundest of her whole life.
+
+Presently her uncle called her.
+
+"Nell, this here hunter wants to give you thet black hoss.
+An' I say you take him."
+
+"Ranger deserves better care than I can give him," said
+Dale.  "He runs free in the woods most of the time.  I'd be
+obliged if she'd have him.  An' the hound, Pedro, too."
+
+Bo swept a saucy glance from Dale to her sister.
+
+"Sure she'll have Ranger.  Just offer him to ME!"
+
+Dale stood there expectantly, holding a blanket in his hand,
+ready to saddle the horse.  Carmichael walked around Ranger
+with that appraising eye so keen in cowboys.
+
+"Las Vegas, do you know anything about horses?" asked Bo.
+
+"Me!  Wal, if you ever buy or trade a hoss you shore have me
+there," replied Carmichael.
+
+"What do you think of Ranger?" went on Bo.
+
+"Shore I'd buy him sudden, if I could."
+
+"Mr.  Las Vegas, you're too late," asserted Helen, as she
+advanced to lay a hand on the horse.
+
+"Ranger is mine."
+
+Dale smoothed out the blanket and, folding it, he threw it
+over the horse; and then with one powerful swing he set the
+saddle in place.
+
+"Thank you very much for him," said Helen, softly.
+
+"You're welcome, an' I'm sure glad," responded Dale, and
+then, after a few deft, strong pulls at the straps, he
+continued.  "There, he's ready for you."
+
+With that he laid an arm over the saddle, and faced Helen as
+she stood patting and smoothing Ranger.  Helen, strong and
+calm now, in feminine possession of her secret and his, as
+well as her composure, looked frankly and steadily at Dale.
+He seemed composed, too, yet the bronze of his fine face was
+a trifle pale.
+
+"But I can't thank you -- I'll never be able to repay you --
+for your service to me and my sister," said Helen.
+
+"I reckon you needn't try," Dale returned.  "An' my service,
+as you call it, has been good for me."
+
+"Are you going down to Pine with us?"
+
+"No."
+
+"But you will come soon?"
+
+"Not very soon, I reckon," he replied, and averted his gaze.
+
+"When?"
+
+"Hardly before spring."
+
+"Spring?  . . .  That is a long time.  Won't you come to see me
+sooner than that?"
+
+"If I can get down to Pine."
+
+"You're the first friend I've made in the West," said Helen,
+earnestly.
+
+"You'll make many more -- an' I reckon soon forget him you
+called the man of the forest."
+
+"I never forget any of my friends.  And you've been the --
+the biggest friend I ever had."
+
+"I'll be proud to remember."
+
+"But will you remember -- will you promise to come to Pine?"
+
+"I reckon."
+
+"Thank you.  All's well, then. . . .  My friend, goodby."
+
+"Good-by," he said, clasping her hand.  His glance was clear,
+warm, beautiful, yet it was sad.
+
+Auchincloss's hearty voice broke the spell.  Then Helen saw
+that the others were mounted.  Bo had ridden up close; her
+face was earnest and happy and grieved all at once, as she
+bade good-by to Dale.  The pack-burros were hobbling along
+toward the green slope.  Helen was the last to mount, but Roy
+was the last to leave the hunter.  Pedro came reluctantly.
+
+It was a merry, singing train which climbed that brown
+odorous trail, under the dark spruces.  Helen assuredly was
+happy, yet a pang abided in her breast.
+
+She remembered that half-way up the slope there was a turn
+in the trail where it came out upon an open bluff.  The time
+seemed long, but at last she got there.  And she checked
+Ranger so as to have a moment's gaze down into the park.
+
+It yawned there, a dark-green and bright-gold gulf, asleep
+under a westering sun, exquisite, wild, lonesome.  Then she
+saw Dale standing in the open space between the pines and
+the spruces.  He waved to her.  And she returned the salute.
+
+Roy caught up with her then and halted his horse.  He waved
+his sombrero to Dale and let out a piercing yell that awoke
+the sleeping echoes, splitting strangely from cliff to cliff
+.
+
+"Shore Milt never knowed what it was to be lonesome," said
+Roy, as if thinking aloud.  "But he'll know now."
+
+Ranger stepped out of his own accord and, turning off the
+ledge, entered the spruce forest.  Helen lost sight of
+Paradise Park.  For hours then she rode along a shady,
+fragrant trail, seeing the beauty of color and wildness,
+hearing the murmur and rush and roar of water, but all the
+while her mind revolved the sweet and momentous realization
+which had thrilled her -- that the hunter, this strange man
+of the forest, so deeply versed in nature and so unfamiliar
+with emotion, aloof and simple and strong like the elements
+which had developed him, had fallen in love with her and did
+not know it.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+Dale stood with face and arm upraised, and he watched Helen
+ride off the ledge to disappear in the forest.  That vast
+spruce slope seemed to have swallowed her.  She was gone!
+Slowly Dale lowered his arm with gesture expressive of a
+strange finality, an eloquent despair, of which he was
+unconscious.
+
+He turned to the park, to his camp, and the many duties of a
+hunter.  The park did not seem the same, nor his home, nor
+his work.
+
+"I reckon this feelin's natural," he soliloquized,
+resignedly, "but it's sure queer for me.  That's what comes
+of makin' friends.  Nell an' Bo, now, they made a difference,
+an' a difference I never knew before."
+
+He calculated that this difference had been simply one of
+responsibility, and then the charm and liveliness of the
+companionship of girls, and finally friendship.  These would
+pass now that the causes were removed.
+
+Before he had worked an hour around camp he realized a
+change had come, but it was not the one anticipated.  Always
+before he had put his mind on his tasks, whatever they might
+be; now he worked while his thoughts were strangely
+involved.
+
+The little bear cub whined at his heels; the tame deer
+seemed to regard him with deep, questioning eyes, the big
+cougar padded softly here and there as if searching for
+something.
+
+"You all miss them -- now -- I reckon," said Dale.  "Well,
+they're gone an' you'll have to get along with me."
+
+Some vague approach to irritation with his pets surprised
+him.  Presently he grew both irritated and surprised with
+himself -- a state of mind totally unfamiliar.  Several
+times, as old habit brought momentary abstraction, he found
+himself suddenly looking around for Helen and Bo.  And each
+time the shock grew stronger.  They were gone, but their
+presence lingered.  After his camp chores were completed he
+went over to pull down the lean-to which the girls had
+utilized as a tent.  The spruce boughs had dried out brown
+and sear; the wind had blown the roof awry; the sides were
+leaning in.  As there was now no further use for this little
+habitation, he might better pull it down.  Dale did not
+acknowledge that his gaze had involuntarily wandered toward
+it many times.  Therefore he strode over with the intention
+of destroying it.
+
+For the first time since Roy and he had built the lean-to he
+stepped inside.  Nothing was more certain than the fact that
+he experienced a strange sensation, perfectly
+incomprehensible to him.  The blankets lay there on the
+spruce boughs, disarranged and thrown back by hurried hands,
+yet still holding something of round folds where the slender
+forms had nestled.  A black scarf often worn by Bo lay
+covering the pillow of pine-needles; a red ribbon that Helen
+had worn on her hair hung from a twig.  These articles were
+all that had been forgotten.  Dale gazed at them attentively,
+then at the blankets, and all around the fragrant little
+shelter; and he stepped outside with an uncomfortable
+knowledge that he could not destroy the place where Helen
+and Bo had spent so many hours.
+
+Whereupon, in studious mood, Dale took up his rifle and
+strode out to hunt.  His winter supply of venison had not yet
+been laid in.  Action suited his mood; he climbed far and
+passed by many a watching buck to slay which seemed murder;
+at last he jumped one that was wild and bounded away.  This
+he shot, and set himself a Herculean task in packing the
+whole carcass back to camp.  Burdened thus, be staggered
+under the trees, sweating freely, many times laboring for
+breath, aching with toil, until at last he had reached camp.
+There he slid the deer carcass off his shoulders, and,
+standing over it, he gazed down while his breast labored.  It
+was one of the finest young bucks he had ever seen.  But
+neither in stalking it, nor making a wonderful shot, nor in
+packing home a weight that would have burdened two men, nor
+in gazing down at his beautiful quarry, did Dale experience
+any of the old joy of the hunter.
+
+"I'm a little off my feed," he mused, as he wiped sweat from
+his heated face.  "Maybe a little dotty, as I called Al.  But
+that'll pass."
+
+Whatever his state, it did not pass.  As of old, after a long
+day's hunt, he reclined beside the camp-fire and watched the
+golden sunset glows change on the ramparts; as of old he
+laid a hand on the soft, furry head of the pet cougar; as of
+old he watched the gold change to red and then to dark, and
+twilight fall like a blanket; as of old he listened to the
+dreamy, lulling murmur of the water fall.  The old familiar
+beauty, wildness, silence, and loneliness were there, but
+the old content seemed strangely gone.
+
+Soberly he confessed then that he missed the happy company
+of the girls.  He did not distinguish Helen from Bo in his
+slow introspection.  When he sought his bed he did not at
+once fall to sleep.  Always, after a few moments of
+wakefulness, while the silence settled down or the wind
+moaned through the pines, he had fallen asleep.  This night
+he found different.  Though he was tired, sleep would not
+soon come.  The wilderness, the mountains, the park, the camp
+-- all seemed to have lost something.  Even the darkness
+seemed empty.  And when at length Dale fell asleep it was to
+be troubled by restless dreams.
+
+Up with the keen-edged, steely-bright dawn, he went at the
+his tasks with the springy stride of the deer-stalker.
+
+At the end of that strenuous day, which was singularly full
+of the old excitement and action and danger, and of new
+observations, he was bound to confess that no longer did the
+chase suffice for him.
+
+Many times on the heights that day, with the wind keen in
+his face, and the vast green billows of spruce below him, he
+had found that be was gazing without seeing, halting without
+object, dreaming as he had never dreamed before.
+
+Once, when a magnificent elk came out upon a rocky ridge
+and, whistling a challenge to invisible rivals, stood there
+a target to stir any hunter's pulse, Dale did not even raise
+his rifle.  Into his ear just then rang Helen's voice: "Milt
+Dale, you are no Indian.  Giving yourself to a hunter's
+wildlife is selfish.  It is wrong.  You love this lonely life,
+but it is not work.  Work that does not help others is not a
+real man's work."
+
+From that moment conscience tormented him.  It was not what
+he loved, but what he ought to do, that counted in the sum
+of good achieved in the world.  Old Al Auchincloss had been
+right.  Dale was wasting strength and intelligence that
+should go to do his share in the development of the West.
+Now that he had reached maturity, if through his knowledge
+of nature's law he had come to see the meaning of the strife
+of men for existence, for place, for possession, and to hold
+them in contempt, that was no reason why he should keep
+himself aloof from them, from some work that was needed in
+an incomprehensible world.
+
+Dale did not hate work, but he loved freedom.  To be alone,
+to live with nature, to feel the elements, to labor and
+dream and idle and climb and sleep unhampered by duty, by
+worry, by restriction, by the petty interests of men -- this
+had always been his ideal of living.  Cowboys, riders,
+sheep-herders, farmers -- these toiled on from one place and
+one job to another for the little money doled out to them.
+Nothing beautiful, nothing significant had ever existed in
+that for him.  He had worked as a boy at every kind of
+range-work, and of all that humdrum waste of effort he had
+liked sawing wood best.  Once he had quit a job of branding
+cattle because the smell of burning hide, the bawl of the
+terrified calf, had sickened him.  If men were honest there
+would be no need to scar cattle.  He had never in the least
+desired to own land and droves of stock, and make deals with
+ranchmen, deals advantageous to himself.  Why should a man
+want to make a deal or trade a horse or do a piece of work
+to another man's disadvantage?  Self-preservation was the
+first law of life.  But as the plants and trees and birds and
+beasts interpreted that law, merciless and inevitable as
+they were, they had neither greed nor dishonesty.  They lived
+by the grand rule of what was best for the greatest number.
+
+But Dale's philosophy, cold and clear and inevitable, like
+nature itself, began to be pierced by the human appeal in
+Helen Rayner's words.  What did she mean?  Not that he should
+lose his love of the wilderness, but that he realize
+himself!  Many chance words of that girl had depth.  He was
+young, strong, intelligent, free from taint of disease or
+the fever of drink.  He could do something for others.  Who?
+If that mattered, there, for instance, was poor old Mrs.
+Cass, aged and lame now; there was Al Auchincloss, dying in
+his boots, afraid of enemies, and wistful for his blood and
+his property to receive the fruit of his labors; there were
+the two girls, Helen and Bo, new and strange to the West,
+about to be confronted by a big problem of ranch life and
+rival interests.  Dale thought of still more people in the
+little village of Pine -- of others who had failed, whose
+lives were hard, who could have been made happier by
+kindness and assistance.
+
+What, then, was the duty of Milt Dale to himself?  Because
+men preyed on one another and on the weak, should he turn
+his back upon a so-called civilization or should he grow
+like them?  Clear as a bell came the answer that his duty was
+to do neither.  And then he saw how the little village of
+Pine, as well as the whole world, needed men like him.  He
+had gone to nature, to the forest, to the wilderness for his
+development; and all the judgments and efforts of his future
+would be a result of that education.
+
+Thus Dale, lying in the darkness and silence of his lonely
+park, arrived at a conclusion that he divined was but the
+beginning of a struggle.
+
+It took long introspection to determine the exact nature of
+that struggle, but at length it evolved into the paradox
+that Helen Rayner had opened his eyes to his duty as a man,
+that he accepted it, yet found a strange obstacle in the
+perplexing, tumultuous, sweet fear of ever going near her
+again.
+
+Suddenly, then, all his thought revolved around the girl,
+and, thrown off his balance, he weltered in a wilderness of
+unfamiliar strange ideas.
+
+When he awoke next day the fight was on in earnest.  In his
+sleep his mind had been active.  The idea that greeted him,
+beautiful as the sunrise, flashed in memory of Auchincloss's
+significant words, "Take your chance with the girl!"
+
+The old rancher was in his dotage.  He hinted of things
+beyond the range of possibility.  That idea of a chance for
+Dale remained before his consciousness only an instant.
+Stars were unattainable; life could not be fathomed; the
+secret of nature did not abide alone on the earth -- these
+theories were not any more impossible of proving than that
+Helen Rayner might be for him.
+
+Nevertheless, her strange coming into his life had played
+havoc, the extent of which he had only begun to realize.
+
+
+For a month he tramped through the forest.  It was October, a
+still golden, fulfilling season of the year; and everywhere
+in the vast dark green a glorious blaze of oak and aspen
+made beautiful contrast.  He carried his rifle, but he never
+used it.  He would climb miles and go this way and that with
+no object in view.  Yet his eye and ear had never been
+keener.  Hours he would spend on a promontory, watching.  the
+distance, where the golden patches of aspen shone bright out
+of dark-green mountain slopes.  He loved to fling himself
+down in an aspen-grove at the edge of a senaca, and there
+lie in that radiance like a veil of gold and purple and red,
+with the white tree-trunks striping the shade.  Always,
+whether there were breeze or not, the aspen-leaves quivered,
+ceaselessly, wonderfully, like his pulses, beyond his
+control.  Often he reclined against a mossy rock beside a
+mountain stream to listen, to watch, to feel all that was
+there, while his mind held a haunting, dark-eyed vision of a
+girl.  On the lonely heights, like an eagle, he sat gazing
+down into Paradise Park, that was more and more beautiful,
+but would never again be the same, never fill him with
+content, never be all and all to him.
+
+Late in October the first snow fell.  It melted at once on
+the south side of the park, but the north slopes and the
+rims and domes above stayed white.
+
+Dale had worked quick and hard at curing and storing his
+winter supply of food, and now he spent days chopping and
+splitting wood to burn during the months he would be
+snowed-in.  He watched for the dark-gray, fast-scudding
+storm-clouds, and welcomed them when they came.  Once there
+lay ten feet of snow on the trails he would be snowed-in
+until spring.  It would be impossible to go down to Pine.  And
+perhaps during the long winter he would be cured of this
+strange, nameless disorder of his feelings.
+
+November brought storms up on the peaks.  Flurries of snow
+fell in the park every day, but the sunny south side, where
+Dale's camp lay, retained its autumnal color and warmth.  Not
+till late in winter did the snow creep over this secluded
+nook.
+
+The morning came at last, piercingly keen and bright, when
+Dale saw that the heights were impassable; the realization
+brought him a poignant regret.  He had not guessed how he had
+wanted to see Helen Rayner again until it was too late.  That
+opened his eyes.  A raging frenzy of action followed, in
+which he only tired himself physically without helping
+himself spiritually.
+
+It was sunset when he faced the west, looking up at the pink
+snow-domes and the dark-golden fringe of spruce, and in that
+moment he found the truth.
+
+"I love that girl!  I love that girl!" he spoke aloud, to the
+distant white peaks, to the winds, to the loneliness and
+silence of his prison, to the great pines and to the
+murmuring stream, and to his faithful pets.  It was his
+tragic confession of weakness, of amazing truth, of hopeless
+position, of pitiful excuse for the transformation wrought
+in him.
+
+Dale's struggle ended there when he faced his soul.  To
+understand himself was to be released from strain, worry,
+ceaseless importuning doubt and wonder and fear.  But the
+fever of unrest, of uncertainty, had been nothing compared
+to a sudden upflashing torment of love.
+
+With somber deliberation he set about the tasks needful, and
+others that he might make -- his camp-fires and meals, the
+care of his pets and horses, the mending of saddles and
+pack-harness, the curing of buckskin for moccasins and
+hunting-suits.  So his days were not idle.  But all this work
+was habit for him and needed no application of mind.
+
+And Dale, like some men of lonely wilderness lives who did
+not retrograde toward the savage, was a thinker.  Love made
+him a sufferer.
+
+The surprise and shame of his unconscious surrender, the
+certain hopelessness of it, the long years of communion with
+all that was wild, lonely, and beautiful, the wonderfully
+developed insight into nature's secrets, and the
+sudden-dawning revelation that he was no omniscient being
+exempt from the ruthless ordinary destiny of man -- all
+these showed him the strength of his manhood and of his
+passion, and that the life he had chosen was of all lives
+the one calculated to make love sad and terrible.
+
+Helen Rayner haunted him.  In the sunlight there was not a
+place around camp which did not picture her lithe, vigorous
+body, her dark, thoughtful eyes, her eloquent, resolute
+lips, and the smile that was so sweet and strong.  At night
+she was there like a slender specter, pacing beside him
+under the moaning pines.  Every camp-fire held in its heart
+the glowing white radiance of her spirit.
+
+Nature had taught Dale to love solitude and silence, but
+love itself taught him their meaning.  Solitude had been
+created for the eagle on his crag, for the blasted mountain
+fir, lonely and gnarled on its peak, for the elk and the
+wolf.  But it had not been intended for man.  And to live
+always in the silence of wild places was to become obsessed
+with self -- to think and dream -- to be happy, which state,
+however pursued by man, was not good for him.  Man must be
+given imperious longings for the unattainable.
+
+It needed, then, only the memory of an unattainable woman to
+render solitude passionately desired by a man, yet almost
+unendurable.  Dale was alone with his secret; and every pine,
+everything in that park saw him shaken and undone.
+
+In the dark, pitchy deadness of night, when there was no
+wind and the cold on the peaks had frozen the waterfall,
+then the silence seemed insupportable.  Many hours that
+should have been given to slumber were paced out under the
+cold, white, pitiless stars, under the lonely pines.
+
+Dale's memory betrayed him, mocked his restraint, cheated
+him of any peace; and his imagination, sharpened by love,
+created pictures, fancies, feelings, that drove him frantic.
+
+He thought of Helen Rayner's strong, shapely brown hand.  In
+a thousand different actions it haunted him.  How quick and
+deft in camp-fire tasks!  how graceful and swift as she
+plaited her dark hair!  how tender and skilful in its
+ministration when one of his pets had been injured!  how
+eloquent when pressed tight against her breast in a moment
+of fear on the dangerous heights!  how expressive of
+unutterable things when laid on his arm!
+
+Dale saw that beautiful hand slowly creep up his arm, across
+his shoulder, and slide round his neck to clasp there.  He
+was powerless to inhibit the picture.  And what he felt then
+was boundless, unutterable.  No woman had ever yet so much as
+clasped his hand, and heretofore no such imaginings had ever
+crossed his mind, yet deep in him, somewhere hidden, had
+been this waiting, sweet, and imperious need.  In the bright
+day he appeared to ward off such fancies, but at night he
+was helpless.  And every fancy left him weaker, wilder.
+
+When, at the culmination of this phase of his passion, Dale,
+who had never known the touch of a woman's lips, suddenly
+yielded to the illusion of Helen Rayner's kisses, he found
+himself quite mad, filled with rapture and despair, loving
+her as he hated himself.  It seemed as if he had experienced
+all these terrible feelings in some former life and had
+forgotten them in this life.  He had no right to think of
+her, but he could not resist it.  Imagining the sweet
+surrender of her lips was a sacrilege, yet here, in spite of
+will and honor and shame, he was lost.
+
+Dale, at length, was vanquished, and he ceased to rail at
+himself, or restrain his fancies.  He became a dreamy,
+sad-eyed, camp-fire gazer, like many another lonely man,
+separated, by chance or error, from what the heart hungered
+most for.  But this great experience, when all its
+significance had clarified in his mind, immeasurably
+broadened his understanding of the principles of nature
+applied to life.
+
+Love had been in him stronger than in most men, because of
+his keen, vigorous, lonely years in the forest, where health
+of mind and body were intensified and preserved.  How simple,
+how natural, how inevitable!  He might have loved any
+fine-spirited, healthy-bodied girl.  Like a tree shooting its
+branches and leaves, its whole entity, toward the sunlight,
+so had he grown toward a woman's love.  Why?  Because the
+thing he revered in nature, the spirit, the universal, the
+life that was God, had created at his birth or before his
+birth the three tremendous instincts of nature -- to fight
+for life, to feed himself, to reproduce his kind.  That was
+all there was to it.  But oh!  the mystery, the beauty, the
+torment, and the terror of this third instinct -- this
+hunger for the sweetness and the glory of a woman's love!
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+Helen Rayner dropped her knitting into her lap and sat
+pensively gazing out of the window over the bare yellow
+ranges of her uncle's ranch.
+
+The winter day was bright, but steely, and the wind that
+whipped down from the white-capped mountains had a keen,
+frosty edge.  A scant snow lay in protected places; cattle
+stood bunched in the lee of ridges; low sheets of dust
+scurried across the flats.
+
+The big living-room of the ranch-house was warm and
+comfortable with its red adobe walls, its huge stone
+fireplace where cedar logs blazed, and its many-colored
+blankets.  Bo Rayner sat before the fire, curled up in an
+armchair, absorbed in a book.  On the floor lay the hound
+Pedro, his racy, fine head stretched toward the warmth.
+
+"Did uncle call?" asked Helen, with a start out of her
+reverie.
+
+"I didn't hear him," replied Bo.
+
+Helen rose to tiptoe across the floor, and, softly parting
+some curtains, she looked into the room where her uncle lay.
+He was asleep.  Sometimes he called out in his slumbers.  For
+weeks now he had been confined to his bed, slowly growing
+weaker.  With a sigh Helen returned to her window-seat and
+took up her work.
+
+"Bo, the sun is bright," she said.  "The days are growing
+longer.  I'm so glad."
+
+"Nell, you're always wishing time away.  For me it passes
+quickly enough," replied the sister.
+
+"But I love spring and summer and fall -- and I guess I hate
+winter," returned Helen, thoughtfully.
+
+The yellow ranges rolled away up to the black ridges and
+they in turn swept up to the cold, white mountains.  Helen's
+gaze seemed to go beyond that snowy barrier.  And Bo's keen
+eyes studied her sister's earnest, sad face.
+
+"Nell, do you ever think of Dale?" she queried, suddenly.
+
+The question startled Helen.  A slow blush suffused neck and
+cheek.
+
+"Of course," she replied, as if surprised that Bo should ask
+such a thing.
+
+"I -- I shouldn't have asked that," said Bo, softly, and
+then bent again over her book.
+
+Helen gazed tenderly at that bright, bowed head.  In this
+swift-flying, eventful, busy winter, during which the
+management of the ranch had devolved wholly upon Helen, the
+little sister had grown away from her.  Bo had insisted upon
+her own free will and she had followed it, to the amusement
+of her uncle, to the concern of Helen, to the dismay and
+bewilderment of the faithful Mexican housekeeper, and to the
+undoing of all the young men on the ranch.
+
+Helen had always been hoping and waiting for a favorable
+hour in which she might find this wilful sister once more
+susceptible to wise and loving influence.  But while she
+hesitated to speak, slow footsteps and a jingle of spurs
+sounded without, and then came a timid knock.  Bo looked up
+brightly and ran to open the door.
+
+"Oh!  It's only -- YOU!" she uttered, in withering scorn, to
+the one who knocked.
+
+Helen thought she could guess who that was.
+
+"How are you-all?" asked a drawling voice.
+
+"Well, Mister Carmichael, if that interests you -- I'm quite
+ill," replied Bo, freezingly.
+
+"Ill!  Aw no, now?"
+
+"It's a fact.  If I don't die right off I'll have to be taken
+back to Missouri," said Bo, casually.
+
+"Are you goin' to ask me in?" queried Carmichael, bluntly.
+"It's cold -- an' I've got somethin' to say to --"
+
+"To ME?  Well, you're not backward, I declare," retorted Bo.
+
+"Miss Rayner, I reckon it 'll be strange to you -- findin'
+out I didn't come to see you."
+
+"Indeed!  No.  But what was strange was the deluded idea I had
+-- that you meant to apologize to me -- like a gentleman. .
+. .Come in, Mr.  Carmichael.  My sister is here."
+
+The door closed as Helen turned round.  Carmichael stood just
+inside with his sombrero in hand, and as he gazed at Bo his
+lean face seemed hard.  In the few months since autumn he had
+changed -- aged, it seemed, and the once young, frank,
+alert, and careless cowboy traits had merged into the making
+of a man.  Helen knew just how much of a man he really was.
+He had been her mainstay during all the complex working of
+the ranch that had fallen upon her shoulders.
+
+"Wal, I reckon you was deluded, all right -- if you thought
+I'd crawl like them other lovers of yours," he said, with
+cool deliberation.
+
+Bo turned pale, and her eyes fairly blazed, yet even in what
+must have been her fury Helen saw amaze and pain.
+
+"OTHER lovers?  I think the biggest delusion here is the way
+you flatter yourself," replied Bo, stingingly.
+
+"Me flatter myself?  Nope.  You don't savvy me.  I'm shore
+hatin' myself these days."
+
+"Small wonder.  I certainly hate you -- with all my heart!"
+
+At this retort the cowboy dropped his head and did not see
+Bo flaunt herself out of the room.  But he heard the door
+close, and then slowly came toward Helen.
+
+"Cheer up, Las Vegas," said Helen, smiling.  "Bo's
+hot-tempered."
+
+"Miss Nell, I'm just like a dog.  The meaner she treats me
+the more I love her," he replied, dejectedly.
+
+To Helen's first instinct of liking for this cowboy there
+had been added admiration, respect, and a growing
+appreciation of strong, faithful, developing character.
+Carmichael's face and hands were red and chapped from winter
+winds; the leather of wrist-bands, belt, and boots was all
+worn shiny and thin; little streaks of dust fell from him as
+he breathed heavily.  He no longer looked the dashing cowboy,
+ready for a dance or lark or fight.
+
+"How in the world did you offend her so?" asked Helen.  "Bo
+is furious.  I never saw her so angry as that."
+
+"Miss Nell, it was jest this way," began Carmichael.  "Shore
+Bo's knowed I was in love with her.  I asked her to marry me
+an' she wouldn't say yes or no. . . .  An', mean as it sounds
+-- she never run away from it, thet's shore.  We've had some
+quarrels -- two of them bad, an' this last's the worst."
+
+"Bo told me about one quarrel," said Helen.  "It was --
+because you drank -- that time."
+
+"Shore it was.  She took one of her cold spells an' I jest
+got drunk."
+
+"But that was wrong," protested Helen.
+
+"I ain't so shore.  You see, I used to get drunk often --
+before I come here.  An' I've been drunk only once.  Back at
+Las Vegas the outfit would never believe thet.  Wal, I
+promised Bo I wouldn't do it again, an' I've kept my word."
+
+"That is fine of you.  But tell me, why is she angry now?"
+
+"Bo makes up to all the fellars," confessed Carmichael,
+hanging his head.  "I took her to the dance last week -- over
+in the town-hall.  Thet's the first time she'd gone anywhere
+with me.  I shore was proud. . . .  But thet dance was hell.
+Bo carried on somethin' turrible, an' I --"
+
+"Tell me.  What did she do?" demanded Helen, anxiously.  "I'm
+responsible for her.  I've got to see that she behaves."
+
+"Aw, I ain't sayin' she didn't behave like a lady," replied
+Carmichael.  "It was -- she -- wal, all them fellars are
+fools over her -- an' Bo wasn't true to me."
+
+"My dear boy, is Bo engaged to you?"
+
+"Lord -- if she only was!" he sighed.
+
+"Then how can you say she wasn't true to you?  Be
+reasonable."
+
+"I reckon now, Miss Nell, thet no one can be in love an' act
+reasonable," rejoined the cowboy.  "I don't know how to
+explain, but the fact is I feel thet Bo has played the --
+the devil with me an' all the other fellars."
+
+"You mean she has flirted?"
+
+"I reckon."
+
+"Las Vegas, I'm afraid you're right," said Helen, with
+growing apprehension.  "Go on.  Tell me what's happened."
+
+"Wal, thet Turner boy, who rides for Beasley, he was hot
+after Bo," returned Carmichael, and he spoke as if memory
+hurt him.  "Reckon I've no use for Turner.  He's a
+fine-lookin', strappin', big cow-puncher, an' calculated to
+win the girls.  He brags thet he can, an' I reckon he's
+right.  Wal, he was always hangin' round Bo.  An' he stole one
+of my dances with Bo.  I only had three, an' he comes up to
+say this one was his; Bo, very innocent -- oh, she's a cute
+one!  -- she says, 'Why, Mister Turner -- is it really
+yours?' An' she looked so full of joy thet when he says to
+me, 'Excoose us, friend Carmichael,' I sat there like a
+locoed jackass an' let them go.  But I wasn't mad at thet.  He
+was a better dancer than me an' I wanted her to have a good
+time.  What started the hell was I seen him put his arm round
+her when it wasn't just time, accordin' to the dance, an' Bo
+-- she didn't break any records gettin' away from him.  She
+pushed him away -- after a little -- after I near died.  Wal,
+on the way home I had to tell her.  I shore did.  An' she said
+what I'd love to forget.  Then -- then, Miss Nell, I grabbed
+her -- it was outside here by the porch an' all bright
+moonlight -- I grabbed her an' hugged an' kissed her good.
+When I let her go I says, sorta brave, but I was plumb
+scared -- I says, "Wal, are you goin' to marry me now?'"
+
+He concluded with a gulp, and looked at Helen with woe in
+his eyes.
+
+"Oh!  What did Bo do?" breathlessly queried Helen.
+
+"She slapped me," he replied.  "An' then she says, I did like
+you best, but NOW I hate you!' An' she slammed the door in
+my face."
+
+"I think you made a great mistake," said Helen, gravely.
+
+"Wal, if I thought so I'd beg her forgiveness.  But I reckon
+I don't.  What's more, I feel better than before.  I'm only a
+cowboy an' never was much good till I met her.  Then I
+braced.  I got to havin' hopes, studyin' books, an' you know
+how I've been lookin' into this ranchin' game.  I stopped
+drinkin' an' saved my money.  Wal, she knows all thet.  Once
+she said she was proud of me.  But it didn't seem to count
+big with her.  An' if it can't count big I don't want it to
+count at all.  I reckon the madder Bo is at me the more
+chance I've got.  She knows I love her -- thet I'd die for
+her -- thet I'm a changed man.  An' she knows I never before
+thought of darin' to touch her hand.  An' she knows she
+flirted with Turner."
+
+"She's only a child," replied Helen.  "And all this change --
+the West -- the wildness -- and you boys making much of her
+-- why, it's turned her head.  But Bo will come out of it
+true blue.  She is good, loving.  Her heart is gold."
+
+"I reckon I know, an' my faith can't be shook," rejoined
+Carmichael, simply.  "But she ought to believe thet she'll
+make bad blood out here.  The West is the West.  Any kind of
+girls are scarce.  An' one like Bo -- Lord!  we cowboys never
+seen none to compare with her.  She'll make bad blood an'
+some of it will be spilled."
+
+"Uncle Al encourages her," said Helen, apprehensively.  "It
+tickles him to hear how the boys are after her.  Oh, she
+doesn't tell him.  But he hears.  And I, who must stand in
+mother's place to her, what can I do?"
+
+"Miss Nell, are you on my side?" asked the cowboy,
+wistfully.  He was strong and elemental, caught in the toils
+of some power beyond him.
+
+Yesterday Helen might have hesitated at that question.  But
+to-day Carmichael brought some proven quality of loyalty,
+some strange depth of rugged sincerity, as if she had
+learned his future worth.
+
+"Yes, I am," Helen replied, earnestly.  And she offered her
+hand.
+
+"Wal, then it 'll shore turn out happy," he said, squeezing
+her hand.  His smile was grateful, but there was nothing in
+it of the victory he hinted at.  Some of his ruddy color had
+gone.  "An' now I want to tell you why I come."
+
+He had lowered his voice.  "Is Al asleep?" he whispered.
+
+"Yes," replied Helen.  "He was a little while ago."
+
+"Reckon I'd better shut his door."
+
+Helen watched the cowboy glide across the room and carefully
+close the door, then return to her with intent eyes.  She
+sensed events in his look, and she divined suddenly that he
+must feel as if he were her brother.
+
+"Shore I'm the one thet fetches all the bad news to you," he
+said, regretfully.
+
+Helen caught her breath.  There had indeed been many little
+calamities to mar her management of the ranch -- loss of
+cattle, horses, sheep -- the desertion of herders to Beasley
+-- failure of freighters to arrive when most needed --
+fights among the cowboys -- and disagreements over
+long-arranged deals.
+
+"Your uncle Al makes a heap of this here Jeff Mulvey,"
+asserted Carmichael.
+
+"Yes, indeed.  Uncle absolutely relies on Jeff," replied
+Helen.
+
+"Wal, I hate to tell you, Miss Nell," said the cowboy,
+bitterly, "thet Mulvey ain't the man he seems."
+
+"Oh, what do you mean?"
+
+"When your uncle dies Mulvey is goin' over to Beasley an'
+he's goin' to take all the fellars who'll stick to him."
+
+"Could Jeff be so faithless -- after so many years my
+uncle's foreman?  Oh, how do you know?"
+
+"Reckon I guessed long ago.  But wasn't shore.  Miss Nell,
+there's a lot in the wind lately, as poor old Al grows
+weaker.  Mulvey has been particular friendly to me an' I've
+nursed him along, 'cept I wouldn't drink.  An' his pards have
+been particular friends with me, too, more an' more as I
+loosened up.  You see, they was shy of me when I first got
+here.  To-day the whole deal showed clear to me like a hoof
+track in soft ground.  Bud Lewis, who's bunked with me, come
+out an' tried to win me over to Beasley -- soon as
+Auchincloss dies.  I palavered with Bud an' I wanted to know.
+But Bud would only say he was goin' along with Jeff an'
+others of the outfit.  I told him I'd reckon over it an' let
+him know.  He thinks I'll come round."
+
+"Why -- why will these men leave me when -- when -- Oh, poor
+uncle!  They bargain on his death.  But why -- tell me why?"
+
+"Beasley has worked on them -- won them over," replied
+Carmichael, grimly.  "After Al dies the ranch will go to you.
+Beasley means to have it.  He an' Al was pards once, an' now
+Beasley has most folks here believin' he got the short end
+of thet deal.  He'll have papers -- shore -- an' he'll have
+most of the men.  So he'll just put you off an' take
+possession.  Thet's all, Miss Nell, an' you can rely on its
+bein' true."
+
+"I -- I believe you -- but I can't believe such -- such
+robbery possible," gasped Helen.
+
+"It's simple as two an' two.  Possession is law out here.
+Once Beasley gets on the ground it's settled.  What could you
+do with no men to fight for your property?"
+
+"But, surely, some of the men will stay with me?"
+
+"I reckon.  But not enough."
+
+"Then I can hire more.  The Beeman boys.  And Dale would come
+to help me."
+
+"Dale would come.  An' he'd help a heap.  I wish he was here,"
+replied Carmichael, soberly.  "But there's no way to get him.
+He's snowed-up till May."
+
+"I dare not confide in uncle," said Helen, with agitation.
+"The shock might kill him.  Then to tell him of the
+unfaithfulness of his old men -- that would be cruel. . . .
+Oh, it can't be so bad as you think."
+
+"I reckon it couldn't be no worse.  An' -- Miss Nell, there's
+only one way to get out of it -- an' thet's the way of the
+West."
+
+"How?" queried Helen, eagerly.
+
+Carmichael lunged himself erect and stood gazing down at
+her.  He seemed completely detached now from that frank,
+amiable cowboy of her first impressions.  The redness was
+totally gone from his face.  Something strange and cold and
+sure looked out of his eyes.
+
+"I seen Beasley go in the saloon as I rode past.  Suppose I
+go down there, pick a quarrel with him -- an' kill him?"
+
+Helen sat bolt-upright with a cold shock.
+
+"Carmichael!  you're not serious?" she exclaimed.
+
+"Serious?  I shore am.  Thet's the only way, Miss Nell.  An' I
+reckon it's what Al would want.  An' between you an' me -- it
+would be easier than ropin' a calf.  These fellars round Pine
+don't savvy guns.  Now, I come from where guns mean
+somethin'.  An' when I tell you I can throw a gun slick an'
+fast, why I shore ain't braggin'.  You needn't worry none
+about me, Miss Nell."
+
+Helen grasped that he had taken the signs of her shocked
+sensibility to mean she feared for his life.  But what had
+sickened her was the mere idea of bloodshed in her behalf.
+
+"You'd -- kill Beasley -- just because there are rumors of
+his -- treachery?" gasped Helen.
+
+"Shore.  It'll have to be done, anyhow," replied the cowboy.
+
+"No!  No!  It's too dreadful to think of.  Why, that would be
+murder.  I -- I can't understand how you speak of it -- so --
+so calmly."
+
+"Reckon I ain't doin' it calmly.  I'm as mad as hell," said
+Carmichael, with a reckless smile.
+
+"Oh, if you are serious then, I say no -- no -- no!  I forbid
+you.  I don't believe I'll be robbed of my property."
+
+"Wal, supposin' Beasley does put you off -- an' takes
+possession.  What 're you goin' to say then?" demanded the
+cowboy, in slow, cool deliberation.
+
+"I'd say the same then as now," she replied.
+
+He bent his head thoughtfully while his red hands smoothed
+his sombrero.
+
+"Shore you girls haven't been West very long," be muttered,
+as if apologizing for them.  "An' I reckon it takes time to
+learn the ways of a country."
+
+"West or no West, I won't have fights deliberately picked,
+and men shot, even if they do threaten me," declared Helen,
+positively.
+
+"All right, Miss Nell, shore I respect your wishes," he
+returned.  "But I'll tell you this.  If Beasley turns you an'
+Bo out of your home -- wal, I'll look him up on my own
+account."
+
+Helen could only gaze at him as he backed to the door, and
+she thrilled and shuddered at what seemed his loyalty to
+her, his love for Bo, and that which was inevitable in
+himself.
+
+"Reckon you might save us all some trouble -- now if you'd
+-- just get mad -- an' let me go after thet greaser."
+
+"Greaser!  Do you mean Beasley?"
+
+"Shore.  He's a half-breed.  He was born in Magdalena, where I
+heard folks say nary one of his parents was no good."
+
+"That doesn't matter.  I'm thinking of humanity of law and
+order.  Of what is right."
+
+"Wal, Miss Nell, I'll wait till you get real mad -- or till
+Beasley --"
+
+"But, my friend, I'll not get mad," interrupted Helen.  "I'll
+keep my temper."
+
+"I'll bet you don't," he retorted.  "Mebbe you think you've
+none of Bo in you.  But I'll bet you could get so mad -- once
+you started -- thet you'd be turrible.  What 've you got them
+eyes for, Miss Nell, if you ain't an Auchincloss ?"
+
+He was smiling, yet he meant every word.  Helen felt the
+truth as something she feared.
+
+"Las Vegas, I won't bet.  But you -- you will always come to
+me -- first -- if there's trouble."
+
+"I promise," he replied, soberly, and then went out.
+
+Helen found that she was trembling, and that there was a
+commotion in her breast.  Carmichael had frightened her.  No
+longer did she hold doubt of the gravity of the situation.
+She had seen Beasley often, several times close at hand, and
+once she had been forced to meet him.  That time had
+convinced her that he had evinced personal interest in her.
+And on this account, coupled with the fact that Riggs
+appeared to have nothing else to do but shadow her, she had
+been slow in developing her intention of organizing and
+teaching a school for the children of Pine.  Riggs had become
+rather a doubtful celebrity in the settlements.  Yet his
+bold, apparent badness had made its impression.  From all
+reports he spent his time gambling, drinking, and bragging.
+It was no longer news in Pine what his intentions were
+toward Helen Rayner.  Twice he had ridden up to the
+ranch-house, upon one occasion securing an interview with
+Helen.  In spite of her contempt and indifference, he was
+actually influencing her life there in Pine.  And it began to
+appear that the other man, Beasley, might soon direct
+stronger significance upon the liberty of her actions.
+
+The responsibility of the ranch had turned out to be a heavy
+burden.  It could not be managed, at least by her, in the way
+Auchincloss wanted it done.  He was old, irritable,
+irrational, and hard.  Almost all the neighbors were set
+against him, and naturally did not take kindly to Helen.
+
+She had not found the slightest evidence of unfair dealing
+on the part of her uncle, but he had been a hard driver.
+Then his shrewd, far-seeing judgment had made all his deals
+fortunate for him, which fact had not brought a profit of
+friendship.
+
+Of late, since Auchincloss had grown weaker and less
+dominating, Helen had taken many decisions upon herself,
+with gratifying and hopeful results.  But the wonderful
+happiness that she had expected to find in the West still
+held aloof.  The memory of Paradise Park seemed only a dream,
+sweeter and more intangible as time passed, and fuller of
+vague regrets.  Bo was a comfort, but also a very
+considerable source of anxiety.  She might have been a help
+to Helen if she had not assimilated Western ways so swiftly.
+Helen wished to decide things in her own way, which was as
+yet quite far from Western.  So Helen had been thrown more
+and more upon her own resources, with the cowboy Carmichael
+the only one who had come forward voluntarily to her aid.
+
+For an hour Helen sat alone in the room, looking out of the
+window, and facing stern reality with a colder, graver,
+keener sense of intimacy than ever before.  To hold her
+property and to live her life in this community according to
+her ideas of honesty, justice, and law might well be beyond
+her powers.  To-day she had been convinced that she could not
+do so without fighting for them, and to fight she must have
+friends.  That conviction warmed her toward Carmichael, and a
+thoughtful consideration of all he had done for her proved
+that she had not fully appreciated him.  She would make up
+for her oversight.
+
+There were no Mormons in her employ, for the good reason
+that Auchincloss would not hire them.  But in one of his
+kindlier hours, growing rare now, he had admitted that the
+Mormons were the best and the most sober, faithful workers
+on the ranges, and that his sole objection to them was just
+this fact of their superiority.  Helen decided to hire the
+four Beemans and any of their relatives or friends who would
+come; and to do this, if possible, without letting her uncle
+know.  His temper now, as well as his judgment, was a
+hindrance to efficiency.  This decision regarding the
+Beemans; brought Helen back to Carmichael's fervent wish for
+Dale, and then to her own.
+
+Soon spring would be at hand, with its multiplicity of range
+tasks.  Dale had promised to come to Pine then, and Helen
+knew that promise would be kept.  Her heart beat a little
+faster, in spite of her business-centered thoughts.  Dale was
+there, over the black-sloped, snowy-tipped mountain, shut
+away from the world.  Helen almost envied him.  No wonder he
+loved loneliness, solitude, the sweet, wild silence and
+beauty of Paradise Park!  But he was selfish, and Helen meant
+to show him that.  She needed his help.  When she recalled his
+physical prowess with animals, and imagined what it must be
+in relation to men, she actually smiled at the thought of
+Beasley forcing her off her property, if Dale were there.
+Beasley would only force disaster upon himself.  Then Helen
+experienced a quick shock.  Would Dale answer to this
+situation as Carmichael had answered?  It afforded her relief
+to assure herself to the contrary.  The cowboy was one of a
+blood-letting breed; the hunter was a man of thought,
+gentleness, humanity.  This situation was one of the kind
+that had made him despise the littleness of men.  Helen
+assured herself that he was different from her uncle and
+from the cowboy, in all the relations of life which she had
+observed while with him.  But a doubt lingered in her mind.
+She remembered his calm reference to Snake Anson, and that
+caused a recurrence of the little shiver Carmichael had
+given her.  When the doubt augmented to a possibility that
+she might not be able to control Dale, then she tried not to
+think of it any more.  It confused and perplexed her that
+into her mind should flash a thought that, though it would
+be dreadful for Carmichael to kill Beasley, for Dale to do
+it would be a calamity -- a terrible thing.  Helen did not
+analyze that strange thought.  She was as afraid of it as she
+was of the stir in her blood when she visualized Dale.
+
+Her meditation was interrupted by Bo, who entered the room,
+rebellious-eyed and very lofty.  Her manner changed, which
+apparently owed its cause to the, fact that Helen was alone.
+
+"Is that -- cowboy gone?" she asked.
+
+"Yes.  He left quite some time ago," replied Helen.
+
+"I wondered if he made your eyes shine -- your color burn
+so.  Nell, you're just beautiful."
+
+"Is my face burning?" asked Helen, with a little laugh.  "So
+it is.  Well, Bo, you've no cause for jealousy.  Las Vegas
+can't be blamed for my blushes."
+
+"Jealous!  Me?  Of that wild-eyed, soft-voiced, two-faced
+cow-puncher?  I guess not, Nell Rayner.  What 'd he say about
+me?"
+
+"Bo, he said a lot," replied Helen, reflectively.  "I'll tell
+you presently.  First I want to ask you -- has Carmichael
+ever told you how he's helped me?"
+
+"No!  When I see him -- which hasn't been often lately -- he
+-- I -- Well, we fight.  Nell, has he helped you?"
+
+Helen smiled in faint amusement.  She was going to be
+sincere, but she meant to keep her word to the cowboy.  The
+fact was that reflection had acquainted her with her
+indebtedness to Carmichael.
+
+"Bo, you've been so wild to ride half-broken mustangs -- and
+carry on with cowboys -- and read -- and sew -- and keep
+your secrets that you've had no time for your sister or her
+troubles."
+
+"Nell!" burst out Bo, in amaze and pain.  She flew to Helen
+and seized her hands.  "What 're you saying?"
+
+"It's all true," replied Helen, thrilling and softening.
+This sweet sister, once aroused, would be hard to resist.
+Helen imagined she should hold to her tone of reproach and
+severity.
+
+"Sure it's true," cried Bo, fiercely.  "But what's my fooling
+got to do with the -- the rest you said?  Nell, are you
+keeping things from me?"
+
+"My dear, I never get any encouragement to tell you my
+troubles."
+
+"But I've -- I've nursed uncle -- sat up with him -- just
+the same as you," said Bo, with quivering lips.
+
+"Yes, you've been good to him."
+
+"We've no other troubles, have we, Nell?"
+
+"You haven't, but I have," responded Helen, reproachfully.
+
+"Why -- why didn't you tell me?" cried Bo, passionately.
+"What are they?  Tell me now.  You must think me a -- a
+selfish, hateful cat."
+
+"Bo, I've had much to worry me -- and the worst is yet to
+come," replied Helen.  Then she told Bo how complicated and
+bewildering was the management of a big ranch -- when the
+owner was ill, testy, defective in memory, and hard as steel
+-- when he had hoards of gold and notes, but could not or
+would not remember his obligations -- when the neighbor
+ranchers had just claims -- when cowboys and sheep-herders
+were discontented, and wrangled among themselves -- when
+great herds of cattle and flocks of sheep had to be fed in
+winter -- when supplies had to be continually freighted
+across a muddy desert and lastly, when an enemy rancher was
+slowly winning away the best hands with the end in view of
+deliberately taking over the property when the owner died.
+Then Helen told how she had only that day realized the
+extent of Carmichael's advice and help and labor -- how,
+indeed, he had been a brother to her -- how --
+
+But at this juncture Bo buried her face in Helen's breast
+and began to cry wildly.
+
+"I -- I -- don't want -- to hear -- any more," she sobbed.
+
+"Well, you've got to hear it," replied Helen, inexorably "I
+want you to know how he's stood by me."
+
+"But I hate him."
+
+"Bo, I suspect that's not true."
+
+"I do -- I do."
+
+"Well, you act and talk very strangely then."
+
+"Nell Rayner -- are -- you -- you sticking up for that --
+that devil?"
+
+"I am, yes, so far as it concerns my conscience," rejoined
+Helen, earnestly.  "I never appreciated him as he deserved --
+not until now.  He's a man, Bo, every inch of him.  I've seen
+him grow up to that in three months.  I'd never have gotten
+along without him.  I think he's fine, manly, big.  I --"
+
+"I'll bet -- he's made love -- to you, too," replied Bo,
+woefully.
+
+"Talk sense," said Helen, sharply.  "He has been a brother to
+me.  But, Bo Rayner, if he HAD made love to me I -- I might
+have appreciated it more than you."
+
+Bo raised her face, flushed in part and also pale, with
+tear-wet cheeks and the telltale blaze in the blue eyes.
+
+"I've been wild about that fellow.  But I hate him, too," she
+said, with flashing spirit.  "And I want to go on hating him.
+So don't tell me any more."
+
+Whereupon Helen briefly and graphically related how
+Carmichael had offered to kill Beasley, as the only way to
+save her property, and how, when she refused, that he
+threatened he would do it anyhow.
+
+Bo fell over with a gasp and clung to Helen.
+
+"Oh -- Nell!  Oh, now I love him more than -- ever," she
+cried, in mingled rage and despair.
+
+Helen clasped her closely and tried to comfort her as in the
+old days, not so very far back, when troubles were not so
+serious as now.
+
+"Of course you love him," she concluded.  "I guessed that
+long ago.  And I'm glad.  But you've been wilful -- foolish.
+You wouldn't surrender to it.  You wanted your fling with the
+other boys.  You're -- Oh, Bo, I fear you have been a sad
+little flirt."
+
+"I -- I wasn't very bad till -- till he got bossy.  Why,
+Nell, he acted -- right off -- just as if he OWNED me.  But
+he didn't. . . .  And to show him -- I -- I really did flirt
+with that Turner fellow.  Then he -- he insulted me. . . .
+Oh, I hate him!"
+
+"Nonsense, Bo.  You can't hate any one while you love him,"
+protested Helen.
+
+"Much you know about that," flashed Bo.  "You just can!  Look
+here.  Did you ever see a cowboy rope and throw and tie up a
+mean horse?"
+
+"Yes, I have."
+
+"Do you have any idea how strong a cowboy is -- how his
+hands and arms are like iron?"
+
+"Yes, I'm sure I know that, too."
+
+"And how savage he is?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And how he goes at anything he wants to do?"
+
+"I must admit cowboys are abrupt," responded Helen, with a
+smile.
+
+"Well, Miss Rayner, did you ever -- when you were standing
+quiet like a lady -- did you ever have a cowboy dive at you
+with a terrible lunge -- grab you and hold you so you
+couldn't move or breathe or scream -- hug you till all your
+bones cracked -- and kiss you so fierce and so hard that you
+wanted to kill him and die?
+
+Helen had gradually drawn back from this blazing-eyed,
+eloquent sister, and when the end of that remarkable
+question came it was impossible to reply.
+
+"There!  I see you never had that done to you," resumed Bo,
+with satisfaction.  "So don't ever talk to me."
+
+"I've heard his side of the story," said Helen,
+constrainedly.
+
+With a start Bo sat up straighter, as if better to defend
+herself.
+
+"Oh!  So you have?  And I suppose you'll take his part -- even
+about that -- that bearish trick."
+
+"No.  I think that rude and bold.  But, Bo, I don't believe he
+meant to be either rude or bold.  From what he confessed to
+me I gather that he believed he'd lose you outright or win
+you outright by that violence.  It seems girls can't play at
+love out here in this wild West.  He said there would be
+blood shed over you.  I begin to realize what he meant.  He's
+not sorry for what he did.  Think how strange that is.  For he
+has the instincts of a gentleman.  He's kind, gentle,
+chivalrous.  Evidently he had tried every way to win your
+favor except any familiar advance.  He did that as a last
+resort.  In my opinion his motives were to force you to
+accept or refuse him, and in case you refused him he'd
+always have those forbidden stolen kisses to assuage his
+self-respect -- when he thought of Turner or any one else
+daring to be familiar with you.  Bo, I see through
+Carmichael, even if I don't make him clear to you.  You've
+got to be honest with yourself.  Did that act of his win or
+lose you?  In other words, do you love him or not?"
+
+Bo hid her face.
+
+"Oh, Nell!  it made me see how I loved him -- and that made
+me so -- so sick I hated him. . . .  But now -- the hate is
+all gone."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+When spring came at last and the willows drooped green and
+fresh over the brook and the range rang with bray of burro
+and whistle of stallion, old Al Auchincloss had been a month
+in his grave.
+
+To Helen it seemed longer.  The month had been crowded with
+work, events, and growing, more hopeful duties, so that it
+contained a world of living.  The uncle had not been
+forgotten, but the innumerable restrictions to development
+and progress were no longer manifest.  Beasley had not
+presented himself or any claim upon Helen; and she,
+gathering confidence day by day, began to believe all that
+purport of trouble had been exaggerated.
+
+In this time she had come to love her work and all that
+pertained to it.  The estate was large.  She had no accurate
+knowledge of how many acres she owned, but it was more than
+two thousand.  The fine, old, rambling ranch-house, set like
+a fort on the last of the foot-hills, corrals and fields and
+barns and meadows, and the rolling green range beyond, and
+innumerable sheep, horses, cattle -- all these belonged to
+Helen, to her ever-wondering realization and ever-growing
+joy.  Still, she was afraid to let herself go and be
+perfectly happy.  Always there was the fear that had been too
+deep and strong to forget so soon.
+
+This bright, fresh morning, in March, Helen came out upon
+the porch to revel a little in the warmth of sunshine and
+the crisp, pine-scented wind that swept down from the
+mountains.  There was never a morning that she did not gaze
+mountainward, trying to see, with a folly she realized, if
+the snow had melted more perceptibly away on the bold white
+ridge.  For all she could see it had not melted an inch, and
+she would not confess why she sighed.  The desert had become
+green and fresh, stretching away there far below her range,
+growing dark and purple in the distance with vague buttes
+rising.  The air was full of sound -- notes of blackbirds and
+the baas of sheep, and blasts from the corrals, and the
+clatter of light hoofs on the court below.
+
+Bo was riding in from the stables.  Helen loved to watch her
+on one of those fiery little mustangs, but the sight was
+likewise given to rousing apprehensions.  This morning Bo
+appeared particularly bent on frightening Helen.  Down the
+lane Carmichael appeared, waving his arms, and Helen at once
+connected him with Bo's manifest desire to fly away from
+that particular place.  Since that day, a month back, when Bo
+had confessed her love for Carmichael, she and Helen had not
+spoken of it or of the cowboy.  The boy and girl were still
+at odds.  But this did not worry Helen.  Bo had changed much
+for the better, especially in that she devoted herself to
+Helen and to her work.  Helen knew that all would turn out
+well in the end, and so she had been careful of her rather
+precarious position between these two young firebrands.
+
+Bo reined in the mustang at the porch steps.  She wore a
+buckskin riding-suit which she had made herself, and its
+soft gray with the touches of red beads was mightily
+becoming to her.  Then she had grown considerably during the
+winter and now looked too flashing and pretty to resemble a
+boy, yet singularly healthy and strong and lithe.  Red spots
+shone in her cheeks and her eyes held that ever-dangerous
+blaze.
+
+"Nell, did you give me away to that cowboy?" she demanded.
+
+"Give you away!" exclaimed Helen, blankly.
+
+"Yes.  You know I told you -- awhile back -- that I was
+wildly in love with him.  Did you give me away -- tell on me?
+"
+
+She might have been furious, but she certainly was not
+confused.
+
+"Why, Bo!  How could you?  No.  I did not," replied Helen.
+
+"Never gave him a hint?"
+
+"Not even a hint.  You have my word for that.  Why?  What's
+happened?"
+
+"He makes me sick."
+
+Bo would not say any more, owing to the near approach of the
+cowboy.
+
+"Mawnin', Miss Nell," he drawled.  "I was just tellin' this
+here Miss Bo-Peep Rayner --"
+
+"Don't call me that!" broke in Bo, with fire in her voice.
+
+"Wal, I was just tellin' her thet she wasn't goin' off on
+any more of them long rides.  Honest now, Miss Nell, it ain't
+safe, an' --"
+
+"You're not my boss," retorted Bo.
+
+"Indeed, sister, I agree with him.  You won't obey me."
+
+"Reckon some one's got to be your boss," drawled Carmichael.
+"Shore I ain't hankerin' for the job.  You could ride to
+Kingdom Come or off among the Apaches -- or over here a
+ways" -- at this he grinned knowingly -- "or anywheres, for
+all I cared.  But I'm workin' for Miss Nell, an' she's boss.
+An' if she says you're not to take them rides -- you won't.
+Savvy that, miss?"
+
+It was a treat for Helen to see Bo look at the cowboy.
+
+"Mis-ter Carmichael, may I ask how you are going to prevent
+me from riding where I like?"
+
+"Wal, if you're goin' worse locoed this way I'll keep you
+off'n a hoss if I have to rope you an' tie you up.  By golly,
+I will!"
+
+His dry humor was gone and manifestly he meant what he said.
+
+"Wal," she drawled it very softly and sweetly, but
+venomously, "if -- you -- ever -- touch -- me again!"
+
+At this he flushed, then made a quick, passionate gesture
+with his hand, expressive of heat and shame.
+
+"You an' me will never get along," he said, with a dignity
+full of pathos.  "I seen thet a month back when you changed
+sudden-like to me.  But nothin' I say to you has any
+reckonin' of mine.  I'm talkin' for your sister.  It's for her
+sake.  An' your own. . . .  I never told her an' I never told
+you thet I've seen Riggs sneakin' after you twice on them
+desert rides.  Wal, I tell you now."
+
+The intelligence apparently had not the slightest effect on
+Bo.  But Helen was astonished and alarmed.
+
+"Riggs!  Oh, Bo, I've seen him myself -- riding around.  He
+does not mean well.  You must be careful."
+
+"If I ketch him again," went on Carmichael, with his mouth
+lining hard, "I'm goin' after him."
+
+He gave her a cool, intent, piercing look, then he dropped
+his head and turned away, to stride back toward the corrals.
+
+Helen could make little of the manner in which her sister
+watched the cowboy pass out of sight.
+
+"A month back -- when I changed sudden-like," mused Bo.  "I
+wonder what he meant by that. . . .  Nell, did I change --
+right after the talk you had with me -- about him?"
+
+"Indeed you did, Bo," replied Helen.  "But it was for the
+better.  Only he can't see it.  How proud and sensitive he is!
+You wouldn't guess it at first.  Bo, your reserve has wounded
+him more than your flirting.  He thinks it's indifference."
+
+"Maybe that 'll be good for him," declared Bo.  "Does he
+expect me to fall on his neck?  He's that thick-headed!  Why,
+he's the locoed one, not me."
+
+"I'd like to ask you, Bo, if you've seen how he has
+changed?" queried Helen, earnestly.  "He's older.  He's
+worried.  Either his heart is breaking for you or else he
+fears trouble for us.  I fear it's both.  How he watches you!
+Bo, he knows all you do -- where you go.  That about Riggs
+sickens me."
+
+"If Riggs follows me and tries any of his four-flush
+desperado games he'll have his hands full," said Bo, grimly.
+"And that without my cowboy protector!  But I just wish Riggs
+would do something.  Then we'll see what Las Vegas Tom
+Carmichael cares.  Then we'll see!"
+
+Bo bit out the last words passionately and jealously, then
+she lifted her bridle to the spirited mustang,
+
+"Nell, don't you fear for me," she said.  "I can take care of
+myself."
+
+Helen watched her ride away, all but willing to confess that
+there might be truth in what Bo said.  Then Helen went about
+her work, which consisted of routine duties as well as an
+earnest study to familiarize herself with continually new
+and complex conditions of ranch life.  Every day brought new
+problems.  She made notes of all that she observed, and all
+that was told her, which habit she had found, after a few
+weeks of trial, was going to be exceedingly valuable to her.
+She did not intend always to be dependent upon the knowledge
+of hired men, however faithful some of them might be.
+
+This morning on her rounds she had expected developments; of
+some kind, owing to the presence of Roy Beeman and two of
+his brothers, who had arrived yesterday.  And she was to
+discover that Jeff Mulvey, accompanied by six of his
+co-workers and associates, had deserted her without a word
+or even sending for their pay.  Carmichael had predicted
+this.  Helen had half doubted.  It was a relief now to be
+confronted with facts, however disturbing.  She had fortified
+herself to withstand a great deal more trouble than had
+happened.  At the gateway of the main corral, a huge
+inclosure fenced high with peeled logs, she met Roy Beeman,
+lasso in hand, the same tall, lean, limping figure she
+remembered so well.  Sight of him gave her an inexplicable
+thrill -- a flashing memory of an unforgettable night ride.
+Roy was to have charge of the horses on the ranch, of which
+there were several hundred, not counting many lost on range
+and mountain, or the unbranded colts.
+
+Roy took off his sombrero and greeted her.  This Mormon had a
+courtesy for women that spoke well for him.  Helen wished she
+had more employees like him.
+
+"It's jest as Las Vegas told us it 'd be," he said,
+regretfully.  "Mulvey an' his pards lit out this mornin'.  I'm
+sorry, Miss Helen.  Reckon thet's all because I come over."
+
+"I heard the news," replied Helen.  "You needn't be sorry,
+Roy, for I'm not.  I'm glad.  I want to know whom I can
+trust."
+
+"Las Vegas says we're shore in for it now."
+
+"Roy, what do you think?"
+
+"I reckon so.  Still, Las Vegas is powerful cross these days
+an' always lookin' on the dark side.  With us boys, now, it's
+sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.  But, Miss
+Helen, if Beasley forces the deal there will be serious
+trouble.  I've seen thet happen.  Four or five years ago
+Beasley rode some greasers off their farms an' no one ever
+knowed if he had a just claim."
+
+"Beasley has no claim on my property.  My uncle solemnly
+swore that on his death-bed.  And I find nothing in his books
+or papers of those years when he employed Beasley.  In fact,
+Beasley was never uncle's partner.  The truth is that my
+uncle took Beasley up when he was a poor, homeless boy."
+
+"So my old dad says," replied Roy.  "But what's right don't
+always prevail in these parts."
+
+"Roy, you're the keenest man I've met since I came West.
+Tell me what you think will happen."
+
+Beeman appeared flattered, but be hesitated to reply.  Helen
+had long been aware of the reticence of these outdoor men.
+
+"I reckon you mean cause an' effect, as Milt Dale would
+say," responded Roy, thoughtfully.
+
+"Yes.  If Beasley attempts to force me off my ranch what will
+happen?"
+
+Roy looked up and met her gaze.  Helen remembered that
+singular stillness, intentness of his face.
+
+"Wal, if Dale an' John get here in time I reckon we can
+bluff thet Beasley outfit."
+
+"You mean my friends -- my men would confront Beasley --
+refuse his demands -- and if necessary fight him off?"
+
+"I shore do," replied Roy.
+
+"But suppose you're not all here?  Beasley would be smart
+enough to choose an opportune time.  Suppose he did put me
+off and take possession?  What then?"
+
+"Then it 'd only be a matter of how soon Dale or Carmichael
+-- or I -- got to Beasley."
+
+"Roy!  I feared just that.  It haunts me.  Carmichael asked me
+to let him go pick a fight with Beasley.  Asked me, just as
+he would ask me about his work!  I was shocked.  And now you
+say Dale -- and you --"
+
+Helen choked in her agitation.
+
+"Miss Helen, what else could you look for?  Las Vegas is in
+love with Miss Bo.  Shore he told me so.  An' Dale's in love
+with you!  . . .  Why, you couldn't stop them any more 'n you
+could stop the wind from blowin' down a pine, when it got
+ready. . . .  Now, it's some different with me.  I'm a Mormon
+an' I'm married.  But I'm Dale's pard, these many years.  An'
+I care a powerful sight for you an' Miss Bo.  So I reckon I'd
+draw on Beasley the first chance I got."
+
+Helen strove for utterance, but it was denied her.  Roy's
+simple statement of Dale's love had magnified her emotion by
+completely changing its direction.  She forgot what she had
+felt wretched about.  She could not look at Roy.
+
+"Miss Helen, don't feel bad," he said, kindly.  "Shore you're
+not to blame.  Your comin' West hasn't made any difference in
+Beasley's fate, except mebbe to hurry it a little.  My dad is
+old, an' when he talks it's like history.  He looks back on
+happenin's.  Wal, it's the nature of happenin's that Beasley
+passes away before his prime.  Them of his breed don't live
+old in the West. . . .  So I reckon you needn't feel bad or
+worry.  you've got friends."
+
+Helen incoherently thanked him, and, forgetting her usual
+round of corrals and stables, she hurried back toward the
+house, deeply stirred, throbbing and dim-eyed, with a
+feeling she could not control.  Roy Beeman had made a
+statement that had upset her equilibrium.  It seemed simple
+and natural, yet momentous and staggering.  To hear that Dale
+loved her -- to hear it spoken frankly, earnestly, by Dale's
+best friend, was strange, sweet, terrifying.  But was it
+true?  Her own consciousness had admitted it.  Yet that was
+vastly different from a man's open statement.  No longer was
+it a dear dream, a secret that seemed hers alone.  How she
+had lived on that secret hidden deep in her breast!
+
+Something burned the dimness from her eyes as she looked
+toward the mountains and her sight became clear, telescopic
+with its intensity.  Magnificently the mountains loomed.
+Black inroads and patches on the slopes showed where a few
+days back all bad been white.  The snow was melting fast.
+Dale would soon be free to ride down to Pine.  And that was
+an event Helen prayed for, yet feared as she had never
+feared anything.
+
+
+The noonday dinner-bell startled Helen from a reverie that
+was a pleasant aftermath of her unrestraint.  How the hours
+had flown!  This morning at least must be credited to
+indolence.
+
+Bo was not in the dining-room, nor in her own room, nor was
+she in sight from window or door.  This absence had occurred
+before, but not particularly to disturb Helen.  In this
+instance, however, she grew worried.  Her nerves presaged
+strain.  There was an overcharge of sensibility in her
+feelings or a strange pressure in the very atmosphere.  She
+ate dinner alone, looking her apprehension, which was not
+mitigated by the expressive fears of old Maria, the Mexican
+woman who served her.
+
+After dinner she sent word to Roy and Carmichael that they
+had better ride out to look for Bo.  Then Helen applied
+herself resolutely to her books until a rapid clatter of
+hoofs out in the court caused her to jump up and hurry to
+the porch.  Roy was riding in.
+
+"Did you find her?" queried Helen, hurriedly.
+
+"Wasn't no track or sign of her up the north range," replied
+Roy, as he dismounted and threw his bridle.  "An' I was
+ridin' back to take up her tracks from the corral an' trail
+her.  But I seen Las Vegas comin' an' he waved his sombrero.
+He was comin' up from the south.  There he is now."
+
+Carmichael appeared swinging into the lane.  He was mounted
+on Helen's big black Ranger, and he made the dust fly.
+
+"Wal, he's seen her, thet's shore," vouchsafed Roy, with
+relief, as Carmichael rode up.
+
+"Miss Neil, she's comin'," said the cowboy, as he reined in
+and slid down with his graceful single motion.  Then in a
+violent action, characteristic of him, he slammed his
+sombrero down on the porch and threw up both arms.  "I've a
+hunch it's come off!"
+
+"Oh, what?" exclaimed Helen.
+
+"Now, Las Vegas, talk sense," expostulated Roy.  "Miss Helen
+is shore nervous to-day.  Has anythin' happened?"
+
+"I reckon, but I don't know what," replied Carmichael,
+drawing a, long breath.  "Folks, I must be gettin' old.  For I
+shore felt orful queer till I seen Bo.  She was ridin' down
+the ridge across the valley.  Ridin' some fast, too, an'
+she'll be here right off, if she doesn't stop in the
+village."
+
+"Wal, I hear her comin' now," said Roy.  "An' -- if you asked
+me I'd say she WAS ridin' some fast."
+
+Helen heard the light, swift, rhythmic beat of hoofs, and
+then out on the curve of the road that led down to Pine she
+saw Bo's mustang, white with lather, coming on a dead run.
+
+"Las Vegas, do you see any Apaches?" asked Roy, quizzingly.
+
+The cowboy made no reply, but he strode out from the porch,
+directly in front of the mustang.  Bo was pulling hard on the
+bridle, and had him slowing down, but not controlled.  When
+he reached the house it could easily be seen that Bo had
+pulled him to the limit of her strength, which was not
+enough to halt him.  Carmichael lunged for the bridle and,
+seizing it, hauled him to a standstill.
+
+At close sight of Bo Helen uttered a startled cry.  Bo was
+white; her sombrero was gone and her hair undone; there were
+blood and dirt on her face, and her riding-suit was torn and
+muddy.  She had evidently sustained a fall.  Roy gazed at her
+in admiring consternation, but Carmichael never looked at
+her at all.  Apparently he was examining the horse.  "Well,
+help me off -- somebody," cried Bo, peremptorily.  Her voice
+was weak, but not her spirit.
+
+Roy sprang to help her off, and when she was down it
+developed that she was lame.
+
+"Oh, Bo!  You've had a tumble," exclaimed Helen, anxiously,
+and she ran to assist Roy.  They led her up the porch and to
+the door.  There she turned to look at Carmichael, who was
+still examining the spent mustang.
+
+"Tell him -- to come in," she whispered.
+
+"Hey, there, Las Vegas!" called Roy.  "Rustle hyar, will
+you?"
+
+When Bo had been led into the sitting-room and seated in a
+chair Carmichael entered.  His face was a study, as slowly he
+walked up to Bo.
+
+"Girl, you -- ain't hurt?" he asked, huskily.
+
+"It's no fault of yours that I'm not crippled -- or dead or
+worse," retorted Bo.  "You said the south range was the only
+safe ride for me.  And there -- I -- it happened."
+
+She panted a little and her bosom heaved.  One of her
+gauntlets was gone, and the bare band, that was bruised and
+bloody, trembled as she held it out.
+
+"Dear, tell us -- are you badly hurt?" queried Helen, with
+hurried gentleness.
+
+"Not much.  I've had a spill," replied Bo.  "But oh!  I'm mad
+-- I'm boiling!"
+
+She looked as if she might have exaggerated her doubt of
+injuries, but certainly she had not overestimated her state
+of mind.  Any blaze Helen had heretofore seen in those quick
+eyes was tame compared to this one.  It actually leaped.  Bo
+was more than pretty then.  Manifestly Roy was admiring her
+looks, but Carmichael saw beyond her charm.  And slowly he
+was growing pale.
+
+"I rode out the south range -- as I was told," began Bo,
+breathing hard and trying to control her feelings.  "That's
+the ride you usually take, Nell, and you bet -- if you'd
+taken it to-day -- you'd not be here now. . . .  About three
+miles out I climbed off the range up that cedar slope.  I
+always keep to high ground.  When I got up I saw two horsemen
+ride out of some broken rocks off to the east.  They rode as
+if to come between me and home.  I didn't like that.  I
+circled south.  About a mile farther on I spied another
+horseman and he showed up directly in front of me and came
+along slow.  That I liked still less.  It might have been
+accident, but it looked to me as if those riders had some
+intent.  All I could do was head off to the southeast and
+ride.  You bet I did ride.  But I got into rough ground where
+I'd never been before.  It was slow going.  At last I made the
+cedars and here I cut loose, believing I could circle ahead
+of those strange riders and come round through Pine.  I had
+it wrong."
+
+Here she hesitated, perhaps for breath, for she had spoken
+rapidly, or perhaps to get better hold on her subject.  Not
+improbably the effect she was creating on her listeners
+began to be significant.  Roy sat absorbed, perfectly
+motionless, eyes keen as steel, his mouth open.  Carmichael
+was gazing over Bo's head, out of the window, and it seemed
+that he must know the rest of her narrative.  Helen knew that
+her own wide-eyed attention alone would have been
+all-compelling inspiration to Bo Rayner.
+
+"Sure I had it wrong," resumed Bo.  "Pretty soon heard a
+horse behind.  I looked back.  I saw a big bay riding down on
+me.  Oh, but he was running!  He just tore through the cedars.
+. . .  I was scared half out of my senses.  But I spurred and
+beat my mustang.  Then began a race!  Rough going -- thick
+cedars -- washes and gullies I had to make him run -- to
+keep my saddle -- to pick my way.  Oh-h-h!  but it was
+glorious!  To race for fun -- that's one thing; to race for
+your life is another!  My heart was in my mouth -- choking
+me.  I couldn't have yelled.  I was as cold as ice -- dizzy
+sometimes -- blind others -- then my stomach turned -- and I
+couldn't get my breath.  Yet the wild thrills I had!  . . .
+But I stuck on and held my own for several miles -- to the
+edge of the cedars.  There the big horse gained on me.  He
+came pounding closer -- perhaps as close as a hundred yards
+-- I could hear him plain enough.  Then I had my spill.  Oh,
+my mustang tripped -- threw me 'way over his head.  I hit
+light, but slid far -- and that's what scraped me so.  I know
+my knee is raw. . . .  When I got to my feet the big horse
+dashed up, throwing gravel all over me -- and his rider
+jumped off. . . .  Now who do you think he was?"
+
+Helen knew, but she did not voice her conviction.  Carmichael
+knew positively, yet he kept silent.  Roy was smiling, as if
+the narrative told did not seem so alarming to him.
+
+"Wal, the fact of you bein' here, safe an' sound, sorta
+makes no difference who thet son-of-a-gun was," he said.
+
+"Riggs!  Harve Riggs!" blazed Bo.  "The instant I recognized
+him I got over my scare.  And so mad I burned all through
+like fire.  I don't know what I said, but it was wild -- and
+it was a whole lot, you bet.
+
+"You sure can ride,' he said.
+
+"I demanded why he had dared to chase me, and he said he had
+an important message for Nell.  This was it: 'Tell your
+sister that Beasley means to put her off an' take the ranch.
+If she'll marry me I'll block his deal.  If she won't marry
+me, I'll go in with Beasley.' Then he told me to hurry home
+and not to breathe a word to any one except Nell.  Well, here
+I am -- and I seem to have been breathing rather fast."
+
+She looked from Helen to Roy and from Roy to Las Vegas.  Her
+smile was for the latter, and to any one not overexcited by
+her story that smile would have told volumes.
+
+"Wal, I'll be doggoned!" ejaculated Roy, feelingly.
+
+Helen laughed.
+
+"Indeed, the working of that man's mind is beyond me. . . .
+Marry him to save my ranch?  I wouldn't marry him to save my
+life!
+
+Carmichael suddenly broke his silence.
+
+"Bo, did you see the other men?"
+
+"Yes.  I was coming to that," she replied.  "I caught a
+glimpse of them back in the cedars.  The three were together,
+or, at least, three horsemen were there.  They had halted
+behind some trees.  Then on the way home I began to think.
+Even in my fury I had received impressions.  Riggs was
+SURPRISED when I got up.  I'll bet he had not expected me to
+be who I was.  He thought I was NELL!  . . .  I look bigger in
+this buckskin outfit.  My hair was up till I lost my hat, and
+that was when I had the tumble.  He took me for Nell.  Another
+thing, I remember -- he made some sign -- some motion while
+I was calling him names, and I believe that was to keep
+those other men back. . . .  I believe Riggs had a plan with
+those other men to waylay Nell and make off with her.  I
+absolutely know it."
+
+"Bo, you're so -- so -- you jump at wild ideas so,"
+protested Helen, trying to believe in her own assurance.  But
+inwardly she was trembling.
+
+"Miss Helen, that ain't a wild idee," said Roy, seriously.
+"I reckon your sister is pretty close on the trail.  Las
+Vegas, don't you savvy it thet way?"
+
+Carmichael's answer was to stalk out of the room.
+
+"Call him back!" cried Helen, apprehensively.
+
+"Hold on, boy!" called Roy, sharply.
+
+Helen reached the door simultaneously with Roy.  The cowboy
+picked up his sombrero, jammed it on his head, gave his belt
+a vicious hitch that made the gun-sheath jump, and then in
+one giant step he was astride Ranger.
+
+"Carmichael!  Stay!" cried Helen.
+
+The cowboy spurred the black, and the stones rang under
+iron-shod hoofs.
+
+"Bo!  Call him back!  Please call him back!" importuned Helen,
+in distress.
+
+"I won't," declared Bo Rayner.  Her face shone whiter now and
+her eyes were like fiery flint.  That was her answer to a
+loving, gentle-hearted sister; that was her answer to the
+call of the West.
+
+"No use," said Roy, quietly.  "An' I reckon I'd better trail
+him up."
+
+He, too, strode out and, mounting his horse, galloped
+swiftly away.
+
+
+It turned out that Bo, was more bruised and scraped and
+shaken than she had imagined.  One knee was rather badly cut,
+which injury alone would have kept her from riding again
+very soon.  Helen, who was somewhat skilled at bandaging
+wounds, worried a great deal over these sundry blotches on
+Bo's fair skin, and it took considerable time to wash and
+dress them.  Long after this was done, and during the early
+supper, and afterward, Bo's excitement remained unabated.
+The whiteness stayed on her face and the blaze in her eyes.
+Helen ordered and begged her to go to bed, for the fact was
+Bo could not stand up and her hands shook.
+
+"Go to bed?  Not much," she said.  "I want to know what he
+does to Riggs."
+
+It was that possibility which had Helen in dreadful
+suspense.  If Carmichael killed Riggs, it seemed to Helen
+that the bottom would drop out of this structure of Western
+life she had begun to build so earnestly and fearfully.  She
+did not believe that he would do so.  But the uncertainty was
+torturing.
+
+"Dear Bo," appealed Helen, "you don't want -- Oh!  you do
+want Carmichael to -- to kill Riggs?"
+
+"No, I don't, but I wouldn't care if he did," replied Bo,
+bluntly.
+
+"Do you think -- he will?"
+
+"Nell, if that cowboy really loves me he read my mind right
+here before he left," declared Bo.  "And he knew what I
+thought he'd do."
+
+"And what's -- that?" faltered Helen.
+
+"I want him to round Riggs up down in the village --
+somewhere in a crowd.  I want Riggs shown up as the coward,
+braggart, four-flush that he is.  And insulted, slapped,
+kicked -- driven out of Pine!"
+
+Her passionate speech still rang throughout the room when
+there came footsteps on the porch.  Helen hurried to raise
+the bar from the door and open it just as a tap sounded on
+the door-post.  Roy's face stood white out of the darkness.
+His eyes were bright.  And his smile made Helen's fearful
+query needless.
+
+"How are you-all this evenin'?" he drawled, as he came in.
+
+A fire blazed on the hearth and a lamp burned on the table.
+By their light Bo looked white and eager-eyed as she
+reclined in the big arm-chair.
+
+"What 'd he do?" she asked, with all her amazing force.
+
+"Wal, now, ain't you goin' to tell me how you are?"
+
+"Roy, I'm all bunged up.  I ought to be in bed, but I just
+couldn't sleep till I hear what Las Vegas did.  I'd forgive
+anything except him getting drunk."
+
+"Wal, I shore can ease your mind on thet," replied Roy.  "He
+never drank a drop."
+
+Roy was distractingly slow about beginning the tale any
+child could have guessed he was eager to tell.  For once the
+hard, intent quietness, the soul of labor, pain, and
+endurance so plain in his face was softened by pleasurable
+emotion.  He poked at the burning logs with the toe of his
+boot.  Helen observed that he had changed his boots and now
+wore no spurs.  Then he had gone to his quarters after
+whatever had happened down in Pine.
+
+"Where IS he?" asked Bo.
+
+"Who?  Riggs?  Wal, I don't know.  But I reckon he's somewhere
+out in the woods nursin' himself."
+
+"Not Riggs.  First tell me where HE is."
+
+"Shore, then, you must mean Las Vegas.  I just left him down
+at the cabin.  He was gettin' ready for bed, early as it is.
+All tired out he was an' thet white you wouldn't have knowed
+him.  But he looked happy at thet, an' the last words he
+said, more to himself than to me, I reckon, was, 'I'm some
+locoed gent, but if she doesn't call me Tom now she's no
+good!"'
+
+Bo actually clapped her hands, notwithstanding that one of
+them was bandaged.
+
+"Call him Tom?  I should smile I will," she declared, in
+delight.  "Hurry now -- what 'd --"
+
+"It's shore powerful strange how he hates thet handle Las
+Vegas," went on Roy, imperturbably.
+
+"Roy, tell me what he did -- what TOM did -- or I'll
+scream," cried Bo.
+
+"Miss Helen, did you ever see the likes of thet girl?" asked
+Roy, appealing to Helen.
+
+"No, Roy, I never did," agreed Helen.  "But please -- please
+tell us what has happened."
+
+Roy grinned and rubbed his hands together in a dark delight,
+almost fiendish in its sudden revelation of a gulf of
+strange emotion deep within him.  Whatever had happened to
+Riggs had not been too much for Roy Beeman.  Helen remembered
+hearing her uncle say that a real Westerner hated nothing so
+hard as the swaggering desperado, the make-believe gunman
+who pretended to sail under the true, wild, and reckoning
+colors of the West.
+
+Roy leaned his lithe, tall form against the stone
+mantelpiece and faced the girls.
+
+"When I rode out after Las Vegas I seen him 'way down the
+road," began Roy, rapidly.  "An' I seen another man ridin'
+down into Pine from the other side.  Thet was Riggs, only I
+didn't know it then.  Las Vegas rode up to the store, where
+some fellars was hangin' round, an' he spoke to them.  When I
+come up they was all headin' for Turner's saloon.  I seen a
+dozen hosses hitched to the rails.  Las Vegas rode on.  But I
+got off at Turner's an' went in with the bunch.  Whatever it
+was Las Vegas said to them fellars, shore they didn't give
+him away.  Pretty soon more men strolled into Turner's an'
+there got to be 'most twenty altogether, I reckon.  Jeff
+Mulvey was there with his pards.  They had been drinkin'
+sorta free.  An' I didn't like the way Mulvey watched me.  So
+I went out an' into the store, but kept a-lookin' for Las
+Vegas.  He wasn't in sight.  But I seen Riggs ridin' up.  Now,
+Turner's is where Riggs hangs out an' does his braggin'.  He
+looked powerful deep an' thoughtful, dismounted slow without
+seein' the unusual number of hosses there, an' then he
+slouches into Turner's.  No more 'n a minute after Las Vegas
+rode down there like a streak.  An' just as quick he was off
+an' through thet door."
+
+Roy paused as if to gain force or to choose his words.  His
+tale now appeared all directed to Bo, who gazed at him,
+spellbound, a fascinated listener.
+
+"Before I got to Turner's door -- an' thet was only a little
+ways -- I heard Las Vegas yell.  Did you ever hear him?  Wal,
+he's got the wildest yell of any cow-puncher I ever beard.
+Quicklike I opened the door an' slipped in.  There was Riggs
+an' Las Vegas alone in the center of the big saloon, with
+the crowd edgin' to the walls an' slidin' back of the bar.
+Riggs was whiter 'n a dead man.  I didn't hear an' I don't
+know what Las Vegas yelled at him.  But Riggs knew an' so did
+the gang.  All of a sudden every man there shore seen in Las
+Vegas what Riggs had always bragged HE was.  Thet time comes
+to every man like Riggs.
+
+"'What 'd you call me?' he asked, his jaw shakin'.
+
+"'I 'ain't called you yet,' answered Las Vegas.  'I just
+whooped.'
+
+"'What d'ye want?'
+
+"'You scared my girl.'
+
+"'The hell ye say!  Who's she?' blustered Riggs, an' he began
+to take quick looks 'round.  But he never moved a hand.  There
+was somethin' tight about the way he stood.  Las Vegas had
+both arms half out, stretched as if he meant to leap.  But he
+wasn't.  I never seen Las Vegas do thet, but when I seen him
+then I understood it.
+
+"'You know.  An' you threatened her an' her sister.  Go for
+your gun,' called Las Vegas, low an' sharp.
+
+"Thet put the crowd right an' nobody moved.  Riggs turned
+green then.  I almost felt sorry for him.  He began to shake
+so he'd dropped a gun if he had pulled one.
+
+"'Hyar, you're off -- some mistake -- I 'ain't seen no gurls
+-- I --'
+
+"'Shut up an' draw!' yelled Las Vegas.  His voice just
+pierced holes in the roof, an' it might have been a bullet
+from the way Riggs collapsed.  Every man seen in a second
+more thet Riggs wouldn't an' couldn't draw.  He was afraid
+for his life.  He was not what he had claimed to be.  I don't
+know if he had any friends there.  But in the West good men
+an' bad men, all alike, have no use for Riggs's kind.  An'
+thet stony quiet broke with haw -- haw.  It shore was as
+pitiful to see Riggs as it was fine to see Las Vegas.
+
+"When he dropped his arms then I knowed there would be no
+gun-play.  An' then Las Vegas got red in the face.  He slapped
+Riggs with one hand, then with the other.  An' he began to
+cuss him.  I shore never knowed thet nice-spoken Las Vegas
+Carmichael could use such language.  It was a stream of the
+baddest names known out here, an' lots I never heard of.  Now
+an' then I caught somethin' like low-down an' sneak an'
+four-flush an' long-haired skunk, but for the most part they
+was just the cussedest kind of names.  An' Las Vegas spouted
+them till he was black in the face, an' foamin' at the
+mouth, an' hoarser 'n a bawlin' cow.
+
+"When he got out of breath from cussin' he punched Riggs all
+about the saloon, threw him outdoors, knocked him down an'
+kicked him till he got kickin' him down the road with the
+whole haw-hawed gang behind.  An' he drove him out of town!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+For two days Bo was confined to her bed, suffering
+considerable pain, and subject to fever, during which she
+talked irrationally.  Some of this talk afforded Helen as
+vast an amusement as she was certain it would have lifted
+Tom Carmichael to a seventh heaven.
+
+The third day, however, Bo was better, and, refusing to
+remain in bed, she hobbled to the sitting-room, where she
+divided her time between staring out of the window toward
+the corrals and pestering Helen with questions she tried to
+make appear casual.  But Helen saw through her case and was
+in a state of glee.  What she hoped most for was that
+Carmichael would suddenly develop a little less inclination
+for Bo.  It was that kind of treatment the young lady needed.
+And now was the great opportunity.  Helen almost felt tempted
+to give the cowboy a hint.
+
+Neither this day, nor the next, however, did he put in an
+appearance at the house, though Helen saw him twice on her
+rounds.  He was busy, as usual, and greeted her as if nothing
+particular had happened.
+
+Roy called twice, once in the afternoon, and again during
+the evening.  He grew more likable upon longer acquaintance.
+This last visit he rendered Bo speechless by teasing her
+about another girl Carmichael was going to take to a dance.
+Bo's face showed that her vanity could not believe this
+statement, but that her intelligence of young men credited
+it with being possible.  Roy evidently was as penetrating as
+he was kind.  He made a dry, casual little remark about the
+snow never melting on the mountains during the latter part
+of March; and the look with which be accompanied this remark
+brought a blush to Helen's cheek.
+
+After Roy had departed Bo said to Helen: "Confound that
+fellow!  He sees right through me."
+
+"My dear, you're rather transparent these days," murmured
+Helen.
+
+"You needn't talk.  He gave you a dig," retorted Bo.  "He just
+knows you're dying to see the snow melt."
+
+"Gracious!  I hope I'm not so bad as that.  Of course I want
+the snow melted and spring to come, and flowers --"
+
+"Hal Ha!  Ha!" taunted Bo.  "Nell Rayner, do you see any green
+in my eyes?  Spring to come!  Yes, the poet said in the spring
+a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.  But
+that poet meant a young woman."
+
+Helen gazed out of the window at the white stars.
+
+"Nell, have you seen him -- since I was hurt?" continued Bo,
+with an effort.
+
+"Him?  Who?"
+
+"Oh, whom do you suppose?  I mean Tom!" she responded, and
+the last word came with a burst.
+
+"Tom?  Who's he?  Ah, you mean Las Vegas.  Yes, I've seen him."
+
+"Well, did he ask a-about me?"
+
+"I believe he did ask how you were -- something like that."
+
+"Humph!  Nell, I don't always trust you." After that she
+relapsed into silence, read awhile, and dreamed awhile,
+looking into the fire, and then she limped over to kiss
+Helen good night and left the room.
+
+Next day she was rather quiet, seeming upon the verge of one
+of the dispirited spells she got infrequently.  Early in the
+evening, just after the lights had been lit and she had
+joined Helen in the sitting-room, a familiar step sounded on
+the loose boards of the porch.
+
+Helen went to the door to admit Carmichael.  He was
+clean-shaven, dressed in his dark suit, which presented such
+marked contrast from his riding-garb, and he wore a flower
+in his buttonhole.  Nevertheless, despite all this style, he
+seemed more than usually the cool, easy, careless cowboy.
+
+"Evenin', Miss Helen," he said, as he stalked in.  "Evenin',
+Miss Bo.  How are you-all?"
+
+Helen returned his greeting with a welcoming smile.
+
+"Good evening -- TOM," said Bo, demurely.
+
+That assuredly was the first time she had ever called him
+Tom.  As she spoke she looked distractingly pretty and
+tantalizing.  But if she had calculated to floor Carmichael
+with the initial, half-promising, wholly mocking use of his
+name she had reckoned without cause.  The cowboy received
+that greeting as if he had heard her use it a thousand times
+or had not heard it at all.  Helen decided if he was acting a
+part he was certainly a clever actor.  He puzzled her
+somewhat, but she liked his look, and his easy manner, and
+the something about him that must have been his unconscious
+sense of pride.  He had gone far enough, perhaps too far, in
+his overtures to Bo.
+
+"How are you feelin'?" be asked.
+
+"I'm better to-day," she replied, with downcast eyes.  "But
+I'm lame yet."
+
+"Reckon that bronc piled you up.  Miss Helen said there shore
+wasn't any joke about the cut on your knee.  Now, a fellar's
+knee is a bad place to hurt, if he has to keep on ridin'."
+
+"Oh, I'll be well soon.  How's Sam?  I hope he wasn't
+crippled."
+
+"Thet Sam -- why, he's so tough he never knowed he had a
+fall."
+
+"Tom -- I -- I want to thank you for giving Riggs what he
+deserved."
+
+She spoke it earnestly, eloquently, and for once she had no
+sly little intonation or pert allurement, such as was her
+wont to use on this infatuated young man.
+
+"Aw, you heard about that," replied Carmichael, with a wave
+of his hand to make light of it.  "Nothin' much.  It had to be
+done.  An' shore I was afraid of Roy.  He'd been bad.  An' so
+would any of the other boys.  I'm sorta lookin' out for all
+of them, you know, actin' as Miss Helen's foreman now."
+
+Helen was unutterably tickled.  The effect of his speech upon
+Bo was stupendous.  He had disarmed her.  He had, with the
+finesse and tact and suavity of a diplomat, removed himself
+from obligation, and the detachment of self, the casual
+thing be apparently made out of his magnificent
+championship, was bewildering and humiliating to Bo.  She sat
+silent for a moment or two while Helen tried to fit easily
+into the conversation.  It was not likely that Bo would long
+be at a loss for words, and also it was immensely probable
+that with a flash of her wonderful spirit she would turn the
+tables on her perverse lover in a twinkling.  Anyway, plain
+it was that a lesson had sunk deep.  She looked startled,
+hurt, wistful, and finally sweetly defiant.
+
+"But -- you told Riggs I was your girl!" Thus Bo unmasked
+her battery.  And Helen could not imagine how Carmichael
+would ever resist that and the soft, arch glance which
+accompanied it.
+
+Helen did not yet know the cowboy, any more than did Bo.
+
+"Shore.  I had to say thet.  I had to make it strong before
+thet gang.  I reckon it was presumin' of me, an' I shore
+apologize."
+
+Bo stared at him, and then, giving a little gasp, she
+drooped.
+
+"Wal, I just run in to say howdy an' to inquire after
+you-all," said Carmichael.  "I'm goin' to the dance, an' as
+Flo lives out of town a ways I'd shore better rustle. . . .
+Good night, Miss Bo; I hope you'll be ridin' Sam soon.  An'
+good night, Miss Helen."
+
+Bo roused to a very friendly and laconic little speech, much
+overdone.  Carmichael strode out, and Helen, bidding him
+good-by, closed the door after him.
+
+The instant he had departed Bo's transformation was tragic.
+
+"Flo!  He meant Flo Stubbs -- that ugly, cross-eyed, bold,
+little frump!"
+
+"Bo!" expostulated Helen.  "The young lady is not beautiful,
+I grant, but she's very nice and pleasant.  I liked her."
+
+"Nell Rayner, men are no good!  And cowboys are the worst!"
+declared Bo, terribly.
+
+"Why didn't you appreciate Tom when you had him?" asked
+Helen.
+
+Bo had been growing furious, but now the allusion, in past
+tense, to the conquest she had suddenly and amazingly found
+dear quite broke her spirit.  It was a very pale, unsteady,
+and miserable girl who avoided Helen's gaze and left the
+room.
+
+Next day Bo was not approachable from any direction.  Helen
+found her a victim to a multiplicity of moods, ranging from
+woe to dire, dark broodings, from them to' wistfulness, and
+at last to a pride that sustained her.
+
+Late in the afternoon, at Helen's leisure hour, when she and
+Bo were in the sitting-room, horses tramped into the court
+and footsteps mounted the porch.  Opening to a loud knock,
+Helen was surprised to see Beasley.  And out in the court
+were several mounted horsemen.  Helen's heart sank.  This
+visit, indeed, had been foreshadowed.
+
+"Afternoon, Miss Rayner," said Beasley, doffing his
+sombrero.  "I've called on a little business deal.  Will you
+see me?"
+
+Helen acknowledged his greeting while she thought rapidly.
+She might just as well see him and have that inevitable
+interview done with.
+
+"Come in," she said, and when he had entered she closed the
+door.  "My sister, Mr.  Beasley."
+
+"How d' you do, Miss?" said the rancher, in bluff, loud
+voice.
+
+Bo acknowledged the introduction with a frigid little bow.
+
+At close range Beasley seemed a forceful personality as well
+as a rather handsome man of perhaps thirty-five, heavy of
+build, swarthy of skin, and sloe-black of eye, like that of
+the Mexicans whose blood was reported to be in him.  He
+looked crafty, confident, and self-centered.  If Helen had
+never heard of him before that visit she would have
+distrusted him.
+
+"I'd called sooner, but I was waitin' for old Jose, the
+Mexican who herded for me when I was pardner to your uncle,"
+said Beasley, and he sat down to put his huge gloved hands
+on his knees.
+
+"Yes?" queried Helen, interrogatively.
+
+"Jose rustled over from Magdalena, an' now I can back up my
+claim. . . .  Miss Rayner, this hyar ranch ought to be mine
+an' is mine.  It wasn't so big or so well stocked when Al
+Auchincloss beat me out of it.  I reckon I'll allow for thet.
+I've papers, an' old Jose for witness.  An' I calculate
+you'll pay me eighty thousand dollars, or else I'll take
+over the ranch."
+
+Beasley spoke in an ordinary, matter-of-fact tone that
+certainly seemed sincere, and his manner was blunt, but
+perfectly natural.
+
+"Mr.  Beasley, your claim is no news to me," responded Helen,
+quietly.  "I've heard about it.  And I questioned my uncle.  He
+swore on his death-bed that he did not owe you a dollar.
+Indeed, he claimed the indebtedness was yours to him.  I
+could find nothing in his papers, so I must repudiate your
+claim.  I will not take it seriously."
+
+"Miss Rayner, I can't blame you for takin' Al's word against
+mine," said Beasley.  "An' your stand is natural.  But you're
+a stranger here an' you know nothin' of stock deals in these
+ranges.  It ain't fair to speak bad of the dead, but the
+truth is thet Al Auchincloss got his start by stealin' sheep
+an' unbranded cattle.  Thet was the start of every rancher I
+know.  It was mine.  An' we none of us ever thought of it as
+rustlin'."
+
+Helen could only stare her surprise and doubt at this
+statement.
+
+"Talk's cheap anywhere, an' in the West talk ain't much at
+all," continued Beasley.  "I'm no talker.  I jest want to tell
+my case an' make a deal if you'll have it.  I can prove more
+in black an' white, an' with witness, than you can.  Thet's
+my case.  The deal I'd make is this. . . .  Let's marry an'
+settle a bad deal thet way."
+
+The man's direct assumption, absolutely without a qualifying
+consideration for her woman's attitude, was amazing,
+ignorant, and base; but Helen was so well prepared for it
+that she hid her disgust.
+
+"Thank you, Mr.  Beasley, but I can't accept your offer," she
+replied.
+
+"Would you take time an' consider?" he asked, spreading wide
+his huge gloved hands.
+
+"Absolutely no."
+
+Beasley rose to his feet.  He showed no disappointment or
+chagrin, but the bold pleasantness left his face, and,
+slight as that change was, it stripped him of the only
+redeeming quality he showed.
+
+"Thet means I'll force you to pay me the eighty thousand or
+put you off," he said.
+
+"Mr.  Beasley, even if I owed you that, how could I raise so
+enormous a sum?  I don't owe it.  And I certainly won't be put
+off my property.  You can't put me off."
+
+"An' why can't I' he demanded, with lowering, dark gaze.
+
+"Because your claim is dishonest.  And I can prove it,"
+declared Helen, forcibly.
+
+"Who 're you goin' to prove it to -- thet I'm dishonest?"
+
+"To my men -- to your men -- to the people of Pine -- to
+everybody.  There's not a person who won't believe me."
+
+He seemed curious, discomfited, surlily annoyed, and yet
+fascinated by her statement or else by the quality and
+appearance of her as she spiritedly defended her cause.
+
+"An' how 're you goin' to prove all thet?" he growled.
+
+"Mr.  Beasley, do you remember last fall when you met Snake
+Anson with his gang up in the woods -- and hired him to make
+off with me?" asked Helen, in swift, ringing words.
+
+The dark olive of Beasley's bold face shaded to a dirty
+white.
+
+"Wha-at?" he jerked out, hoarsely.
+
+"I see you remember.  Well, Milt Dale was hidden in the loft
+of that cabin where you met Anson.  He heard every word of
+your deal with the outlaw."
+
+Beasley swung his arm in sudden violence, so hard that he
+flung his glove to the floor.  As he stooped to snatch it up
+he uttered a sibilant hiss.  Then, stalking to the door, he
+jerked it open, and slammed it behind him.  His loud voice,
+hoarse with passion, preceded the scrape and crack of hoofs.
+
+
+Shortly after supper that day, when Helen was just
+recovering her composure, Carmichael presented himself at
+the open door.  Bo was not there.  In the dimming twilight
+Helen saw that the cowboy was pale, somber, grim.
+
+"Oh, what's happened?" cried Helen.
+
+"Roy's been shot.  It come off in Turner's saloon But he
+ain't dead.  We packed him over to Widow Cass's.  An' he said
+for me to tell you he'd pull through."
+
+"Shot!  Pull through!" repeated Helen, in slow, unrealizing
+exclamation.  She was conscious of a deep internal tumult and
+a cold checking of blood in all her external body.
+
+"Yes, shot," replied Carmichael, fiercely.
+
+"An', whatever he says, I reckon he won't pull through."
+
+"0 Heaven, how terrible!" burst out Helen.  "He was so good
+-- such a man!  What a pity!  Oh, he must have met that in my
+behalf.  Tell me, what happened?  Who shot him?"
+
+"Wal, I don't know.  An' thet's what's made me hoppin' mad.  I
+wasn't there when it come off.  An' he won't tell me."
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"I don't know thet, either.  I reckoned first it was because
+he wanted to get even.  But, after thinkin' it over, I guess
+he doesn't want me lookin' up any one right now for fear I
+might get hurt.  An' you're goin' to need your friends.
+Thet's all I can make of Roy."
+
+Then Helen hurriedly related the event of Beasley's call on
+her that afternoon and all that had occurred.
+
+"Wal, the half-breed son-of-a-greaser!" ejaculated
+Carmichael, in utter confoundment.  "He wanted you to marry
+him!"
+
+"He certainly did.  I must say it was a -- a rather abrupt
+proposal."
+
+Carmichael appeared to be laboring with speech that had to
+be smothered behind his teeth.  At last he let out an
+explosive breath.
+
+"Miss Nell, I've shore felt in my bones thet I'm the boy
+slated to brand thet big bull."
+
+"Oh, he must have shot Roy.  He left here in a rage."
+
+"I reckon you can coax it out of Roy.  Fact is, all I could
+learn was thet Roy come in the saloon alone.  Beasley was
+there, an' Riggs --"
+
+"Riggs!" interrupted Helen.
+
+"Shore, Riggs.  He come back again.  But he'd better keep out
+of my way. . . .  An' Jeff Mulvey with his outfit.  Turner
+told me he heard an argument an' then a shot.  The gang
+cleared out, leavin' Roy on the floor.  I come in a little
+later.  Roy was still layin' there.  Nobody was doin' anythin'
+for him.  An' nobody had.  I hold that against Turner.  Wal, I
+got help an' packed Roy over to Widow Cass's.  Roy seemed all
+right.  But he was too bright an' talky to suit me.  The
+bullet hit his lung, thet's shore.  An' he lost a sight of
+blood before we stopped it.  Thet skunk Turner might have
+lent a hand.  An' if Roy croaks I reckon I'll --"
+
+"Tom, why must you always be reckoning to kill somebody?"
+demanded Helen, angrily.
+
+"'Cause somebody's got to be killed 'round here.  Thet's
+why!" he snapped back.
+
+"Even so -- should you risk leaving Bo and me without a
+friend?" asked Helen, reproachfully.
+
+At that Carmichael wavered and lost something of his sullen
+deadliness.
+
+"Aw, Miss Nell, I'm only mad.  If you'll just be patient with
+me -- an' mebbe coax me. . . .  But I can't see no other way
+out."
+
+"Let's hope and pray," said Helen, earnestly.  "You spoke of
+my coaxing Roy to tell who shot him.  When can I see him?"
+
+"To-morrow, I reckon.  I'll come for you.  Fetch Bo along with
+you.  We've got to play safe from now on.  An' what do you say
+to me an' Hal sleepin' here at the ranch-house?"
+
+"Indeed I'd feel safer," she replied.  "There are rooms.
+Please come."
+
+"Allright.  An' now I'll be goin' to fetch Hal.  Shore wish I
+hadn't made you pale an' scared like this."
+
+
+About ten o'clock next morning Carmichael drove Helen and Bo
+into Pine, and tied up the team before Widow Cass's cottage.
+
+The peach- and apple-trees were mingling blossoms of pink
+and white; a drowsy hum of bees filled the fragrant air;
+rich, dark-green alfalfa covered the small orchard flat; a
+wood fire sent up a lazy column of blue smoke; and birds
+were singing sweetly.
+
+Helen could scarcely believe that amid all this tranquillity
+a man lay perhaps fatally injured.  Assuredly Carmichael had
+been somber and reticent enough to rouse the gravest fears.
+
+Widow Cass appeared on the little porch, a gray, bent, worn,
+but cheerful old woman whom Helen had come to know as her
+friend.
+
+"My land!  I'm thet glad to see you, Miss Helen," she said.
+"An' you've fetched the little lass as I've not got
+acquainted with yet."
+
+"Good morning, Mrs.  Cass.  How -- how is Roy?" replied Helen,
+anxiously scanning the wrinkled face.
+
+"Roy?  Now don't you look so scared.  Roy's 'most ready to git
+on his hoss an' ride home, if I let him.  He knowed you was
+a-comin'.  An' he made me hold a lookin'-glass for him to
+shave.  How's thet fer a man with a bullet-hole through him!
+You can't kill them Mormons, nohow."
+
+She led them into a little sitting-room, where on a couch
+underneath a window Roy Beeman lay.  He was wide awake and
+smiling, but haggard.  He lay partly covered with a blanket.
+His gray shirt was open at the neck, disclosing bandages.
+
+"Mornin' -- girls," he drawled.  "Shore is good of you, now,
+comin' down."
+
+Helen stood beside him, bent over him, in her earnestness,
+as she greeted him.  She saw a shade of pain in his eyes and
+his immobility struck her, but he did not seem badly off.  Bo
+was pale, round-eyed, and apparently too agitated to speak.
+Carmichael placed chairs beside the couch for the girls.
+
+"Wal, what's ailin' you this nice mornin'?" asked Roy, eyes
+on the cowboy.
+
+"Huh!  Would you expect me to be wearin' the smile of 'a
+fellar goin' to be married?" retorted Carmichael.
+
+"Shore you haven't made up with Bo yet," returned Roy.
+
+Bo blushed rosy red, and the cowboy's face lost something of
+its somber hue.
+
+"I allow it's none of your d -- darn bizness if SHE ain't
+made up with me," he said.
+
+"Las Vegas, you're a wonder with a hoss an' a rope, an' I
+reckon with a gun, but when it comes to girls you shore
+ain't there."
+
+"I'm no Mormon, by golly!  Come, Ma Cass, let's get out of
+here, so they can talk."
+
+"Folks, I was jest a-goin' to say thet Roy's got fever an'
+he oughtn't t' talk too much," said the old woman.  Then she
+and Carmichael went into the kitchen and closed, the door.
+
+Roy looked up at Helen with his keen eyes, more kindly
+piercing than ever.
+
+"My brother John was here.  He'd just left when you come.  He
+rode home to tell my folks I'm not so bad hurt, an' then
+he's goin' to ride a bee-line into the mountains."
+
+Helen's eyes asked what her lips refused to utter.
+
+"He's goin' after Dale.  I sent him.  I reckoned we-all sorta
+needed sight of thet doggone hunter."
+
+Roy had averted his gaze quickly to Bo.
+
+"Don't you agree with me, lass?"
+
+"I sure do," replied Bo, heartily.
+
+All within Helen had been stilled for the moment of her
+realization; and then came swell and beat of heart, and
+inconceivable chafing of a tide at its restraint.
+
+"Can John -- fetch Dale out -- when the snow's so deep?" she
+asked, unsteadily.
+
+"Shore.  He's takin' two hosses up to the snow-line.  Then, if
+necessary, he'll go over the pass on snow-shoes.  But I bet
+him Dale would ride out.  Snow's about gone except on the
+north slopes an' on the peaks."
+
+"Then -- when may I -- we expect to see Dale?"
+
+"Three or four days, I reckon.  I wish he was here now. . . .
+Miss Helen, there's trouble afoot."
+
+"I realize that.  I'm ready.  Did Las Vegas tell you about
+Beasley's visit to me?"
+
+"No.  You tell me," replied Roy.
+
+Briefly Helen began to acquaint him with the circumstances
+of that visit, and before she had finished she made sure Roy
+was swearing to himself.
+
+"He asked you to marry him!  Jerusalem!  . . .  Thet I'd never
+have reckoned.  The -- low-down coyote of a greaser!  . . .
+Wal, Miss Helen, when I met up with Senuor Beasley last night
+he was shore spoilin' from somethin'; now I see what thet
+was.  An' I reckon I picked out the bad time."
+
+"For what?  Roy, what did you do?"
+
+"Wal, I'd made up my mind awhile back to talk to Beasley the
+first chance I had.  An' thet was it.  I was in the store when
+I seen him go into Turner's.  So I followed.  It was 'most
+dark.  Beasley an' Riggs an' Mulvey an' some more were
+drinkin' an' powwowin'.  So I just braced him right then."
+
+"Roy!  Oh, the way you boys court danger!"
+
+"But, Miss Helen, thet's the only way.  To be afraid MAKES
+more danger.  Beasley 'peared civil enough first off.  Him an'
+me kept edgin' off, an' his pards kept edgin' after us, till
+we got over in a corner of the saloon.  I don't know all I
+said to him.  Shore I talked a heap.  I told him what my old
+man thought.  An' Beasley knowed as well as I thet my old
+man's not only the oldest inhabitant hereabouts, but he's
+the wisest, too.  An' he wouldn't tell a lie.  Wal, I used all
+his sayin's in my argument to show Beasley thet if he didn't
+haul up short he'd end almost as short.  Beasley's
+thick-headed, an' powerful conceited.  Vain as a peacock!  He
+couldn't see, an' he got mad.  I told him he was rich enough
+without robbin' you of your ranch, an' -- wal, I shore put
+up a big talk for your side.  By this time he an' his gang
+had me crowded in a corner, an' from their looks I begun to
+get cold feet.  But I was in it an' had to make the best of
+it.  The argument worked down to his pinnin' me to my word
+that I'd fight for you when thet fight come off.  An' I shore
+told him for my own sake I wished it 'd come off quick. . .
+.  Then -- wal -- then somethin' did come off quick!"
+
+"Roy, then he shot you!" exclaimed Helen, passionately.
+
+"Now, Miss Helen, I didn't say who done it," replied Roy,
+with his engaging smile.
+
+"Tell me, then -- who did?"
+
+"Wal, I reckon I sha'n't tell you unless you promise not to
+tell Las Vegas.  Thet cowboy is plumb off his head.  He thinks
+he knows who shot me an' I've been lyin' somethin'
+scandalous.  You see, if he learns -- then he'll go gunnin'.
+An', Miss Helen, thet Texan is bad.  He might get plugged as
+I did -- an' there would be another man put off your side
+when the big trouble comes."
+
+"Roy, I promise you I will not tell Las Vegas," replied
+Helen, earnestly.
+
+"Wal, then -- it was Riggs!" Roy grew still paler as he
+confessed this and his voice, almost a whisper, expressed
+shame and hate.  "Thet four-flush did it.  Shot me from behind
+Beasley!  I had no chance.  I couldn't even see him draw.  But
+when I fell an' lay there an' the others dropped back, then
+I seen the smokin' gun in his hand.  He looked powerful
+important.  An' Beasley began to cuss him an' was cussin' him
+as they all run out."
+
+"Oh, coward!  the despicable coward!" cried Helen.
+
+"No wonder Tom wants to find out!" exclaimed Bo, low and
+deep.  "I'll bet he suspects Riggs."
+
+Shore he does, but I wouldn't give him no satisfaction."
+
+"Roy, you know that Riggs can't last out here."
+
+"Wal, I hope he lasts till I get on my feet again."
+
+"There you go!  Hopeless, all you boys!  You must spill
+blood!" murmured Helen, shudderingly.
+
+"Dear Miss Helen, don't take on so.  I'm like Dale -- no man
+to hunt up trouble.  But out here there's a sort of unwritten
+law -- an eye for an eye -- a tooth for a tooth.  I believe
+in God Almighty, an' killin' is against my religion, but
+Riggs shot me -- the same as shootin' me in the back."
+
+"Roy, I'm only a woman -- I fear, faint-hearted and unequal
+to this West."
+
+"Wait till somethin' happens to you.  'Supposin' Beasley
+comes an' grabs you with his own dirty big paws an', after
+maulin' you some, throws you out of your home!  Or supposin'
+Riggs chases you into a corner!"
+
+Helen felt the start of all her physical being -- a violent
+leap of blood.  But she could only judge of her looks from
+the grim smile of the wounded man as he watched her with his
+keen, intent eyes.
+
+"My friend, anythin' can happen," he said.  "But let's hope
+it won't be the worst."
+
+He had begun to show signs of weakness, and Helen, rising at
+once, said that she and Bo had better leave him then, but
+would come to see him the next day.  At her call Carmichael
+entered again with Mrs.  Cass, and after a few remarks the
+visit was terminated.  Carmichael lingered in the doorway.
+
+"Wal, Cheer up, you old Mormon!" he called.
+
+"Cheer up yourself, you cross old bachelor!" retorted Roy,
+quite unnecessarily loud.  "Can't you raise enough nerve to
+make up with Bo?"
+
+Carmichael evacuated the doorway as if he had been spurred.
+He was quite red in the face while he unhitched the team,
+and silent during the ride up to the ranch-house.  There he
+got down and followed the girls into the sitting room.  He
+appeared still somber, though not sullen, and had fully
+regained his composure.
+
+"Did you find out who shot Roy?" he asked, abruptly, of
+Helen.
+
+"Yes.  But I promised Roy I would not tell," replied Helen,
+nervously.  She averted her eyes from his searching gaze,
+intuitively fearing his next query.
+
+"Was it thet -- Riggs?"
+
+"Las Vegas, don't ask me.  I will not break my promise."
+
+He strode to the window and looked out a moment, and
+presently, when he turned toward Bo, he seemed a stronger,
+loftier, more impelling man, with all his emotions under
+control.
+
+"Bo, will you listen to me -- if I swear to speak the truth
+-- as I know it?"
+
+"Why, certainly," replied Bo, with the color coming swiftly
+to her face.
+
+"Roy doesn't want me to know because he wants to meet thet
+fellar himself.  An' I want to know because I want to stop
+him before he can do more dirt to us or our friends.  Thet's
+Roy's reason an' mine.  An' I'm askin' YOU to tell me."
+
+"But, Tom -- I oughtn't," replied Bo, haltingly.
+
+"Did you promise Roy not to tell?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Or your sister?"
+
+"No.  I didn't promise either."
+
+"Wal, then you tell me.  I want you to trust me in this here
+matter.  But not because I love you an' once had a wild dream
+you might care a little for me --"
+
+"Oh -- Tom!" faltered Bo.
+
+"Listen.  I want you to trust me because I'm the one who
+knows what's best.  I wouldn't lie an' I wouldn't say so if I
+didn't know shore.  I swear Dale will back me up.  But he
+can't be here for some days.  An' thet gang has got to be
+bluffed.  You ought to see this.  I reckon you've been quick
+in savvyin' Western ways.  I couldn't pay you no higher
+compliment, Bo Rayner. . . .  Now will you tell me?"
+
+"Yes, I will," replied Bo, with the blaze leaping to her
+eyes.
+
+"Oh, Bo -- please don't -- please don't.  Wait!" implored
+Helen.
+
+"Bo -- it's between you an' me," said Carmichael.
+
+"Tom, I'll tell you," whispered Bo.  "It was a lowdown,
+cowardly trick. . . .  Roy was surrounded -- and shot from
+behind Beasley -- by that four-flush Riggs!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+The memory of a woman had ruined Milt Dale's peace, had
+confounded his philosophy of self-sufficient, lonely
+happiness in the solitude of the wilds, had forced him to
+come face to face with his soul and the fatal significance
+of life.
+
+When he realized his defeat, that things were not as they
+seemed, that there was no joy for him in the coming of
+spring, that he had been blind in his free, sensorial,
+Indian relation to existence, he fell into an inexplicably
+strange state, a despondency, a gloom as deep as the silence
+of his home.  Dale reflected that the stronger an animal, the
+keener its nerves, the higher its intelligence, the greater
+must be its suffering under restraint or injury.  He thought
+of himself as a high order of animal whose great physical
+need was action, and now the incentive to action seemed
+dead.  He grew lax.  He did not want to move.  He performed his
+diminishing duties under compulsion.
+
+He watched for spring as a liberation, but not that he could
+leave the valley.  He hated the cold, he grew weary of wind
+and snow; he imagined the warm sun, the park once more green
+with grass and bright with daisies, the return of birds and
+squirrels and deer to heir old haunts, would be the means
+whereby he could break this spell upon him.  Then he might
+gradually return to past contentment, though it would never
+be the same.
+
+But spring, coming early to Paradise Park, brought a fever
+to Dale's blood -- a fire of unutterable longing.  It was
+good, perhaps, that this was so, because he seemed driven to
+work, climb, tramp, and keep ceaselessly on the move from
+dawn till dark.  Action strengthened his lax muscles and kept
+him from those motionless, senseless hours of brooding.  He
+at least need not be ashamed of longing for that which could
+never be his -- the sweetness of a woman -- a home full of
+light, joy, hope, the meaning and beauty of children.  But
+those dark moods were sinkings into a pit of hell.
+
+Dale had not kept track of days and weeks.  He did not know
+when the snow melted off three slopes of Paradise Park.  All
+he knew was that an age had dragged over his head and that
+spring had come.  During his restless waking hours, and even
+when he was asleep, there seemed always in the back of his
+mind a growing consciousness that soon he would emerge from
+this trial, a changed man, ready to sacrifice his chosen
+lot, to give up his lonely life of selfish indulgence in
+lazy affinity with nature, and to go wherever his strong
+hands might perform some real service to people.
+Nevertheless, he wanted to linger in this mountain fastness
+until his ordeal was over -- until he could meet her, and
+the world, knowing himself more of a man than ever before.
+
+One bright morning, while he was at his camp-fire, the tame
+cougar gave a low, growling warning.  Dale was startled.  Tom
+did not act like that because of a prowling grizzly or a
+straying stag.  Presently Dale espied a horseman riding
+slowly out of the straggling spruces.  And with that sight
+Dale's heart gave a leap, recalling to him a divination of
+his future relation to his kind.  Never had he been so glad
+to see a man!
+
+This visitor resembled one of the Beemans, judging from the
+way he sat his horse, and presently Dale recognized him to
+be John.
+
+At this juncture the jaded horse was spurred into a trot,
+soon reaching the pines and the camp.
+
+"Howdy, there, you ole b'ar-hunter!" called John, waving his
+hand.
+
+For all his hearty greeting his appearance checked a like
+response from Dale.  The horse was mud to his flanks and John
+was mud to his knees, wet, bedraggled, worn, and white.  This
+hue of his face meant more than fatigue.
+
+"Howdy, John?" replied Dale.
+
+They shook hands.  John wearily swung his leg over the
+pommel, but did not at once dismount.  His clear gray eyes
+were wonderingly riveted upon the hunter.
+
+"Milt -- what 'n hell's wrong?" he queried.
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Bust me if you ain't changed so I hardly knowed you.  You've
+been sick -- all alone here!"
+
+"Do I look sick?"
+
+"Wal, I should smile.  Thin an' pale an' down in the mouth!
+Milt, what ails you?"
+
+"I've gone to seed."
+
+"You've gone off your head, jest as Roy said, livin' alone
+here.  You overdid it, Milt.  An' you look sick."
+
+"John, my sickness is here," replied Dale, soberly, as he
+laid a hand on his heart.
+
+"Lung trouble!" ejaculated John.  "With thet chest, an' up in
+this air?  . . .  Get out!"
+
+"No -- not lung trouble," said Dale.
+
+"I savvy.  Had a hunch from Roy, anyhow."
+
+"What kind of a hunch?"
+
+"Easy now, Dale, ole man. . . .  Don't you reckon I'm ridin'
+in on you pretty early?  Look at thet hoss!" John slid off
+and waved a hand at the drooping beast, then began to
+unsaddle him.  "Wal, he done great.  We bogged some comin'
+over.  An' I climbed the pass at night on the frozen snow."
+
+"You're welcome as the flowers in May.  John, what month is
+it?"
+
+"By spades!  are you as bad as thet?  . . .  Let's see.  It's
+the twenty-third of March."
+
+"March!  Well, I'm beat.  I've lost my reckonin' -- an' a lot
+more, maybe."
+
+"Thar!" declared John, slapping the mustang.  "You can jest
+hang up here till my next trip.  Milt, how 're your hosses?"
+
+"Wintered fine."
+
+"Wal, thet's good.  We'll need two big, strong hosses right
+off."
+
+"What for?" queried Dale, sharply.  He dropped a stick of
+wood and straightened up from the camp-fire.
+
+"You're goin' to ride down to Pine with me -- thet's what
+for."
+
+Familiarly then came back to Dale the quiet, intent
+suggestiveness of the Beemans in moments foreboding trial.
+
+At this certain assurance of John's, too significant to be
+doubted, Dale's though of Pine gave slow birth to a strange
+sensation, as if he had been dead and was vibrating back to
+life.
+
+"Tell what you got to tell!" he broke out.
+
+Quick as a flash the Mormon replied: "Roy's been shot.  But
+he won't die.  He sent for you.  Bad deal's afoot.  Beasley
+means to force Helen Rayner out an' steal her ranch."
+
+A tremor ran all through Dale.  It seemed another painful yet
+thrilling connection between his past and this vaguely
+calling future.  His emotions had been broodings dreams,
+longings.  This thing his friend said had the sting of real
+life.
+
+"Then old Al's dead?" he asked.
+
+"Long ago -- I reckon around the middle of February.  The
+property went to Helen.  She's been doin' fine.  An' many
+folks say it's a pity she'll lose it."
+
+"She won't lose it," declared Dale.  How strange his voice
+sounded to his own ears!  It was hoarse and unreal, as if
+from disuse.
+
+"Wal, we-all have our idees.  I say she will.  My father says
+so.  Carmichael says so."
+
+"Who's he?"
+
+"Reckon you remember thet cow-puncher who came up with Roy
+an' Auchincloss after the girls -- last fall?"
+
+"Yes.  They called him Las -- Las Vegas.  I liked his looks."
+
+"Humph!  You'll like him a heap when you know him.  He's kept
+the ranch goin' for Miss Helen all along.  But the deal's
+comin' to a head.  Beasley's got thick with thet Riggs.  You
+remember him?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Wal, he's been hangin' out at Pine all winter, watchin' for
+some chance to get at Miss Helen or Bo.  Everybody's seen
+thet.  An' jest lately he chased Bo on hossback -- gave the
+kid a nasty fall.  Roy says Riggs was after Miss Helen.  But I
+think one or t'other of the girls would do thet varmint.
+Wal, thet sorta started goin's-on.  Carmichael beat Riggs an'
+drove him out of town.  But he come back.  Beasley called on
+Miss Helen an' offered to marry her so's not to take the
+ranch from her, he said."
+
+Dale awoke with a thundering curse.
+
+"Shore!" exclaimed John.  "I'd say the same -- only I'm
+religious.  Don't thet beady-eyed greaser's gall make you
+want to spit all over yourself?  My Gawd!  but Roy was mad!
+Roy's powerful fond of Miss Helen an' Bo. . . .  Wal, then,
+Roy, first chance he got, braced Beasley an' give him some
+straight talk.  Beasley was foamin' at the mouth, Roy said.
+It was then Riggs shot Roy.  Shot him from behind Beasley
+when Roy wasn't lookin'!  An' Riggs brags of bein' a
+gun-fighter.  Mebbe thet wasn't a bad shot for him!"
+
+"I reckon," replied Dale, as he swallowed hard.  "Now, just
+what was Roy's message to me?"
+
+"Wal, I can't remember all Roy said," answered John,
+dubiously.  "But Roy shore was excited an' dead in earnest.
+He says: 'Tell Milt what's happened.  Tell him Helen Rayner's
+in more danger than she was last fall.  Tell him I've seen
+her look away acrost the mountains toward Paradise Park with
+her heart in her eyes.  Tell him she needs him most of all!'"
+
+Dale shook all over as with an attack of ague.  He was seized
+by a whirlwind of passionate, terrible sweetness of
+sensation, when what he wildly wanted was to curse Roy and
+John for their simple-minded conclusions.
+
+"Roy's -- crazy!" panted Dale.
+
+"Wal, now, Milt -- thet's downright surprisin' of you.  Roy's
+the level-headest of any fellars I know."
+
+"Man!  if he MADE me believe him -- an' it turned out untrue
+-- I'd -- I'd kill him," replied Dale.
+
+"Untrue!  Do you think Roy Beeman would lie?"
+
+"But, John -- you fellows can't see my case.  Nell Rayner
+wants me -- needs me!  . . .  It can't be true!"
+
+"Wal, my love-sick pard -- it jest IS true!" exclaimed John,
+feelingly.  "Thet's the hell of life -- never knowin'.  But
+here it's joy for you.  You can believe Roy Beeman about
+women as quick as you'd trust him to track your lost hoss.
+Roy's married three girls.  I reckon he'll marry some more.
+Roy's only twenty-eight an' he has two big farms.  He said
+he'd seen Nell Rayner's heart in her eyes, lookin' for you
+-- an' you can jest bet your life thet's true.  An' he said
+it because he means you to rustle down there an' fight for
+thet girl."
+
+"I'll -- go," said Dale, in a shaky whisper, as he sat down
+on a pine log near the fire.  He stared unseeingly at the
+bluebells in the grass by his feet while storm after storm
+possessed his breast.  They were fierce and brief because
+driven by his will.  In those few moments of contending
+strife Dale was immeasurably removed from that dark gulf of
+self which had made his winter a nightmare.  And when he
+stood erect again it seemed that the old earth had a
+stirring, electrifying impetus for his feet.  Something
+black, bitter, melancholy, and morbid, always unreal to him,
+had passed away forever.  The great moment had been forced
+upon him.  He did not believe Roy Beeman's preposterous hint
+regarding Helen; but he had gone back or soared onward, as
+if by magic, to his old true self.
+
+
+Mounted on Dale's strongest horses, with only a light pack,
+an ax, and their weapons, the two men had reached the
+snow-line on the pass by noon that day.  Tom, the tame
+cougar, trotted along in the rear.
+
+The crust of the snow, now half thawed by the sun, would not
+hold the weight of a horse, though it upheld the men on
+foot.  They walked, leading the horses.  Travel was not
+difficult until the snow began to deepen; then progress
+slackened materially.  John had not been able to pick out the
+line of the trail, so Dale did not follow his tracks.  An old
+blaze on the trees enabled Dale to keep fairly well to the
+trail; and at length the height of the pass was reached,
+where the snow was deep.  Here the horses labored, plowing
+through foot by foot.  When, finally, they sank to their
+flanks, they had to be dragged and goaded on, and helped by
+thick flat bunches of spruce boughs placed under their
+hoofs.  It took three hours of breaking toil to do the few
+hundred yards of deep snow on the height of the pass.  The
+cougar did not have great difficulty in following, though it
+was evident he did not like such traveling.
+
+That behind them, the horses gathered heart and worked on to
+the edge of the steep descent, where they had all they could
+do to hold back from sliding and rolling.  Fast time was made
+on this slope, at the bottom of which began a dense forest
+with snow still deep in places and windfalls hard to locate.
+The men here performed Herculean labors, but they got
+through to a park where the snow was gone.  The ground,
+however, soft and boggy, in places was more treacherous than
+the snow; and the travelers had to skirt the edge of the
+park to a point opposite, and then go on through the forest.
+When they reached bare and solid ground, just before dark
+that night, it was high time, for the horses were ready to
+drop, and the men likewise.
+
+Camp was made in an open wood.  Darkness fell and the men
+were resting on bough beds, feet to the fire, with Tom
+curled up close by, and the horses still drooping where they
+had been unsaddled.  Morning, however, discovered them
+grazing on the long, bleached grass.  John shook his head
+when he looked at them.
+
+"You reckoned to make Pine by nightfall.  How far is it --
+the way you'll go?"
+
+"Fifty mile or thereabouts," replied Dale.
+
+"Wal, we can't ride it on them critters."
+
+"John, we'd do more than that if we had to."
+
+They were saddled and on the move before sunrise, leaving
+snow and bog behind.  Level parks and level forests led one
+after another to long slopes and steep descents, all growing
+sunnier and greener as the altitude diminished.  Squirrels
+and grouse, turkeys and deer, and less tame denizens of the
+forest grew more abundant as the travel advanced.  In this
+game zone, however, Dale had trouble with Tom.  The cougar
+had to be watched and called often to keep him off of
+trails.
+
+"Tom doesn't like a long trip," said Dale.  "But I'm goin' to
+take him.  Some way or other he may come in handy."
+
+"Sic him onto Beasley's gang," replied John.  "Some men are
+powerful scared of cougars.  But I never was."
+
+"Nor me.  Though I've had cougars give me a darn uncanny
+feelin'."
+
+The men talked but little.  Dale led the way, with Tom
+trotting noiselessly beside his horse.  John followed close
+behind.  They loped the horses across parks, trotted through
+the forests, walked slow up what few inclines they met, and
+slid down the soft, wet, pine-matted descents.  So they
+averaged from six to eight miles an hour.  The horses held up
+well under that steady travel, and this without any rest at
+noon.
+
+Dale seemed to feel himself in an emotional trance.  Yet,
+despite this, the same old sensorial perceptions crowded
+thick and fast upon him, strangely sweet and vivid after the
+past dead months when neither sun nor wind nor cloud nor
+scent of pine nor anything in nature could stir him.  His
+mind, his heart, his soul seemed steeped in an intoxicating
+wine of expectation, while his eyes and ears and nose had
+never been keener to register the facts of the forest-land.
+He saw the black thing far ahead that resembled a burned
+stump, but he knew was a bear before it vanished; he saw
+gray flash of deer and wolf and coyote, and the red of fox,
+and the small, wary heads of old gobblers just sticking
+above the grass; and he saw deep tracks of game as well as
+the slow-rising blades of bluebells where some soft-footed
+beast had just trod.  And he heard the melancholy notes of
+birds, the twitter of grouse, the sough of the wind, the
+light dropping of pine-cones, the near and distant bark of
+squirrels, the deep gobble of a turkey close at hand and the
+challenge from a rival far away, the cracking of twigs in
+the thickets, the murmur of running water, the scream of an
+eagle and the shrill cry of a hawk, and always the soft,
+dull, steady pads of the hoofs of the horses.
+
+The smells, too, were the sweet, stinging ones of spring,
+warm and pleasant -- the odor of the clean, fresh earth
+cutting its way through that thick, strong fragrance of
+pine, the smell of logs rotting in the sun, and of fresh new
+grass and flowers along a brook of snow-water.
+
+"I smell smoke," said Dale, suddenly, as he reined in, and
+turned for corroboration from his companion.
+
+John sniffed the warm air.
+
+"Wal, you're more of an Injun than me," he replied, shaking
+his head.
+
+They traveled on, and presently came out upon the rim of the
+last slope.  A long league of green slanted below them,
+breaking up into straggling lines of trees and groves that
+joined the cedars, and these in turn stretched on and down
+in gray-black patches to the desert, that glittering and
+bare, with streaks of somber hue, faded in the obscurity of
+distance.
+
+The village of Pine appeared to nestle in a curve of the
+edge of the great forest, and the cabins looked like tiny
+white dots set in green.
+
+"Look there," said Dale, pointing.
+
+Some miles to the right a gray escarpment of rock cropped
+out of the slope, forming a promontory; and from it a thin,
+pale column of smoke curled upward to be lost from sight as
+soon as it had no background of green.
+
+"Thet's your smoke, shore enough," replied John,
+thoughtfully.  "Now, I jest wonder who's campin' there.  No
+water near or grass for hosses."
+
+"John, that point's been used for smoke signals many a
+time."
+
+"Was jest thinkin' of thet same.  Shall we ride around there
+an' take a peek?"
+
+"No.  But we'll remember that.  If Beasley's got his deep
+scheme goin', he'll have Snake Anson's gang somewhere
+close."
+
+"Roy said thet same.  Wal, it's some three hours till
+sundown.  The hosses keep up.  I reckon I'm fooled, for we'll
+make Pine all right.  But old Tom there, he's tired or lazy."
+
+The big cougar was lying down, panting, and his half-shut
+eyes were on Dale.
+
+"Tom's only lazy an' fat.  He could travel at this gait for a
+week.  But let's rest a half-hour an' watch that smoke before
+movin' on.  We can make Pine before sundown."
+
+
+When travel had been resumed, half-way down the slope Dale's
+sharp eyes caught a broad track where shod horses had
+passed, climbing in a long slant toward the promontory.  He
+dismounted to examine it, and John, coming up, proceeded
+with alacrity to get off and do likewise.  Dale made his
+deductions, after which he stood in a brown study beside his
+horse, waiting for John.
+
+"Wal, what 'd you make of these here tracks?" asked that
+worthy.
+
+"Some horses an' a pony went along here yesterday, an'
+to-day a single horse made, that fresh track."
+
+"Wal, Milt, for a hunter you ain't so bad at hoss tracks,"
+observed John, "But how many hosses went yesterday ?"
+
+"I couldn't make out -- several -- maybe four or five."
+
+"Six hosses an' a colt or little mustang, unshod, to be
+strict-correct.  Wal, supposin' they did.  What 's it mean to
+us?"
+
+"I don't know as I'd thought anythin' unusual, if it hadn't
+been for that smoke we saw off the rim, an' then this here
+fresh track made along to-day.  Looks queer to me."
+
+"Wish Roy was here," replied John, scratching his head.
+"Milt, I've a hunch, if he was, he'd foller them tracks."
+
+"Maybe.  But we haven't time for that.  We can backtrail them,
+though, if they keep clear as they are here.  An' we'll not
+lose any time, either."
+
+That broad track led straight toward Pine, down to the edge
+of the cedars, where, amid some jagged rocks, evidences
+showed that men had camped there for days.  Here it ended as
+a broad trail.  But from the north came the single fresh
+track made that very day, and from the east, more in a line
+with Pine, came two tracks made the day before.  And these
+were imprints of big and little hoofs.  Manifestly these
+interested John more than they did Dale, who had to wait for
+his companion.
+
+"Milt, it ain't a colt's -- thet little track," avowed John.
+
+"Why not -- an' what if it isn't?" queried Dale.
+
+"Wal, it ain't, because a colt always straggles back, an'
+from one side to t'other.  This little track keeps close to
+the big one.  An', by George!  it was made by a led mustang."
+
+John resembled Roy Beeman then with that leaping, intent
+fire in his gray eyes.  Dale's reply was to spur his horse
+into a trot and call sharply to the lagging cougar.
+
+When they turned into the broad, blossom-bordered road that
+was the only thoroughfare of Pine the sun was setting red
+and gold behind the mountains.  The horses were too tired for
+any more than a walk.  Natives of the village, catching sight
+of Dale and Beeman, and the huge gray cat following like a
+dog, called excitedly to one another.  A group of men in
+front of Turner's gazed intently down the road, and soon
+manifested signs of excitement.  Dale and his comrade
+dismounted in front of Widow Cass's cottage.  And Dale called
+as he strode up the little path.  Mrs.  Cass came out.  She was
+white and shaking, but appeared calm.  At sight of her John
+Beeman drew a sharp breath.
+
+"Wal, now --" he began, hoarsely, and left off.
+
+"How's Roy?" queried Dale.
+
+"Lord knows I'm glad to see you, boys!  Milt, you're thin an'
+strange-lookin'.  Roy's had a little setback.  He got a shock
+to-day an' it throwed him off.  Fever -- an' now he's out of
+his head.  It won't do no good for you to waste time seein'
+him.  Take my word for it he's all right.  But there's others
+as -- For the land's sakes, Milt Dale, you fetched thet
+cougar back!  Don't let him near me!"
+
+"Tom won't hurt you, mother," said Dale, as the cougar came
+padding up the path.  "You were sayin' somethin' -- about
+others.  Is Miss Helen safe?  Hurry!"
+
+"Ride up to see her -- an' waste no more time here."
+
+Dale was quick in the saddle, followed by John, but the
+horses had to be severely punished to force them even to a
+trot.  And that was a lagging trot, which now did not leave
+Torn behind.
+
+The ride up to Auchincloss's ranch-house seemed endless to
+Dale.  Natives came out in the road to watch after he had
+passed.  Stern as Dale was in dominating his feelings, he
+could not wholly subordinate his mounting joy to a waiting
+terrible anticipation of catastrophe.  But no matter what
+awaited -- nor what fateful events might hinge upon this
+nameless circumstance about to be disclosed, the wonderful
+and glorious fact of the present was that in a moment he
+would see Helen Rayner.
+
+There were saddled horses in the courtyard, but no riders.  A
+Mexican boy sat on the porch bench, in the seat where Dale
+remembered he had encountered Al Auchincloss.  The door of
+the big sitting-room was open.  The scent of flowers, the
+murmur of bees, the pounding of hoofs came vaguely to Dale.
+His eyes dimmed, so that the ground, when he slid out of his
+saddle, seemed far below him.  He stepped upon the porch.  His
+sight suddenly cleared.  A tight fullness at his throat made
+incoherent the words he said to the Mexican boy.  But they
+were understood, as the boy ran back around the house.  Dale
+knocked sharply and stepped over the threshold.
+
+Outside, John, true to his habits, was thinking, even in
+that moment of suspense, about the faithful, exhausted
+horses.  As he unsaddled them he talked: "Fer soft an' fat
+hosses, winterin' high up, wal, you've done somethin'!"
+
+Then Dale heard a voice in another room, a step, a creak of
+the door.  It opened.  A woman in white appeared.  He
+recognized Helen.  But instead of the rich brown bloom and
+dark-eyed beauty so hauntingly limned on his memory, he saw
+a white, beautiful face, strained and quivering in anguish,
+and eyes that pierced his heart.  He could not speak.
+
+"Oh!  my friend -- you've come!" she whispered.
+
+Dale put out a shaking hand.  But she did not see it.  She
+clutched his shoulders, as if to feel whether or not he was
+real, and then her arms went up round his neck.
+
+"Oh, thank God!  I knew you would come!" she said, and her
+head sank to his shoulder.
+
+Dale divined what he had suspected.  Helen's sister had been
+carried off.  Yet, while his quick mind grasped Helen's
+broken spirit -- the unbalance that was reason for this
+marvelous and glorious act -- he did not take other meaning
+of the embrace to himself.  He just stood there, transported,
+charged like a tree struck by lightning, making sure with
+all his keen senses, so that he could feel forever, how she
+was clinging round his neck, her face over his bursting
+heart, her quivering form close pressed to his.
+
+"It's -- Bo," he said, unsteadily.
+
+"She went riding yesterday -- and -- never -- came -- back!"
+replied Helen, brokenly.
+
+"I've seen her trail.  She's been taken into the woods.  I'll
+find her.  I'll fetch her back," he replied, rapidly.
+
+With a shock she seemed to absorb his meaning.  With another
+shock she raised her face -- leaned back a little to look at
+him.
+
+"You'll find her -- fetch her back?"
+
+"Yes," he answered, instantly.
+
+With that ringing word it seemed to Dale she realized how
+she was standing.  He felt her shake as she dropped her arms
+and stepped back, while the white anguish of her face was
+flooded out by a wave of scarlet.  But she was brave in her
+confusion.  Her eyes never fell, though they changed swiftly,
+darkening with shame, amaze, and with feelings he could not
+read.
+
+"I'm almost -- out of my head," she faltered.
+
+"No wonder.  I saw that. . . .  But now you must get
+clear-headed.  I've no time to lose."
+
+He led her to the door.
+
+"John, it's Bo that's gone," he called.  "Since yesterday. .
+. .  Send the boy to get me a bag of meat an' bread.  You run
+to the corral an' get me a fresh horse.  My old horse Ranger
+if you can find him quick.  An' rustle."
+
+Without a word John leaped bareback on one of the horses he
+had just unsaddled and spurred him across the courtyard.
+
+Then the big cougar, seeing Helen, got up from where he lay
+on the porch and came to her.
+
+"Oh, it's Tom!" cried Helen, and as he rubbed against her
+knees she patted his head with trembling hand.  "You big,
+beautiful pet!  Oh, how I remember!  Oh, how Bo would love to
+--"
+
+"Where's Carmichael?" interrupted Dale.  "Out huntin' Bo?"
+
+"Yes.  It was he who missed her first.  He rode everywhere
+yesterday.  Last night when he came back he was wild.  I've
+not seen him to-day.  He made all the other men but Hal and
+Joe stay home on the ranch."
+
+"Right.  An' John must stay, too, declared Dale.  "But it's
+strange.  Carmichael ought to have found the girl's tracks.
+She was ridin' a pony?"
+
+"Bo rode Sam.  He's a little bronc, very strong and fast."
+
+"I come across his tracks.  How'd Carmichael miss them?"
+
+"He didn't.  He found them -- trailed them all along the
+north range.  That's where he forbade Bo to go.  You see,
+they're in love with each other.  They've been at odds.
+Neither will give in.  Bo disobeyed him.  There's hard ground
+off the north range, so he said.  He was able to follow her
+tracks only so far."
+
+"Were there any other tracks along with hers?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Miss Helen, I found them 'way southeast of Pine up on the
+slope of the mountain.  There were seven other horses makin'
+that trail -- when we run across it.  On the way down we
+found a camp where men had waited.  An' Bo's pony, led by a
+rider on a big horse, come into that camp from the east --
+maybe north a little.  An' that tells the story."
+
+"Riggs ran her down -- made off with her!" cried Helen,
+passionately.  "Oh, the villain!  He had men in waiting.
+That's Beasley's work.  They were after me."
+
+"It may not be just what you said, but that's close enough.
+An' Bo's in a bad fix.  You must face that an' try to bear up
+under -- fears of the worst."
+
+"My friend!  You will save her!"
+
+"I'll fetch her back, alive or dead."
+
+"Dead!  Oh, my God!" Helen cried, and closed her eyes an
+instant, to open them burning black.  "But Bo isn't dead.  I
+know that -- I feel it.  She'll not die very easy.  She's a
+little savage.  She has no fear.  She'd fight like a tigress
+for her life.  She's strong.  You remember how strong.  She can
+stand anything.  Unless they murder her outright she'll live
+-- a long time -- through any ordeal. . . .  So I beg you, my
+friend, don't lose an hour -- don't ever give up!"
+
+Dale trembled under the clasp of her hands.  Loosing his own
+from her clinging hold, he stepped out on the porch At that
+moment John appeared on Ranger, coming at a gallop.
+
+"Nell, I'll never come back without her," said Dale.  "I
+reckon you can hope -- only be prepared.  That's all.  It's
+hard.  But these damned deals are common out here in the
+West."
+
+"Suppose Beasley comes -- here!" exclaimed Helen, and again
+her hand went out toward him.
+
+"If he does, you refuse to get off ," replied Dale.  "But
+don't let him or his greasers put a dirty hand on you.
+Should he threaten force -- why, pack some clothes -- an'
+your valuables -- an' go down to Mrs.  Cass's.  An' wait till
+I come back!"
+
+"Wait -- till you -- come back!" she faltered, slowly
+turning white again.  Her dark eyes dilated.  "Milt -- you're
+like Las Vegas.  You'll kill Beasley!"
+
+Dale heard his own laugh, very cold and strange, foreign to
+his ears.  A grim, deadly hate of Beasley vied with the
+tenderness and pity he felt for this distressed girl.  It was
+a sore trial to see her leaning there against the door -- to
+be compelled to leave her alone.  Abruptly be stalked off the
+porch.  Tom followed him.  The black horse whinnied his
+recognition of Dale and snorted at sight of the cougar.  Just
+then the Mexican boy returned with a bag.  Dale tied this,
+with the small pack, behind the saddle.
+
+"John, you stay here with Miss Helen," said Dale.  "An' if
+Carmichael comes back, keep him, too!  An' to-night, if any
+one rides into Pine from the way we come, you be sure to
+spot him."
+
+"I'll do thet, Milt," responded John.
+
+Dale mounted, and, turning for a last word to Helen, he felt
+the words of cheer halted on his lips as he saw her standing
+white and broken-hearted, with her hands to her bosom.  He
+could not look twice.
+
+"Come on there, you Tom," he called to the cougar.  Reckon on
+this track you'll pay me for all my trainin' of you"
+
+"Oh, my friend!" came Helen's sad voice, almost a whisper to
+his throbbing ears.  "Heaven help you -- to save her!  I --"
+
+Then Ranger started and Dale heard no more.  He could not
+look back.  His eyes were full of tears and his breast ached.
+By a tremendous effort he shifted that emotion -- called on
+all the spiritual energy of his being to the duty of this
+grim task before him.
+
+He did not ride down through the village, but skirted the
+northern border, and worked round to the south, where,
+coming to the trail he had made an hour past, he headed on
+it, straight for the slope now darkening in the twilight.
+The big cougar showed more willingness to return on this
+trail than he had shown in the coming.  Ranger was fresh and
+wanted to go, but Dale held him in.
+
+A cool wind blew down from the mountain with the coming of
+night.  Against the brightening stars Dale saw the promontory
+lift its bold outline.  It was miles away.  It haunted him,
+strangely calling.  A night, and perhaps a day, separated him
+from the gang that held Bo Rayner prisoner.  Dale had no plan
+as yet.  He had only a motive as great as the love he bore
+Helen Rayner.
+
+Beasley's evil genius had planned this abduction.  Riggs was
+a tool, a cowardly knave dominated by a stronger will.  Snake
+Anson and his gang had lain in wait at that cedar camp; had
+made that broad hoof track leading up the mountain.  Beasley
+had been there with them that very day.  All this was as
+assured to Dale as if he had seen the men.
+
+But the matter of Dale's recovering the girl and doing it
+speedily strung his mental strength to its highest pitch.
+Many outlines of action flashed through his mind as he rode
+on, peering keenly through the night, listening with
+practised ears.  All were rejected.  And at the outset of
+every new branching of thought he would gaze down at the
+gray form of the cougar, long, graceful, heavy, as he padded
+beside the horse.  From the first thought of returning to
+help Helen Rayner he had conceived an undefined idea of
+possible value in the qualities of his pet.  Tom had
+performed wonderful feats of trailing, but he had never been
+tried on men.  Dale believed he could make him trail
+anything, yet he had no proof of this.  One fact stood out of
+all Dale's conjectures, and it was that he had known men,
+and brave men, to fear cougars.
+
+Far up on the slope, in a little hollow where water ran and
+there was a little grass for Ranger to pick, Dale haltered
+him and made ready to spend the night.  He was sparing with
+his food, giving Tom more than he took himself.  Curled close
+up to Dale, the big cat went to sleep.
+
+But Dale lay awake for long.
+
+The night was still, with only a faint moan of wind on this
+sheltered slope.  Dale saw hope in the stars.  He did not seem
+to have promised himself or Helen that he could save her
+sister, and then her property.  He seemed to have stated
+something unconsciously settled, outside of his thinking.
+Strange how this certainty was not vague, yet irreconcilable
+with any plans he created!  Behind it, somehow nameless with
+inconceivable power, surged all his wonderful knowledge of
+forest, of trails, of scents, of night, of the nature of men
+lying down to sleep in the dark, lonely woods, of the nature
+of this great cat that lived its every action in accordance
+with his will.
+
+He grew sleepy, and gradually his mind stilled, with his
+last conscious thought a portent that he would awaken to
+accomplish his desperate task.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+Young Burt possessed the keenest eyes of any man in Snake
+Anson's gang, for which reason he was given the post as
+lookout from the lofty promontory.  His instructions were to
+keep sharp watch over the open slopes below and to report
+any sight of a horse.
+
+A cedar fire with green boughs on top of dead wood sent up a
+long, pale column of smoke.  This signal-fire had been kept
+burning since sunrise.
+
+The preceding night camp had been made on a level spot in
+the cedars back of the promontory.  But manifestly Anson did
+not expect to remain there long.  For, after breakfast, the
+packs had been made up and the horses stood saddled and
+bridled.  They were restless and uneasy, tossing bits and
+fighting flies.  The sun, now half-way to meridian, was hot
+and no breeze blew in that sheltered spot.
+
+Shady Jones had ridden off early to fill the water-bags, and
+had not yet returned.  Anson, thinner and scalier and more
+snakelike than ever, was dealing a greasy, dirty deck of
+cards, his opponent being the square-shaped, black-visaged
+Moze.  In lieu of money the gamblers wagered with
+cedar-berries, each of which berries represented a pipeful
+of tobacco.  Jim Wilson brooded under a cedar-tree, his
+unshaven face a dirty dust-hue, a smoldering fire in his
+light eyes, a sullen set to his jaw.  Every little while he
+would raise his eyes to glance at Riggs, and it seemed that
+a quick glance was enough.  Riggs paced to and fro in the
+open, coatless and hatless, his black-broadcloth trousers
+and embroidered vest dusty and torn.  An enormous gun bumped
+awkwardly in its sheath swinging below his hip.  Riggs looked
+perturbed.  His face was sweating freely, yet it was far from
+red in color.  He did not appear to mind the sun or the
+flies.  His eyes were staring, dark, wild, shifting in gaze
+from everything they encountered.  But often that gaze shot
+back to the captive girl sitting under a cedar some yards
+from the man.
+
+Bo Rayner's little, booted feet were tied together with one
+end of a lasso and the other end trailed off over the
+ground.  Her hands were free.  Her riding-habit was dusty and
+disordered.  Her eyes blazed defiantly out of a small, pale
+face.
+
+"Harve Riggs, I wouldn't be standing in those cheap boots of
+yours for a million dollars," she said, sarcastically.  Riggs
+took no notice of her words.
+
+"You pack that gun-sheath wrong end out.  What have you got
+the gun for, anyhow?" she added, tauntingly.
+
+Snake Anson let out a hoarse laugh and Moze's black visage
+opened in a huge grin.  Jim Wilson seemed to drink in the
+girl's words.  Sullen and somber, he bent his lean head, very
+still, as if listening.
+
+"You'd better shut up," said Riggs, darkly.
+
+"I will not shut up," declared Bo.
+
+"Then I'll gag you," he threatened.
+
+"Gag me!  Why, you dirty, low-down, two-bit of a bluff!" she
+exclaimed, hotly, "I'd like to see you try it.  I'll tear
+that long hair of yours right off your head."
+
+Riggs advanced toward her with his hands clutching, as if
+eager to throttle her.  The girl leaned forward, her face
+reddening, her eyes fierce.
+
+"You damned little cat!" muttered Riggs, thickly.  "I'll gag
+you -- if you don't stop squallin'."
+
+"Come on.  I dare you to lay a hand on me. . . .  Harve Riggs,
+I'm not the least afraid of you.  Can't you savvy that?
+You're a liar, a four-flush, a sneak!  Why, you're not fit to
+wipe the feet of any of these outlaws."
+
+Riggs took two long strides and bent over her, his teeth
+protruding in a snarl, and he cuffed her hard on the side of
+the head.
+
+Bo's head jerked back with the force of the blow, but she
+uttered no cry.
+
+"Are you goin' to keep your jaw shut?" he demanded,
+stridently, and a dark tide of blood surged up into his
+neck.
+
+"I should smile I'm not," retorted Bo, in cool, deliberate
+anger of opposition.  "You've roped me -- and you've struck
+me!  Now get a club -- stand off there -- out of my reach --
+and beat me!  Oh, if I only knew cuss words fit for you --
+I'd call you them!"
+
+Snake Anson had stopped playing cards, and was watching,
+listening, with half-disgusted, half-amused expression on
+his serpent-like face.  Jim Wilson slowly rose to his feet.
+If any one had observed him it would have been to note that
+he now seemed singularly fascinated by this scene, yet all
+the while absorbed in himself.  Once he loosened the
+neck-band of his blouse.
+
+Riggs swung his arm more violently at the girl.  But she
+dodged.
+
+"You dog!" she hissed.  "Oh, if I only had a gun!"
+
+Her face then, with its dead whiteness and the eyes of
+flame, held a tragic, impelling beauty that stung Anson into
+remonstrance.
+
+"Aw, Riggs, don't beat up the kid," he protested.  "Thet
+won't do any good.  Let her alone."
+
+"But she's got to shut up," replied Riggs.
+
+"How 'n hell air you goin' to shet her up?  Mebbe if you get
+out of her sight she'll be quiet. . . .  How about thet,
+girl?"
+
+Anson gnawed his drooping mustache as he eyed Bo.
+
+"Have I made any kick to you or your men yet?" she queried.
+
+"It strikes me you 'ain't," replied Anson.
+
+"You won't hear me make any so long as I'm treated decent,"
+said Bo.  "I don't know what you've got to do with Riggs.  He
+ran me down -- roped me -- dragged me to your camp.  Now I've
+a hunch you're waiting for Beasley."
+
+"Girl, your hunch 's correct," said Anson.
+
+"Well, do you know I'm the wrong girl?"
+
+"What's thet?  I reckon you're Nell Rayner, who got left all
+old Auchincloss's property."
+
+"No.  I'm Bo Rayner.  Nell is my sister.  She owns the ranch.
+Beasley wanted her."
+
+Anson cursed deep and low.  Under his sharp, bristling
+eyebrows he bent cunning green eyes upon Riggs.
+
+"Say, you!  Is what this kid says so?"
+
+"Yes.  She's Nell Rayner's sister," replied Riggs, doggedly.
+
+"A-huh!  Wal, why in the hell did you drag her into my camp
+an' off up here to signal Beasley?  He ain't wantin' her.  He
+wants the girl who owns the ranch.  Did you take one fer the
+other -- same as thet day we was with you?"
+
+"Guess I must have," replied Riggs, sullenly.
+
+"But you knowed her from her sister afore you come to my
+camp?"
+
+Riggs shook his head.  He was paler now and sweating more
+freely.  The dank hair hung wet over his forehead.  His manner
+was that of a man suddenly realizing he had gotten into a
+tight place.
+
+"Oh, he's a liar!" exclaimed Bo, with contemptuous ring in
+her voice.  "He comes from my country.  He has known Nell and
+me for years."
+
+Snake Anson turned to look at Wilson.
+
+"Jim, now hyar's a queer deal this feller has rung in on us.
+I thought thet kid was pretty young.  Don't you remember
+Beasley told us Nell Rayner was a handsome woman?"
+
+"Wal, pard Anson, if this heah gurl ain't handsome my eyes
+have gone pore," drawled Wilson.
+
+"A-huh!  So your Texas chilvaree over the ladies is some
+operatin'," retorted Anson, with fine sarcasm.  "But thet
+ain't tellin' me what you think?"
+
+"Wal, I ain't tellin' you what I think yet.  But I know thet
+kid ain't Nell Rayner.  For I've seen her."
+
+Anson studied his right-hand man for a moment, then, taking
+out his tobacco-pouch, he sat himself down upon a stone and
+proceeded leisurely to roll a cigarette.  He put it between
+his thin lips and apparently forgot to light it.  For a few
+moments he gazed at the yellow ground and some scant
+sage-brush.  Riggs took to pacing up and down.  Wilson leaned
+as before against the cedar.  The girl slowly recovered from
+her excess of anger.
+
+"Kid, see hyar," said Anson, addressing the girl; "if Riggs
+knowed you wasn't Nell an' fetched you along anyhow -- what
+'d he do thet fur?"
+
+"He chased me -- caught me.  Then he saw some one after us
+and he hurried to your camp.  He was afraid -- the cur!"
+
+Riggs heard her reply, for he turned a malignant glance upon
+her.
+
+"Anson, I fetched her because I know Nell Rayner will give
+up anythin' on earth for her," he said, in loud voice.
+
+Anson pondered this statement with an air of considering its
+apparent sincerity.
+
+"Don't you believe him," declared Bo Rayner, bluntly.  "He's
+a liar.  He's double-crossing Beasley and all of you."
+
+Riggs raised a shaking hand to clench it at her.  "Keep still
+or it 'll be the worse for you."
+
+"Riggs, shut up yourself," put in Anson, as he leisurely
+rose.  "Mebbe it 'ain't occurred to you thet she might have
+some talk interestin' to me.  An' I'm runnin' this hyar camp.
+. . .  Now, kid, talk up an' say what you like."
+
+"I said he was double-crossing you all," replied the girl,
+instantly.  "Why, I'm surprised you'd be caught in his
+company!  My uncle Al and my sweetheart Carmichael and my
+friend Dale -- they've all told me what Western men are,
+even down to outlaws, robbers, cutthroat rascals like you.
+And I know the West well enough now to be sure that
+four-flush doesn't belong here and can't last here.  He went
+to Dodge City once and when he came back he made a bluff at
+being a bad man.  He was a swaggering, bragging, drinking
+gun-fighter.  He talked of the men he'd shot, of the fights
+he'd had.  He dressed like some of those gun-throwing
+gamblers. . . .  He was in love with my sister Nell.  She
+hated him.  He followed us out West and he has hung on our
+actions like a sneaking Indian.  Why, Nell and I couldn't
+even walk to the store in the village.  He rode after me out
+on the range -- chased me. . . .  For that Carmichael called
+Riggs's bluff down in Turner's saloon.  Dared him to draw!
+Cussed him every name on the range!  Slapped and beat and
+kicked him!  Drove him out of Pine!  . . .  And now, whatever
+he has said to Beasley or you, it's a dead sure bet he's
+playing his own game.  That's to get hold of Nell, and if not
+her -- then me!  . . .  Oh, I'm out of breath -- and I'm out
+of names to call him.  If I talked forever -- I'd never be --
+able to -- do him justice.  But lend me -- a gun -- a
+minute!"
+
+Jim Wilson's quiet form vibrated with a start.  Anson with
+his admiring smile pulled his gun and, taking a couple of
+steps forward, held it out butt first.  She stretched eagerly
+for it and he jerked it away.
+
+"Hold on there!" yelled Riggs, in alarm.
+
+"Damme, Jim, if she didn't mean bizness!" exclaimed the
+outlaw.
+
+"Wal, now -- see heah, Miss.  Would you bore him -- if you
+hed a gun?" inquired Wilson, with curious interest.  There
+was more of respect in his demeanor than admiration.
+
+"No.  I don't want his cowardly blood on my hands," replied
+the girl.  "But I'd make him dance -- I'd make him run."
+
+"Shore you can handle a gun?"
+
+She nodded her answer while her eyes flashed hate and her
+resolute lips twitched.
+
+Then Wilson made a singularly swift motion and his gun was
+pitched butt first to within a foot of her hand.  She
+snatched it up, cocked it, aimed it, all before Anson could
+move.  But he yelled:
+
+"Drop thet gun, you little devil!"
+
+Riggs turned ghastly as the big blue gun lined on him.  He
+also yelled, but that yell was different from Anson's.
+
+"Run or dance!" cried the girl.
+
+The big gun boomed and leaped almost out of her hand.  She
+took both hands, and called derisively as she fired again.
+The second bullet hit at Riggs's feet, scattering the dust
+and fragments of stone all over him.  He bounded here --
+there -- then darted for the rocks.  A third time the heavy
+gun spoke and this bullet must have ticked Riggs, for he let
+out a hoarse bawl and leaped sheer for the protection of a
+rock.
+
+"Plug him!  Shoot off a leg!" yelled Snake Anson, whooping
+and stamping, as Riggs got out of sight.
+
+Jim Wilson watched the whole performance with the same
+quietness that had characterized his manner toward the girl.
+Then, as Riggs disappeared, Wilson stepped forward and took
+the gun from the girl's trembling hands.  She was whiter than
+ever, but still resolute and defiant.  Wilson took a glance
+over in the direction Riggs had hidden and then proceeded to
+reload the gun.  Snake Anson's roar of laughter ceased rather
+suddenly.
+
+"Hyar, Jim, she might have held up the whole gang with thet
+gun," he protested.
+
+"I reckon she 'ain't nothin' ag'in' us," replied Wilson.
+
+"A-huh!  You know a lot about wimmen now, don't you?  But thet
+did my heart good.  Jim, what 'n earth would you have did if
+thet 'd been you instead of Riggs?"
+
+The query seemed important and amazing.  Wilson pondered.
+
+"Shore I'd stood there -- stock-still -- an' never moved an
+eye-winker."
+
+"An' let her shoot!" ejaculated Anson, nodding his long
+head.  "Me, too!"
+
+So these rough outlaws, inured to all the violence and
+baseness of their dishonest calling, rose to the challenging
+courage of a slip of a girl.  She had the one thing they
+respected -- nerve.
+
+Just then a halloo, from the promontory brought Anson up
+with a start.  Muttering to himself, he strode out toward the
+jagged rocks that hid the outlook.  Moze shuffled his burly
+form after Anson.
+
+"Miss, it shore was grand -- thet performance of Mister
+Gunman Riggs," remarked Jim Wilson, attentively studying the
+girl.
+
+"Much obliged to you for lending me your gun," she replied.
+"I -- I hope I hit him -- a little."
+
+"Wal, if you didn't sting him, then Jim Wilson knows nothin'
+about lead."
+
+"Jim Wilson?  Are you the man -- the outlaw my uncle Al
+knew?"
+
+"Reckon I am, miss.  Fer I knowed Al shore enough.  What 'd he
+say aboot me?"
+
+"I remember once he was telling me about Snake Anson's gang.
+He mentioned you.  Said you were a real gun-fighter.  And what
+a shame it was you had to be an outlaw."
+
+"Wal!  An' so old Al spoke thet nice of me. . . .  It's
+tolerable likely I'll remember.  An' now, miss, can I do
+anythin' for you?"
+
+Swift as a flash she looked at him.
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Wal, shore I don't mean much, I'm sorry to say.  Nothin' to
+make you look like thet. . . .  I hev to be an outlaw, shore
+as you're born.  But -- mebbe there's a difference in
+outlaws."
+
+She understood him and paid him the compliment not to voice
+her sudden upflashing hope that he might be one to betray
+his leader.
+
+"Please take this rope off my feet.  Let me walk a little.
+Let me have a -- a little privacy.  That fool watched every
+move I made.  I promise not to run away.  And, oh!  I'm
+thirsty."
+
+"Shore you've got sense." He freed her feet and helped her
+get up.  "There'll be some fresh water any minit now, if
+you'll wait."
+
+Then he turned his back and walked over to where Riggs sat
+nursing a bullet-burn on his leg.
+
+"Say, Riggs, I'm takin' the responsibility of loosin' the
+girl for a little spell.  She can't get away.  An' there ain't
+any sense in bein' mean."
+
+Riggs made no reply, and went on rolling down his trousers
+leg, lapped a fold over at the bottom and pulled on his
+boot.  Then he strode out toward the promontory.  Half-way
+there he encountered Anson tramping back.
+
+"Beasley's comin' one way an' Shady's comin' another.  We'll
+be off this hot point of rock by noon," said the outlaw
+leader.
+
+Riggs went on to the promontory to look for himself.
+
+"Where's the girl?" demanded Anson, in surprise, when he got
+back to the camp.
+
+"Wal, she's walkin' 'round between heah an' Pine," drawled
+Wilson.
+
+"Jim, you let her loose?"
+
+"Shore I did.  She's been hawg-tied all the time.  An' she
+said she'd not run off.  I'd take thet girl's word even to a
+sheep-thief."
+
+"A-huh.  So would I, for all of thet.  But, Jim, somethin's
+workin' in you.  Ain't you sort of rememberin' a time when
+you was young -- an' mebbe knowed pretty kids like this
+one?"
+
+"Wal, if I am it 'll shore turn out bad fer somebody."
+
+Anson gave him a surprised stare and suddenly lost the
+bantering tone.
+
+"A-huh!  So thet's how it's workin'," he replied, and flung
+himself down in the shade.
+
+Young Burt made his appearance then, wiping his sallow face.
+His deep-set, hungry eyes, upon which his comrades set such
+store, roved around the camp.
+
+"Whar's the gurl?" he queried.
+
+"Jim let her go out fer a stroll," replied Anson.
+
+"I seen Jim was gittin' softy over her.  Haw!  Haw!  Haw!"
+
+But Snake Anson did not crack a smile.  The atmosphere
+appeared not to be congenial for jokes, a fact Burt rather
+suddenly divined.  Riggs and Moze returned from the
+promontory, the latter reporting that Shady Jones was riding
+up close.  Then the girl walked slowly into sight and
+approached to find a seat within ten yards of the group.
+They waited in silence until the expected horseman rode up
+with water-bottles slung on both sides of his saddle.  His
+advent was welcome.  All the men were thirsty.  Wilson took
+water to the girl before drinking himself.
+
+"Thet's an all-fired hot ride fer water," declared the
+outlaw Shady, who somehow fitted his name in color and
+impression.  "An', boss, if it's the same to you I won't take
+it ag'in."
+
+"Cheer up, Shady.  We'll be rustlin' back in the mountains
+before sundown," said Anson.
+
+"Hang me if that ain't the cheerfulest news I've hed in some
+days.  Hey, Moze?"
+
+The black-faced Moze nodded his shaggy head.
+
+"I'm sick an' sore of this deal," broke out Burt, evidently
+encouraged by his elders.  "Ever since last fall we've been
+hangin' 'round -- till jest lately freezin' in camps -- no
+money -- no drink -- no grub wuth havin'.  All on promises!"
+
+Not improbably this young and reckless member of the gang
+had struck the note of discord.  Wilson seemed most detached
+from any sentiment prevailing there.  Some strong thoughts
+were revolving in his brain.
+
+"Burt, you ain't insinuatin' thet I made promises?" inquired
+Anson, ominously.
+
+"No, boss, I ain't.  You allus said we might hit it rich.  But
+them promises was made to you.  An' it 'd be jest like thet
+greaser to go back on his word now we got the gurl."
+
+"Son, it happens we got the wrong one.  Our long-haired pard
+hyar -- Mister Riggs -- him with the big gun -- he waltzes
+up with this sassy kid instead of the woman Beasley wanted."
+
+Burt snorted his disgust while Shady Jones, roundly
+swearing, pelted the smoldering camp-fire with stones.  Then
+they all lapsed into surly silence.  The object of their
+growing scorn, Riggs, sat a little way apart, facing none of
+them, but maintaining as bold a front as apparently he could
+muster.
+
+Presently a horse shot up his ears, the first indication of
+scent or sound imperceptible to the men.  But with this cue
+they all, except Wilson, sat up attentively.  Soon the crack
+of iron-shod hoofs on stone broke the silence.  Riggs
+nervously rose to his feet.  And the others, still excepting
+Wilson, one by one followed suit.  In another moment a rangy
+bay horse trotted out of the cedars, up to the camp, and his
+rider jumped off nimbly for so heavy a man.
+
+"Howdy, Beasley?" was Anson's greeting.
+
+"Hello, Snake, old man!" replied Beasley, as his bold,
+snapping black eyes swept the group.  He was dusty and hot,
+and wet with sweat, yet evidently too excited to feel
+discomfort.  "I seen your smoke signal first off an' jumped
+my hoss quick.  But I rode north of Pine before I headed
+'round this way.  Did you corral the girl or did Riggs?  Say!
+-- you look queer!  . . .  What's wrong here?  You haven't
+signaled me for nothin'?
+
+Snake Anson beckoned to Bo.
+
+"Come out of the shade.  Let him look you over."
+
+The girl walked out from under the spreading cedar that had
+hidden her from sight.
+
+Beasley stared aghast -- his jaw dropped.
+
+"Thet's the kid sister of the woman I wanted!" he
+ejaculated.
+
+"So we've jest been told."
+
+Astonishment still held Beasley.
+
+"Told?" he echoed.  Suddenly his big body leaped with a
+start.  "Who got her?  , Who fetched her?"
+
+"Why, Mister Gunman Riggs hyar," replied Anson, with a
+subtle scorn.
+
+"Riggs, you got the wrong girl," shouted Beasley.  "You made
+thet mistake once before.  What're you up to?"
+
+"I chased her an' when I got her, seein' it wasn't Nell
+Rayner -- why -- I kept her, anyhow," replied Riggs.  "An'
+I've got a word for your ear alone."
+
+"Man, you're crazy -- queerin' my deal thet way!" roared
+Beasley.  "You heard my plans. . . .  Riggs, this
+girl-stealin' can't be done twice.  Was you drinkin' or
+locoed or what?"
+
+"Beasley, he was giving you the double-cross," cut in Bo
+Rayner's cool voice.
+
+The rancher stared speechlessly at her, then at Anson, then
+at Wilson, and last at Riggs, when his brown visage shaded
+dark with rush of purple blood.  With one lunge he knocked
+Riggs flat, then stood over him with a convulsive hand at
+his gun.
+
+"You white-livered card-sharp!  I've a notion to bore you. .
+. .  They told me you had a deal of your own, an' now I
+believe it."
+
+"Yes -- I had," replied Riggs, cautiously getting up.  He was
+ghastly.  "But I wasn't double-crossin' you.  Your deal was to
+get the girl away from home so you could take possession of
+her property.  An' I wanted her."
+
+"What for did you fetch the sister, then?" demanded Beasley,
+his big jaw bulging.
+
+"Because I've a plan to --"
+
+"Plan hell!  You've spoiled my plan an' I've seen about
+enough of you." Beasley breathed hard; his lowering gaze
+boded an uncertain will toward the man who had crossed him;
+his hand still hung low and clutching.
+
+"Beasley, tell them to get my horse.  I want to go home,"
+said Bo Rayner.
+
+Slowly Beasley turned.  Her words enjoined a silence.  What to
+do with her now appeared a problem.
+
+"I had nothin' to do with fetchin' you here an' I'll have
+nothin' to do with sendin' you back or whatever's done with
+you," declared Beasley.
+
+Then the girl's face flashed white again and her eyes
+changed to fire.
+
+"You're as big a liar as Riggs," she cried, passionately.
+"And you're a thief, a bully who picks on defenseless girls.
+Oh, we know your game!  Milt Dale heard your plot with this
+outlaw Anson to steal my sister.  You ought to be hanged --
+you half-breed greaser!"
+
+"I'll cut out your tongue!" hissed Beasley.
+
+"Yes, I'll bet you would if you had me alone.  But these
+outlaws -- these sheep-thieves -- these tools you hire are
+better than you and Riggs. . . .  What do you suppose
+Carmichael will do to you?  Carmichael!  He's my sweetheart --
+that cowboy.  You know what he did to Riggs.  Have you brains
+enough to know what he'll do to you?"
+
+"He'll not do much," growled Beasley.  But the thick purplish
+blood was receding from his face.  "Your cowpuncher --"
+
+"Bah!" she interrupted, and she snapped her fingers in his
+face.  "He's from Texas!  He's from TEXAS!"
+
+"Supposin' he is from Texas?" demanded Beasley, in angry
+irritation.  "What's thet?  Texans are all over.  There's Jim
+Wilson, Snake Anson's right-hand man.  He's from Texas.  But
+thet ain't scarin' any one."
+
+He pointed toward Wilson, who shifted uneasily from foot to
+foot.  The girl's flaming glance followed his hand.
+
+"Are you from Texas?" she asked.
+
+"Yes, Miss, I am -- an' I reckon I don't deserve it,"
+replied Wilson.  It was certain that a vague shame attended
+his confession.
+
+"Oh!  I believed even a bandit from Texas would fight for a
+helpless girl!" she replied, in withering scorn of
+disappointment.
+
+Jim Wilson dropped his head.  If any one there suspected a
+serious turn to Wilson's attitude toward that situation it
+was the keen outlaw leader.
+
+"Beasley, you're courtin' death," he broke in.
+
+"You bet you are!" added Bo, with a passion that made her
+listeners quiver.  "You've put me at the mercy of a gang of
+outlaws!  You may force my sister out of her home!  But your
+day will come.' Tom Carmichael will KILL you."
+
+Beasley mounted his horse.  Sullen, livid, furious, he sat
+shaking in the saddle, to glare down at the outlaw leader.
+
+"Snake, thet's no fault of mine the deal's miscarried.  I was
+square.  I made my offer for the workin' out of my plan.  It
+'ain't been done.  Now there's hell to pay an' I'm through."
+
+"Beasley, I reckon I couldn't hold you to anythin'," replied
+Anson, slowly.  "But if you was square you ain't square now.
+We've hung around an' tried hard.  My men are all sore.  An'
+we're broke, with no outfit to speak of.  Me an' you never
+fell out before.  But I reckon we might."
+
+"Do I owe you any money -- accordin' to the deal?" demanded
+Beasley.
+
+"No, you don't," responded Anson, sharply.
+
+"Then thet's square.  I wash my hands of the whole deal.  Make
+Riggs pay up.  He's got money an' he's got plans.  Go in with
+him."
+
+With that Beasley spurred his horse, wheeled and rode away.
+The outlaws gazed after him until he disappeared in the
+cedars.
+
+"What'd you expect from a greaser?" queried Shady Jones.
+
+"Anson, didn't I say so?" added Burt.
+
+The black-visaged Moze rolled his eyes like a mad bull and
+Jim Wilson studiously examined a stick he held in his hands.
+Riggs showed immense relief.
+
+"Anson, stake me to some of your outfit an' I'll ride off
+with the girl," he said, eagerly.
+
+"Where'd you go now?" queried Anson, curiously.
+
+Riggs appeared at a loss for a quick answer; his wits were
+no more equal to this predicament than his nerve.
+
+"You're no woodsman.  An' onless you're plumb locoed you'd
+never risk goin' near Pine or Show Down.  There'll be real
+trackers huntin' your trail."
+
+The listening girl suddenly appealed to Wilson.
+
+"Don't let him take me off -- alone -- in the woods!" she
+faltered.  That was the first indication of her weakening.
+
+Jim Wilson broke into gruff reply.  "I'm not bossin' this
+gang."
+
+"But you're a man!" she importuned.
+
+"Riggs, you fetch along your precious firebrand an' come
+with us," said Anson, craftily.  "I'm particular curious to
+see her brand you."
+
+"Snake, lemme take the girl back to Pine," said Jim Wilson.
+
+Anson swore his amaze.
+
+"It's sense," continued Wilson.  "We've shore got our own
+troubles, an' keepin' her 'll only add to them.  I've a
+hunch.  Now you know I ain't often givin' to buckin' your
+say-so.  But this deal ain't tastin' good to me.  Thet girl
+ought to be sent home."
+
+"But mebbe there's somethin' in it for us.  Her sister 'd pay
+to git her back."
+
+"Wal, I shore hope you'll recollect I offered -- thet's
+all," concluded Wilson.
+
+"Jim, if we wanted to git rid of her we'd let Riggs take her
+off," remonstrated the outlaw leader.  He was perturbed and
+undecided.  Wilson worried him.
+
+The long Texan veered around full faced.  What subtle
+transformation in him!
+
+"Like hell we would!" he said.
+
+It could not have been the tone that caused Anson to quail.
+He might have been leader here, but he was not the greater
+man.  His face clouded.
+
+"Break camp," he ordered.
+
+Riggs had probably not heard that last exchange between
+Anson and Wilson, for he had walked a few rods aside to get
+his horse.
+
+In a few moments when they started off, Burt, Jones, and
+Moze were in the lead driving the pack-horses, Anson rode
+next, the girl came between him and Riggs, and
+significantly, it seemed, Jim Wilson brought up the rear.
+
+This start was made a little after the noon hour.  They
+zigzagged up the slope, took to a deep ravine, and followed
+it up to where it headed in the level forest.  From there
+travel was rapid, the pack-horses being driven at a jogtrot.
+Once when a troop of deer burst out of a thicket into a
+glade, to stand with ears high, young Burt halted the
+cavalcade.  His well-aimed shot brought down a deer.  Then the
+men rode on, leaving him behind to dress and pack the meat.
+The only other halt made was at the crossing of the first
+water, a clear, swift brook, where both horses and men drank
+thirstily.  Here Burt caught up with his comrades.
+
+They traversed glade and park, and wended a crooked trail
+through the deepening forest, and climbed, bench after
+bench, to higher ground, while the sun sloped to the
+westward, lower and redder.  Sunset had gone, and twilight
+was momentarily brightening to the afterglow when Anson,
+breaking his silence of the afternoon, ordered a halt.
+
+The place was wild, dismal, a shallow vale between dark
+slopes of spruce.  Grass, fire-wood, and water were there in
+abundance.  All the men were off, throwing saddles and packs,
+before the tired girl made an effort to get down.  Riggs,
+observing her, made a not ungentle move to pull her off.  She
+gave him a sounding slap with her gloved hand.
+
+"Keep your paws to yourself," she said.  No evidence of
+exhaustion was there in her spirit.
+
+Wilson had observed this by-play, but Anson had not.
+
+"What come off?" he asked.
+
+"Wal, the Honorable Gunman Riggs jest got caressed by the
+lady -- as he was doin' the elegant," replied Moze, who
+stood nearest.
+
+"Jim, was you watchin'?" queried Anson.  His curiosity had
+held through the afternoon.
+
+"He tried to yank her off an' she biffed him," replied
+Wilson.
+
+"That Riggs is jest daffy or plain locoed," said Snake, in
+an aside to Moze.
+
+"Boss, you mean plain cussed.  Mark my words, he'll hoodoo
+this outfit.  Jim was figgerin' correct."
+
+"Hoodoo --" cursed Anson, under his breath.
+
+Many hands made quick work.  In a few moments a fire was
+burning brightly, water was boiling, pots were steaming, the
+odor of venison permeated the cool air.  The girl had at last
+slipped off her saddle to the ground, where she sat while
+Riggs led the horse away.  She sat there apparently
+forgotten, a pathetic droop to her head.
+
+Wilson had taken an ax and was vigorously wielding it among
+the spruces.  One by one they fell with swish and soft crash.
+Then the sliding ring of the ax told how he was slicing off
+the branches with long sweeps.  Presently he appeared in the
+semi-darkness, dragging half-trimmed spruces behind him.  He
+made several trips, the last of which was to stagger under a
+huge burden of spruce boughs.  These he spread under a low,
+projecting branch of an aspen.  Then he leaned the bushy
+spruces slantingly against this branch on both sides,
+quickly improvising a V-shaped shelter with narrow aperture
+in front.  Next from one of the packs he took a blanket and
+threw that inside the shelter.  Then, touching the girl on
+the shoulder, he whispered:
+
+"When you're ready, slip in there.  An' don't lose no sleep
+by worryin', fer I'll be layin' right here."
+
+He made a motion to indicate his length across the front of
+the narrow aperture.
+
+"Oh, thank you!  Maybe you really are a Texan," she whispered
+back.
+
+"Mebbe," was his gloomy reply.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+
+The girl refused to take food proffered her by Riggs, but
+she ate and drank a little that Wilson brought her, then she
+disappeared in the spruce lean-to.
+
+Whatever loquacity and companionship had previously existed
+in Snake Anson's gang were not manifest in this camp.  Each
+man seemed preoccupied, as if pondering the dawn in his mind
+of an ill omen not clear to him yet and not yet dreamed of
+by his fellows.  They all smoked.  Then Moze and Shady played
+cards awhile by the light of the fire, but it was a dull
+game, in which either seldom spoke.  Riggs sought his blanket
+first, and the fact was significant that he lay down some
+distance from the spruce shelter which contained Bo Rayner.
+Presently young Burt went off grumbling to his bed.  And not
+long afterward the card-players did likewise.
+
+Snake Anson and Jim Wilson were left brooding in silence
+beside the dying camp-fire.
+
+The night was dark, with only a few stars showing.  A fitful
+wind moaned unearthly through the spruce.  An occasional
+thump of hoof sounded from the dark woods.  No cry of wolf or
+coyote or cat gave reality to the wildness of forest-land.
+
+By and by those men who had rolled in their blankets were
+breathing deep and slow in heavy slumber.
+
+"Jim, I take it this hyar Riggs has queered our deal," said
+Snake Anson, in low voice.
+
+"I reckon," replied Wilson.
+
+"An' I'm feared he's queered this hyar White Mountain
+country fer us."
+
+"Shore I 'ain't got so far as thet.  What d' ye mean, Snake?"
+
+"Damme if I savvy," was the gloomy reply.  "I only know what
+was bad looks growin' wuss.  Last fall -- an' winter -- an'
+now it's near April.  We've got no outfit to make a long
+stand in the woods. . . .  Jim, jest how strong is thet
+Beasley down in the settlements?"
+
+"I've a hunch he ain't half as strong as he bluffs."
+
+"Me, too.  I got thet idee yesterday.  He was scared of the
+kid -- when she fired up an' sent thet hot-shot about her
+cowboy sweetheart killin' him.  He'll do it, Jim.  I seen that
+Carmichael at Magdalena some years ago.  Then he was only a
+youngster.  But, whew!  Mebbe he wasn't bad after toyin' with
+a little red liquor."
+
+"Shore.  He was from Texas, she said."
+
+"Jim, I savvied your feelin's was hurt -- by thet talk about
+Texas -- an' when she up an' asked you."
+
+Wilson had no rejoinder for this remark.
+
+"Wal, Lord knows, I ain't wonderin'.  You wasn't a hunted
+outlaw all your life.  An' neither was I. . . .  Wilson, I
+never was keen on this girl deal -- now, was I?"
+
+"I reckon it's honest to say no to thet," replied Wilson.
+But it's done.  Beasley 'll get plugged sooner or later.  Thet
+won't help us any.  Chasin' sheep-herders out of the country
+an' stealin' sheep -- thet ain't stealin' gurls by a long
+sight.  Beasley 'll blame that on us, an' be greaser enough
+to send some of his men out to hunt us.  For Pine an' Show
+Down won't stand thet long.  There's them Mormons.  They'll be
+hell when they wake up.  Suppose Carmichael got thet hunter
+Dale an' them hawk-eyed Beemans on our trail?"
+
+"Wal, we'd cash in -- quick," replied Anson, gruffly.
+
+"Then why didn't you let me take the gurl back home?"
+
+"Wal, come to think of thet, Jim, I'm sore, an' I need money
+-- an' I knowed you'd never take a dollar from her sister.
+An' I've made up my mind to git somethin' out of her."
+
+"Snake, you're no fool.  How 'll you do thet same an' do it
+quick?"
+
+"'Ain't reckoned it out yet."
+
+"Wal, you got aboot to-morrer an' thet's all," returned
+Wilson, gloomily.
+
+"Jim, what's ailin' you?"
+
+"I'll let you figger thet out."
+
+"Wal, somethin' ails the whole gang," declared Anson,
+savagely.  "With them it's nothin' to eat -- no whisky -- no
+money to bet with -- no tobacco!. . .  But thet's not what's
+ailin' you, Jim Wilson, nor me!"
+
+"Wal, what is, then?" queried Wilson.
+
+"With me it's a strange feelin' thet my day's over on these
+ranges.  I can't explain, but it jest feels so.  Somethin' in
+the air.  I don't like them dark shadows out there under the
+spruces.  Savvy?  . . .  An' as fer you, Jim -- wal, you allus
+was half decent, an' my gang's got too lowdown fer you."
+
+"Snake, did I ever fail you?"
+
+"No, you never did.  You're the best pard I ever knowed.  In
+the years we've rustled together we never had a contrary
+word till I let Beasley fill my ears with his promises.
+Thet's my fault.  But, Jim, it's too late."
+
+"It mightn't have been too late yesterday."
+
+"Mebbe not.  But it is now, an' I'll hang on to the girl or
+git her worth in gold," declared the outlaw, grimly.
+
+"Snake, I've seen stronger gangs than yours come an' go.
+Them Big Bend gangs in my country -- them rustlers -- they
+were all bad men.  You have no likes of them gangs out heah.
+If they didn't get wiped out by Rangers or cowboys, why they
+jest naturally wiped out themselves.  Thet's a law I
+recognize in relation to gangs like them.  An' as for yours
+-- why, Anson, it wouldn't hold water against one real
+gun-slinger."
+
+"A-huh' Then if we ran up ag'in' Carmichael or some such
+fellar -- would you be suckin' your finger like a baby?"
+
+"Wal, I wasn't takin' count of myself.  I was takin'
+generalities."
+
+"Aw, what 'n hell are them?" asked Anson, disgustedly.  Jim,
+I know as well as you thet this hyar gang is hard put.  We're
+goin' to be trailed an' chased.  We've got to hide -- be on
+the go all the time -- here an' there -- all over, in the
+roughest woods.  An' wait our chance to work south."
+
+"Shore.  But, Snake, you ain't takin' no count of the
+feelin's of the men -- an' of mine an' yours. . . .  I'll bet
+you my hoss thet in a day or so this gang will go to
+pieces."
+
+"I'm feared you spoke what's been crowdin' to git in my
+mind," replied Anson.  Then he threw up his hands in a
+strange gesture of resignation.  The outlaw was brave, but
+all men of the wilds recognized a force stronger than
+themselves.  He sat there resembling a brooding snake with
+basilisk eyes upon the fire.  At length he arose, and without
+another word to his comrade he walked wearily to where lay
+the dark, quiet forms of the sleepers.
+
+Jim Wilson remained beside the flickering fire.  He was
+reading something in the red embers, perhaps the past.
+Shadows were on his face, not all from the fading flames or
+the towering spruces.  Ever and anon he raised his head to
+listen, not apparently that he expected any unusual sound,
+but as if involuntarily.  Indeed, as Anson had said, there
+was something nameless in the air.  The black forest breathed
+heavily, in fitful moans of wind.  It had its secrets.  The
+glances Wilson threw on all sides betrayed that any hunted
+man did not love the dark night, though it hid him.  Wilson
+seemed fascinated by the life inclosed there by the black
+circle of spruce.  He might have been reflecting on the
+strange reaction happening to every man in that group, since
+a girl had been brought among them.  Nothing was clear,
+however; the forest kept its secret, as did the melancholy
+wind; the outlaws were sleeping like tired beasts, with
+their dark secrets locked in their hearts.
+
+After a while Wilson put some sticks on the red embers, then
+pulled the end of a log over them.  A blaze sputtered up,
+changing the dark circle and showing the sleepers with their
+set, shadowed faces upturned.  Wilson gazed on all of them, a
+sardonic smile on his lips, and then his look fixed upon the
+sleeper apart from the others -- Riggs.  It might have been
+the false light of flame and shadow that created Wilson's
+expression of dark and terrible hate.  Or it might have been
+the truth, expressed in that lonely, unguarded hour, from
+the depths of a man born in the South -- a man who by his
+inheritance of race had reverence for all womanhood -- by
+whose strange, wild, outlawed bloody life of a gun-fighter
+he must hate with the deadliest hate this type that aped and
+mocked his fame.
+
+It was a long gaze Wilson rested upon Riggs -- as strange
+and secretive as the forest wind moaning down the great
+aisles -- and when that dark gaze was withdrawn Wilson
+stalked away to make his bed with the stride of one ill whom
+spirit had liberated force.
+
+He laid his saddle in front of the spruce shelter where the
+girl had entered, and his tarpaulin and blankets likewise
+and then wearily stretched his long length to rest.
+
+The camp-fire blazed up, showing the exquisite green.  and
+brown-flecked festooning of the spruce branches, symmetrical
+and perfect, yet so irregular, and then it burned out and
+died down, leaving all in the dim gray starlight.  The horses
+were not moving around; the moan of night wind had grown
+fainter; the low hum of insects, was dying away; even the
+tinkle of the brook had diminished.  And that growth toward
+absolute silence continued, yet absolute silence was never
+attained.  Life abided in the forest; only it had changed its
+form for the dark hours.
+
+
+Anson's gang did not bestir themselves at the usual early
+sunrise hour common to all woodsmen, hunters, or outlaws, to
+whom the break of day was welcome.  These companions -- Anson
+and Riggs included -- might have hated to see the dawn come.
+It meant only another meager meal, then the weary packing
+and the long, long ride to nowhere in particular, and
+another meager meal -- all toiled for without even the
+necessities of satisfactory living, and assuredly without
+the thrilling hopes that made their life significant, and
+certainly with a growing sense of approaching calamity.
+
+The outlaw leader rose surly and cross-grained.  He had to
+boot Burt to drive him out for the horses.  Riggs followed
+him.  Shady Jones did nothing except grumble.  Wilson, by
+common consent, always made the sour-dough bread, and he was
+slow about it this morning.  Anson and Moze did the rest of
+the work, without alacrity.  The girl did not appear.
+
+"Is she dead?" growled Anson.
+
+"No, she ain't," replied Wilson, looking up.  "She's
+sleepin'.  Let her sleep.  She'd shore be a sight better off
+if she was daid."
+
+"A-huh!  So would all of this hyar outfit," was Anson's
+response.
+
+"Wal, Sna-ake, I shore reckon we'll all be thet there soon,"
+drawled Wilson, in his familiar cool and irritating tone
+that said so much more than the content of the words.
+
+Anson did not address the Texas member of his party again.
+
+Burt rode bareback into camp, driving half the number of the
+horses; Riggs followed shortly with several more.  But three
+were missed, one of them being Anson's favorite.  He would
+not have budged without that horse.  During breakfast he
+growled about his lazy men, and after the meal tried to urge
+them off.  Riggs went unwillingly.  Burt refused to go at all.
+
+"Nix.  I footed them hills all I'm a-goin' to," he said.  "An'
+from now on I rustle my own hoss."
+
+The leader glared his reception of this opposition.  Perhaps
+his sense of fairness actuated him once more, for he ordered
+Shady and Moze out to do their share.
+
+"Jim, you're the best tracker in this outfit.  Suppose you
+go," suggested Anson.  "You allus used to be the first one
+off."
+
+"Times has changed, Snake," was the imperturbable reply.
+
+"Wal, won't you go?" demanded the leader, impatiently.
+
+"I shore won't."
+
+Wilson did not look or intimate in any way that he would not
+leave the girl in camp with one or any or all of Anson's
+gang, but the truth was as significant as if he had shouted
+it.  The slow-thinking Moze gave Wilson a sinister look.
+
+"Boss, ain't it funny how a pretty wench --?" began Shady
+Jones, sarcastically.
+
+"Shut up, you fool!" broke in Anson.  "Come on, I'll help
+rustle them hosses."
+
+After they had gone Burt took his rifle and strolled off
+into the forest.  Then the girl appeared.  Her hair was down,
+her face pale, with dark shadows.  She asked for water to
+wash her face.  Wilson pointed to the brook, and as she
+walked slowly toward it he took a comb and a clean scarf
+from his pack and carried them to her.
+
+Upon her return to the camp-fire she looked very different
+with her hair arranged and the red stains in her cheeks.
+
+"Miss, air you hungry?" asked Wilson.
+
+"Yes, I am," she replied.
+
+He helped her to portions of bread, venison and gravy, and a
+cup of coffee.  Evidently she relished the meat, but she had
+to force down the rest.
+
+"Where are they all?" she asked.
+
+"Rustlin' the hosses."
+
+Probably she divined that he did not want to talk, for the
+fleeting glance she gave him attested to a thought that his
+voice or demeanor had changed.  Presently she sought a seat
+under the aspen-tree, out of the sun, and the smoke
+continually blowing in her face; and there she stayed, a
+forlorn little figure, for all the resolute lips and defiant
+eyes.
+
+The Texan paced to and fro beside the camp-fire with bent
+head, and hands locked behind him.  But for the swinging gun
+he would have resembled a lanky farmer, coatless and
+hatless, with his brown vest open, his trousers stuck in the
+top of the high boots.
+
+And neither he nor the girl changed their positions
+relatively for a long time.  At length, however, after
+peering into the woods, and listening, he remarked to the
+girl that he would be back in a moment, and then walked off
+around the spruces.
+
+No sooner had he disappeared -- in fact, so quickly
+after-ward that it presupposed design instead of accident --
+than Riggs came running from the opposite side of the glade.
+He ran straight to the girl, who sprang to her feet.
+
+"I hid -- two of the -- horses," he panted, husky with
+excitement.  "I'll take -- two saddles.  You grab some grub.
+We'll run for it."
+
+"No," she cried, stepping back.
+
+"But it's not safe -- for us -- here," he said, hurriedly,
+glancing all around.  "I'll take you -- home.  I swear. . . .
+Not safe -- I tell you -- this gang's after me.  Hurry!"
+
+He laid hold of two saddles, one with each hand.  The moment
+had reddened his face, brightened his eyes, made his action
+strong.
+
+"I'm safer -- here with this outlaw gang," she replied.
+
+"You won't come!" His color began to lighten then, and his
+face to distort.  He dropped his hold on the saddles.
+
+"Harve Riggs, I'd rather become a toy and a rag for these
+ruffians than spend an hour alone with you," she flashed at
+him, in unquenchable hate.
+
+"I'll drag you!"
+
+He seized her, but could not hold her.  Breaking away, she
+screamed.
+
+"Help!"
+
+That whitened his face, drove him to frenzy.  Leaping
+forward, he struck her a hard blow across the mouth.  It
+staggered her, and, tripping on a saddle, she fell.  His
+hands flew to her throat, ready to choke her.  But she lay
+still and held her tongue.  Then he dragged her to her feet.
+
+"Hurry now -- grab that pack -- an' follow me." Again Riggs
+laid hold of the two saddles.  A desperate gleam, baleful and
+vainglorious, flashed over his face.  He was living his one
+great adventure.
+
+The girl's eyes dilated.  They looked beyond him.  Her lips
+opened.
+
+"Scream again an' I'll kill you!" he cried, hoarsely and
+swiftly.  The very opening of her lips had terrified Riggs.
+
+"Reckon one scream was enough," spoke a voice, slow, but
+without the drawl, easy and cool, yet incalculable in some
+terrible sense.
+
+Riggs wheeled with inarticulate cry.  Wilson stood a few
+paces off, with his gun half leveled, low down.  His face
+seemed as usual, only his eyes held a quivering, light
+intensity, like boiling molten silver.
+
+"Girl, what made thet blood on your mouth?"
+
+"Riggs hit me!" she whispered.  Then at something she feared
+or saw or divined she shrank back, dropped on her knees, and
+crawled into the spruce shelter.
+
+"Wal, Riggs, I'd invite you to draw if thet 'd be any use,"
+said Wilson.  This speech was reflective, yet it hurried a
+little.
+
+Riggs could not draw nor move nor speak.  He seemed turned to
+stone, except his jaw, which slowly fell.
+
+"Harve Riggs, gunman from down Missouri way," continued the
+voice of incalculable intent, "reckon you've looked into a
+heap of gun-barrels in your day.  Shore!  Wal, look in this
+heah one!"
+
+Wilson deliberately leveled the gun on a line with Riggs's
+starting eyes.
+
+"Wasn't you heard to brag in Turner's saloon -- thet you
+could see lead comin' -- an' dodge it?  Shore you must be
+swift!  . . .  DODGE THIS HEAH BULLET!"
+
+The gun spouted flame and boomed.  One of Riggs's starting,
+popping eyes -- the right one -- went out, like a lamp.  The
+other rolled horribly, then set in blank dead fixedness.
+Riggs swayed in slow motion until a lost balance felled him
+heavily, an inert mass.
+
+Wilson bent over the prostrate form.  Strange, violent
+contrast to the cool scorn of the preceding moment!  Hissing,
+spitting, as if poisoned by passion, he burst with the hate
+that his character had forbidden him to express on a living
+counterfeit.  Wilson was shaken, as if by a palsy.  He choked
+over passionate, incoherent invective.  It was class hate
+first, then the hate of real manhood for a craven, then the
+hate of disgrace for a murder.  No man so fair as a
+gun-fighter in the Western creed of an "even break"!
+
+Wilson's terrible cataclysm of passion passed.  Straightening
+up, he sheathed his weapon and began a slow pace before the
+fire.  Not many moments afterward he jerked his head high and
+listened.  Horses were softly thudding through the forest.
+Soon Anson rode into sight with his men and one of the
+strayed horses.  It chanced, too, that young Burt appeared on
+the other side of the glade.  He walked quickly, as one who
+anticipated news.
+
+Snake Anson as he dismounted espied the dead man.
+
+"Jim -- I thought I heard a shot."
+
+The others exclaimed and leaped off their horses to view the
+prostrate form with that curiosity and strange fear common
+to all men confronted by sight of sudden death.
+
+That emotion was only momentary.
+
+"Shot his lamp out!" ejaculated Moze.
+
+"Wonder how Gunman Riggs liked thet plumb center peg!"
+exclaimed Shady Jones, with a hard laugh.
+
+"Back of his head all gone!" gasped young Burt.  Not
+improbably he had not seen a great many bullet-marked men.
+
+"Jim!  -- the long-haired fool didn't try to draw on you!"
+exclaimed Snake Anson, astounded.
+
+Wilson neither spoke nor ceased his pacing.
+
+"What was it over?" added Anson, curiously.
+
+"He hit the gurl," replied Wilson.
+
+Then there were long-drawn exclamations all around, and
+glance met glance.
+
+"Jim, you saved me the job," continued the outlaw leader.
+"An' I'm much obliged. . . .  Fellars, search Riggs an' we'll
+divvy. . . .  Thet all right, Jim?"
+
+"Shore, an' you can have my share."
+
+They found bank-notes in the man's pocket and considerable
+gold worn in a money-belt around his waist.  Shady Jones
+appropriated his boots, and Moze his gun.  Then they left him
+as he had fallen.
+
+"Jim, you'll have to track them lost hosses.  Two still
+missin' an' one of them's mine," called Anson as Wilson
+paced to the end of his beat.
+
+The girl heard Anson, for she put her head out of the spruce
+shelter and called: "Riggs said he'd hid two of the horses.
+They must be close.  He came that way."
+
+"Howdy, kid!  Thet's good news," replied Anson.  His spirits
+were rising.  "He must hev wanted you to slope with him?"
+
+"Yes.  I wouldn't go."
+
+"An' then he hit you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Wal, recallin' your talk of yestiddy, I can't see as Mister
+Riggs lasted much longer hyar than he'd hev lasted in Texas.
+We've some of thet great country right in our outfit."
+
+The girl withdrew her white face.
+
+"It's break camp, boys," was the leader's order.  "A couple
+of you look up them hosses.  They'll be hid in some thick
+spruces.  The rest of us 'll pack."
+
+
+Soon the gang was on the move, heading toward the height of
+land, and swerving from it only to find soft and grassy
+ground that would not leave any tracks.
+
+They did not travel more than a dozen miles during the
+afternoon, but they climbed bench after bench until they
+reached the timbered plateau that stretched in sheer black
+slope up to the peaks.  Here rose the great and gloomy forest
+of firs and pines, with the spruce overshadowed and thinned
+out.  The last hour of travel was tedious and toilsome, a
+zigzag, winding, breaking, climbing hunt for the kind of
+camp-site suited to Anson's fancy.  He seemed to be growing
+strangely irrational about selecting places to camp.  At
+last, for no reason that could have been manifest to a good
+woodsman, he chose a gloomy bowl in the center of the
+densest forest that had been traversed.  The opening, if such
+it could have been called, was not a park or even a glade.  A
+dark cliff, with strange holes, rose to one side, but not so
+high as the lofty pines that brushed it.  Along its base
+babbled a brook, running over such formation of rock that
+from different points near at hand it gave forth different
+sounds, some singing, others melodious, and one at least of
+a hollow, weird, deep sound, not loud, but strangely
+penetrating.
+
+"Sure spooky I say," observed Shady, sentiently.
+
+The little uplift of mood, coincident with the rifling of
+Riggs's person, had not worn over to this evening camp.  What
+talk the outlaws indulged in was necessary and conducted in
+low tones.  The place enjoined silence.
+
+Wilson performed for the girl very much the same service as
+he had the night before.  Only he advised her not to starve
+herself; she must eat to keep up her strength.  She complied
+at the expense of considerable effort.
+
+As it had been a back-breaking day, in which all of them,
+except the girl, had climbed miles on foot, they did not
+linger awake long enough after supper to learn what a wild,
+weird, and pitch-black spot the outlaw leader had chosen.
+The little spaces of open ground between the huge-trunked
+pine-trees had no counterpart up in the lofty spreading
+foliage.  Not a star could blink a wan ray of light into that
+Stygian pit.  The wind, cutting down over abrupt heights
+farther up, sang in the pine-needles as if they were strings
+vibrant with chords.  Dismal creaks were audible.  They were
+the forest sounds of branch or tree rubbing one another, but
+which needed the corrective medium of daylight to convince
+any human that they were other than ghostly.  Then, despite
+the wind and despite the changing murmur of the brook, there
+seemed to be a silence insulating them, as deep and
+impenetrable as the darkness.
+
+But the outlaws, who were fugitives now, slept the sleep of
+the weary, and heard nothing.  They awoke with the sun, when
+the forest seemed smoky in a golden gloom, when light and
+bird and squirrel proclaimed the day.
+
+The horses had not strayed out of this basin during the
+night, a circumstance that Anson was not slow to appreciate.
+
+"It ain't no cheerful camp, but I never seen a safer place
+to hole up in," he remarked to Wilson.
+
+"Wal, yes -- if any place is safe," replied that ally,
+dubiously.
+
+"We can watch our back tracks.  There ain't any other way to
+git in hyar thet I see."
+
+"Snake, we was tolerable fair sheep-rustlers, but we're no
+good woodsmen."
+
+Anson grumbled his disdain of this comrade who had once been
+his mainstay.  Then he sent Burt out to hunt fresh meat and
+engaged his other men at cards.  As they now had the means to
+gamble, they at once became absorbed.  Wilson smoked and
+divided his thoughtful gaze between the gamblers and the
+drooping figure of the girl.  The morning air was keen, and
+she, evidently not caring to be near her captors beside the
+camp-fire, had sought the only sunny spot in this gloomy
+dell.  A couple of hours passed; the sun climbed high; the
+air grew warmer.  Once the outlaw leader raised his head to
+scan the heavy-timbered slopes that inclosed the camp.
+
+"Jim, them hosses are strayin' off ," he observed.
+
+Wilson leisurely rose and stalked off across the small, open
+patches, in the direction of the horses.  They had grazed
+around from the right toward the outlet of the brook.  Here
+headed a ravine, dense and green.  Two of the horses had gone
+down.  Wilson evidently heard them, though they were not in
+sight, and he circled somewhat so as to get ahead of them
+and drive them back.  The invisible brook ran down over the
+rocks with murmur and babble.  He halted with instinctive
+action.  He listened.  Forest sounds, soft, lulling, came on
+the warm, pine-scented breeze.  It would have taken no keen
+ear to hear soft and rapid padded footfalls.  He moved on
+cautiously and turned into a little open, mossy spot,
+brown-matted and odorous, full of ferns and bluebells.  In
+the middle of this, deep in the moss, he espied a huge round
+track of a cougar.  He bent over it.  Suddenly he stiffened,
+then straightened guardedly.  At that instant he received a
+hard prod in the back.  Throwing up his hands, he stood
+still, then slowly turned.  A tall hunter in gray buckskin,
+gray-eyed and square-jawed, had him covered with a cocked
+rifle.  And beside this hunter stood a monster cougar,
+snarling and blinking.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+
+"Howdy, Dale," drawled Wilson.  "Reckon you're a little
+previous on me."
+
+"Sssssh!  Not so loud," said the hunter, in low voice.
+"You're Jim Wilson?"
+
+"Shore am.  Say, Dale, you showed up soon.  Or did you jest
+happen to run acrost us?"
+
+"I've trailed you.  Wilson, I'm after the girl."
+
+"I knowed thet when I seen you!"
+
+The cougar seemed actuated by the threatening position of
+his master, and he opened his mouth, showing great yellow
+fangs, and spat at Wilson.  The outlaw apparently had no fear
+of Dale or the cocked rifle, but that huge, snarling cat
+occasioned him uneasiness.
+
+"Wilson, I've heard you spoken of as a white outlaw," said
+Dale.
+
+"Mebbe I am.  But shore I'll be a scared one in a minit.
+Dale, he's goin' to jump me!"
+
+"The cougar won't jump you unless I make him.  Wilson, if I
+let you go will you get the girl for me?"
+
+"Wal, lemme see.  Supposin' I refuse?" queried Wilson,
+shrewdly.
+
+"Then, one way or another, it's all up with you."
+
+"Reckon I 'ain't got much choice.  Yes, I'll do it.  But,
+Dale, are you goin' to take my word for thet an' let me go
+back to Anson?"
+
+"Yes, I am.  You're no fool.  An' I believe you're square.
+I've got Anson and his gang corralled.  You can't slip me --
+not in these woods.  I could run off your horses -- pick you
+off one by one -- or turn the cougar loose on you at night."
+
+"Shore.  It's your game.  Anson dealt himself this hand. . . .
+Between you an' me, Dale, I never liked the deal."
+
+"Who shot Riggs?  . . .  I found his body."
+
+"Wal, yours truly was around when thet come off," replied
+Wilson, with an involuntary little shudder.  Some thought
+made him sick.
+
+"The girl?  Is she safe -- unharmed?" queried Dale,
+hurriedly.
+
+"She's shore jest as safe an' sound as when she was home.
+Dale, she's the gamest kid thet ever breathed!  Why, no one
+could hev ever made me believe a girl, a kid like her, could
+hev the nerve she's got.  Nothin's happened to her 'cept
+Riggs hit her in the mouth. . . .  I killed him for thet. . .
+.  An', so help me, God, I believe it's been workin' in me to
+save her somehow!  Now it'll not be so hard."
+
+"But how?" demanded Dale.
+
+"Lemme see. . . .  Wal, I've got to sneak her out of camp an'
+meet you.  Thet's all."
+
+"It must be done quick."
+
+"But, Dale, listen," remonstrated Wilson, earnestly.  "Too
+quick 'll be as bad as too slow.  Snake is sore these days,
+gittin' sorer all the time.  He might savvy somethin', if I
+ain't careful, an' kill the girl or do her harm.  I know
+these fellars.  They're all ready to go to pieces.  An' shore
+I must play safe.  Shore it'd be safer to have a plan."
+
+Wilson's shrewd, light eyes gleamed with an idea.  He was
+about to lower one of his upraised hands, evidently to point
+to the cougar, when he thought better of that.
+
+"Anson's scared of cougars.  Mebbe we can scare him an' the
+gang so it 'd be easy to sneak the girl off.  Can you make
+thet big brute do tricks?  Rush the camp at night an' squall
+an' chase off the horses?"
+
+"I'll guarantee to scare Anson out of ten years' growth,"
+replied Dale.
+
+"Shore it's a go, then," resumed Wilson, as if glad.  "I'll
+post the girl -- give her a hunch to do her part.  You sneak
+up to-night jest before dark.  I'll hev the gang worked up.
+An' then you put the cougar to his tricks, whatever you
+want.  When the gang gits wild I'll grab the girl an' pack
+her off down heah or somewheres aboot an' whistle fer you. .
+. .  But mebbe thet ain't so good.  If' thet cougar comes
+pilin' into camp he might jump me instead of one of the
+gang.  An' another hunch.  He, might slope up on me in the
+dark when I was tryin' to find you.  Shore thet ain't
+appealin' to me."
+
+"Wilson, this cougar is a pet," replied Dale.  "You think
+he's dangerous, but he's not.  No more than a kitten.  He only
+looks fierce.  He has never been hurt by a person an' he's
+never fought anythin' himself but deer an' bear.  I can make
+him trail any scent.  But the truth is I couldn't make him
+hurt you or anybody.  All the same, he can be made to scare
+the hair off any one who doesn't know him."
+
+"Shore thet settles me.  I'll be havin' a grand joke while
+them fellars is scared to death. . . .  Dale, you can depend
+on me.  An' I'm beholdin' to you fer what 'll square me some
+with myself. . . .  To-night, an' if it won't work then,
+to-morrer night shore!"
+
+Dale lowered the rifle.  The big cougar spat again.  Wilson
+dropped his hands and, stepping forward, split the green
+wall of intersecting spruce branches.  Then he turned up the
+ravine toward the glen.  Once there, in sight of his
+comrades, his action and expression changed.
+
+"Hosses all thar, Jim?" asked Anson, as he picked up, his
+cards.
+
+"Shore.  They act awful queer, them hosses," replied.  Wilson.
+"They're afraid of somethin'."
+
+"A-huh!  Silvertip mebbe," muttered Anson.  "Jim, You jest
+keep watch of them hosses.  We'd be done if some tarnal
+varmint stampeded them."
+
+"Reckon I'm elected to do all the work now," complained
+Wilson, "while you card-sharps cheat each other." Rustle the
+hosses -- an' water an' fire-wood.  Cook an' wash.  Hey?"
+
+"No one I ever seen can do them camp tricks any better 'n
+Jim Wilson," replied Anson.
+
+"Jim, you're a lady's man an' thar's our pretty hoodoo over
+thar to feed an' amoose," remarked Shady Jones, with a smile
+that disarmed his speech.
+
+The outlaws guffawed.
+
+"Git out, Jim, you're breakin' up the game," said Moze, who
+appeared loser.
+
+"Wal, thet gurl would starve if it wasn't fer me," replied
+Wilson, genially, and he walked over toward her, beginning
+to address her, quite loudly, as he approached.  "Wal, miss,
+I'm elected cook an' I'd shore like to heah what you fancy
+fer dinner."
+
+The outlaws heard, for they guffawed again.  "Haw!  Haw!  if
+Jim ain't funny!" exclaimed Anson.
+
+The girl looked up amazed.  Wilson was winking at her, and
+when he got near he began to speak rapidly and low.
+
+"I jest met Dale down in the woods with his pet cougar.  He's
+after you.  I'm goin' to help him git you safe away.  Now you
+do your part.  I want you to pretend you've gone crazy.
+Savvy?  Act out of your head!  Shore I don't care what you do
+or say, only act crazy.  An' don't be scared.  We're goin' to
+scare the gang so I'll hev a chance to sneak you away.
+To-night or to-morrow -- shore."
+
+Before he began to speak she was pale, sad, dull of eye.
+Swiftly, with his words, she was transformed, and when he
+had ended she did not appear the same girl.  She gave him one
+blazing flash of comprehension and nodded her head rapidly.
+
+"Yes, I understand.  I'll do it!" she whispered.
+
+The outlaw turned slowly away with the most abstract air,
+confounded amid his shrewd acting, and he did not collect
+himself until half-way back to his comrades.  Then, beginning
+to hum an old darky tune, he stirred up and replenished the
+fire, and set about preparation for the midday meal.  But he
+did not miss anything going on around him.  He saw the girl
+go into her shelter and come out with her hair all down over
+her face.  Wilson, back to his comrades, grinned his glee,
+and he wagged his head as if he thought the situation was
+developing.
+
+The gambling outlaws, however, did not at once see the girl
+preening herself and smoothing her long hair in a way
+calculated to startle.
+
+"Busted!" ejaculated Anson, with a curse, as he slammed down
+his cards.  "If I ain't hoodooed I'm a two-bit of a gambler!"
+
+"Sartin you're hoodooed," said Shady Jones, in scorn.  "Is
+thet jest dawnin' on you?"
+
+"Boss, you play like a cow stuck in the mud," remarked Moze,
+laconically.
+
+"Fellars, it ain't funny," declared Anson, with pathetic
+gravity.  "I'm jest gittin' on to myself.  Somethin's wrong.
+Since 'way last fall no luck -- nothin' but the wust end of
+everythin'.  I ain't blamin' anybody.  I'm the boss.  It's me
+thet's off."
+
+"Snake, shore it was the gurl deal you made," rejoined
+Wilson, who had listened.  "I told you.  Our troubles hev only
+begun.  An' I can see the wind-up.  Look!"
+
+Wilson pointed to where the girl stood, her hair flying
+wildly all over her face and shoulders.  She was making most
+elaborate bows to an old stump, sweeping the ground with her
+tresses in her obeisance.
+
+Anson started.  He grew utterly astounded.  His amaze was
+ludicrous.  And the other two men looked to stare, to equal
+their leader's bewilderment.
+
+"What 'n hell's come over her?" asked Anson, dubiously.
+"Must hev perked up. . . .  But she ain't feelin' thet gay!"
+
+Wilson tapped his forehead with a significant finger.
+
+"Shore I was scared of her this mawnin'," he whispered.
+
+"Naw!" exclaimed Anson, incredulously.
+
+"If she hain't queer I never seen no queer wimmin,"
+vouchsafed Shady Jones, and it would have been judged, by
+the way he wagged his head, that he had been all his days
+familiar with women.
+
+Moze looked beyond words, and quite alarmed.
+
+"I seen it comin'," declared Wilson, very much excited.  "But
+I was scared to say so.  You-all made fun of me aboot her.
+Now I shore wish I had spoken up."
+
+Anson nodded solemnly.  He did not believe the evidence of
+his sight, but the facts seemed stunning.  As if the girl
+were a dangerous and incomprehensible thing, he approached
+her step by step.  Wilson followed, and the others appeared
+drawn irresistibly.
+
+"Hey thar -- kid!" called Anson, hoarsely.
+
+The girl drew her slight form up haughtily.  Through her
+spreading tresses her eyes gleamed unnaturally upon the
+outlaw leader.  But she deigned not to reply.
+
+"Hey thar -- you Rayner girl!" added Anson, lamely.  "What's
+ailin' you?"
+
+"My lord!  did you address me?" she asked, loftily.
+
+Shady Jones got over his consternation and evidently
+extracted some humor from the situation, as his dark face
+began to break its strain.
+
+"Aww!" breathed Anson, heavily.
+
+"Ophelia awaits your command, my lord.  I've been gathering
+flowers," she said, sweetly, holding up her empty hands as
+if they contained a bouquet.
+
+Shady Jones exploded in convulsed laughter.  But his
+merriment was not shared.  And suddenly it brought disaster
+upon him.  The girl flew at him.
+
+"Why do you croak, you toad?  I will have you whipped and put
+in irons, you scullion!" she cried, passionately.
+
+Shady underwent a remarkable change, and stumbled in his
+backward retreat.  Then she snapped her fingers in Moze's
+face.
+
+"You black devil!  Get hence!  Avaunt!"
+
+Anson plucked up courage enough to touch her.
+
+"Aww!  Now, Ophelyar --"
+
+Probably he meant to try to humor her, but she screamed, and
+he jumped back as if she might burn him.  She screamed
+shrilly, in wild, staccato notes.
+
+"You!  You!" she pointed her finger at the outlaw leader.
+"You brute to women!  You ran off from your wife!"
+
+Anson turned plum-color and then slowly white.  The girl must
+have sent a random shot home.
+
+"And now the devil's turned you into a snake.  A long, scaly
+snake with green eyes!  Uugh!  You'll crawl on your belly soon
+-- when my cowboy finds you.  And he'll tramp you in the
+dust."
+
+She floated away from them and began to whirl gracefully,
+arms spread and hair flying; and then, apparently oblivious
+of the staring men, she broke into a low, sweet song.  Next
+she danced around a pine, then danced into her little green
+inclosure.  From which presently she sent out the most
+doleful moans.
+
+"Aww!  What a shame!" burst out Anson.  "Thet fine, healthy,
+nervy kid!  Clean gone!  Daffy!  Crazy 'n a bedbug!"
+
+"Shore it's a shame," protested Wilson." But it's wuss for
+us.  Lord!  if we was hoodooed before, what will we be now?
+Didn't I tell you, Snake Anson?  You was warned.  Ask Shady
+an' Moze -- they see what's up."
+
+"No luck 'll ever come our way ag'in," predicted Shady,
+mournfully.
+
+"It beats me, boss, it beats me," muttered Moze.
+
+"A crazy woman on my hands!  If thet ain't the last straw!"
+broke out Anson, tragically, as he turned away.  Ignorant,
+superstitious, worked upon by things as they seemed, the
+outlaw imagined himself at last beset by malign forces.  When
+he flung himself down upon one of the packs his big
+red-haired hands shook.  Shady and Moze resembled two other
+men at the end of their ropes.
+
+Wilson's tense face twitched, and he averted it, as
+apparently he fought off a paroxysm of some nature.  Just
+then Anson swore a thundering oath.
+
+"Crazy or not, I'll git gold out of thet kid!" he roared.
+
+"But, man, talk sense.  Are you gittin' daffy, too?  I declare
+this outfit's been eatin' loco.  You can't git gold fer her!"
+said Wilson, deliberately.
+
+"Why can't I?"
+
+"'Cause we're tracked.  We can't make no dickers.  Why, in
+another day or so we'll be dodgin' lead."
+
+"Tracked!  Whar 'd you git thet idee?  As soon as this?"
+queried Anson, lifting his head like a striking snake.  His
+men, likewise, betrayed sudden interest.
+
+"Shore it's no idee.  I 'ain't seen any one.  But I feel it in
+my senses.  I hear somebody comin' -- a step on our trail --
+all the time -- night in particular.  Reckon there's a big
+posse after us."
+
+"Wal, if I see or hear anythin' I'll knock the girl on the
+head an' we'll dig out of hyar," replied Anson, sullenly.
+
+Wilson executed a swift forward motion, violent and
+passionate, so utterly unlike what might have been looked
+for from him, that the three outlaws gaped.
+
+"Then you'll shore hev to knock Jim Wilson on the haid
+first," he said, in voice as strange as his action.
+
+"Jim!  You wouldn't go back on me!" implored Anson, with
+uplifted hands, in a dignity of pathos.
+
+"I'm losin' my haid, too, an' you shore might as well knock
+it in, an' you'll hev to before I'll stand you murderin'
+thet pore little gurl you've drove crazy."
+
+"Jim, I was only mad," replied Anson.  "Fer thet matter, I'm
+growin' daffy myself.  Aw!  we all need a good stiff drink of
+whisky."
+
+So he tried to throw off gloom and apprehension, but he
+failed.  His comrades did not rally to his help.  Wilson
+walked away, nodding his head.
+
+"Boss, let Jim alone," whispered Shady.  "It's orful the way
+you buck ag'in' him -- when you seen he's stirred up.  Jim's
+true blue.  But you gotta be careful."
+
+Moze corroborated this statement by gloomy nods.
+
+When the card-playing was resumed, Anson did not join the
+game, and both Moze and Shady evinced little of that
+whole-hearted obsession which usually attended their
+gambling.  Anson lay at length, his head in a saddle,
+scowling at the little shelter where the captive girl kept
+herself out of sight.  At times a faint song or laugh, very
+unnatural, was wafted across the space.  Wilson plodded at
+the cooking and apparently heard no sounds.  Presently he
+called the men to eat, which office they surlily and
+silently performed, as if it was a favor bestowed upon the
+cook.
+
+"Snake, hadn't I ought to take a bite of grub over to the
+gurl?" asked Wilson.
+
+"Do you hev to ask me thet?" snapped Anson.  "She's gotta be
+fed, if we hev to stuff it down her throat."
+
+"Wal, I ain't stuck on the job," replied Wilson.  "But I'll
+tackle it, seein' you-all got cold feet."
+
+With plate and cup be reluctantly approached the little
+lean-to, and, kneeling, he put his head inside.  The girl,
+quick-eyed and alert, had evidently seen him coming.  At any
+rate, she greeted him with a cautious smile.
+
+"Jim, was I pretty good?" she whispered.
+
+"Miss, you was shore the finest aktress I ever seen," he
+responded, in a low voice.  "But you dam near overdid it.  I'm
+goin' to tell Anson you're sick now -- poisoned or somethin'
+awful.  Then we'll wait till night.  Dale shore will help us
+out."
+
+"Oh, I'm on fire to get away," she exclaimed.  "Jim Wilson,
+I'll never forget you as long as I live!"
+
+He seemed greatly embarrassed.
+
+"Wal -- miss -- I -- I'll do my best licks.  But I ain't
+gamblin' none on results.  Be patient.  Keep your nerve.  Don't
+get scared.  I reckon between me an' Dale you'll git away
+from heah."
+
+Withdrawing his head, he got up and returned to the
+camp-fire, where Anson was waiting curiously.
+
+"I left the grub.  But she didn't touch it.  Seems sort of
+sick to me, like she was poisoned."
+
+"Jim, didn't I hear you talkin'?" asked Anson.
+
+"Shore.  I was coaxin' her.  Reckon she ain't so ranty as she
+was.  But she shore is doubled-up, an' sickish."
+
+"Wuss an' wuss all the time," said Anson, between his teeth.
+"An' where's Burt?  Hyar it's noon an' he left early.  He
+never was no woodsman.  He's got lost."
+
+"Either thet or he's run into somethin'," replied Wilson,
+thoughtfully.
+
+Anson doubled a huge fist and cursed deep under his breath
+-- the reaction of a man whose accomplices and partners and
+tools, whose luck, whose faith in himself had failed him.  He
+flung himself down under a tree, and after a while, when his
+rigidity relaxed, he probably fell asleep.  Moze and Shady
+kept at their game.  Wilson paced to and fro, sat down, and
+then got up to bunch the horses again, walked around the
+dell and back to camp.  The afternoon hours were long.  And
+they were waiting hours.  The act of waiting appeared on the
+surface of all these outlaws did.
+
+At sunset the golden gloom of the glen changed to a vague,
+thick twilight.  Anson rolled over, yawned, and sat up.  As he
+glanced around, evidently seeking Burt, his face clouded.
+
+"No sign of Burt?" he asked.
+
+Wilson expressed a mild surprise.  "Wal, Snake, you ain't
+expectin' Burt now?"
+
+"I am, course I am.  Why not?" demanded Anson.  "Any other
+time we'd look fer him, wouldn't we?"
+
+"Any other time ain't now. . . .  Burt won't ever come back!"
+Wilson spoke it with a positive finality."
+
+"A-huh!  Some more of them queer feelin's of yourn --
+operatin' again, hey?  Them onnatural kind thet you can't
+explain, hey?"
+
+Anson's queries were bitter and rancorous.
+
+"Yes.  An', Snake, I tax you with this heah.  Ain't any of
+them queer feelin's operatin' in you?  "
+
+"No!" rolled out the leader, savagely.  But his passionate
+denial was a proof that he lied.  From the moment of this
+outburst, which was a fierce clinging to the old, brave
+instincts of his character, unless a sudden change marked
+the nature of his fortunes, he would rapidly deteriorate to
+the breaking-point.  And in such brutal, unrestrained natures
+as his this breaking-point meant a desperate stand, a
+desperate forcing of events, a desperate accumulation of
+passions that stalked out to deal and to meet disaster and
+blood and death.
+
+Wilson put a little wood on the fire and he munched a
+biscuit.  No one asked him to cook.  No one made any effort to
+do so.  One by one each man went to the pack to get some
+bread and meat.
+
+Then they waited as men who knew not what they waited for,
+yet hated and dreaded it.
+
+Twilight in that glen was naturally a strange, veiled
+condition of the atmosphere.  It was a merging of shade and
+light, which two seemed to make gray, creeping shadows.
+
+Suddenly a snorting and stamping of the horses startled the
+men.
+
+"Somethin' scared the hosses," said Anson, rising.  "Come
+on."
+
+Moze accompanied him, and they disappeared in the gloom.
+More trampling of hoofs was heard, then a cracking of brush,
+and the deep voices of men.  At length the two outlaws
+returned, leading three of the horses, which they haltered
+in the open glen.
+
+The camp-fire light showed Anson's face dark and serious.
+
+"Jim, them hosses are wilder 'n deer," he said.  "I ketched
+mine, an' Moze got two.  But the rest worked away whenever we
+come close.  Some varmint has scared them bad.  We all gotta
+rustle out thar quick."
+
+Wilson rose, shaking his head doubtfully.  And at that moment
+the quiet air split to a piercing, horrid neigh of a
+terrified horse.  Prolonged to a screech, it broke and ended.
+Then followed snorts of fright, pound and crack and thud of
+hoofs, and crash of brush; then a gathering thumping,
+crashing roar, split by piercing sounds.
+
+"Stampede!" yelled Anson, and he ran to hold his own horse,
+which he had haltered right in camp.  It was big and
+wild-looking, and now reared and plunged to break away.
+Anson just got there in time, and then it took all his
+weight to pull the horse down.  Not until the crashing,
+snorting, pounding melee had subsided and died away over the
+rim of the glen did Anson dare leave his frightened
+favorite.
+
+"Gone!  Our horses are gone!  Did you hear 'em?" he exclaimed,
+blankly.
+
+"Shore.  They're a cut-up an' crippled bunch by now," replied
+Wilson.
+
+"Boss, we'll never git 'ern back, not 'n a hundred years,"
+declared Moze.
+
+"Thet settles us, Snake Anson," stridently added Shady
+Jones.  "Them hosses are gone!  You can kiss your hand to
+them. . . .  They wasn't hobbled.  They hed an orful scare.
+They split on thet stampede an' they'll never git together.
+. . .  See what you've fetched us to!"
+
+Under the force of this triple arraignment the outlaw leader
+dropped to his seat, staggered and silenced.  In fact,
+silence fell upon all the men and likewise enfolded the
+glen.
+
+Night set in jet-black, dismal, lonely, without a star.
+Faintly the wind moaned.  Weirdly the brook babbled through
+its strange chords to end in the sound that was hollow.  It
+was never the same -- a rumble, as if faint, distant thunder
+-- a deep gurgle, as of water drawn into a vortex -- a
+rolling, as of a stone in swift current.  The black cliff was
+invisible, yet seemed to have many weird faces; the giant
+pines loomed spectral; the shadows were thick, moving,
+changing.  Flickering lights from the camp-fire circled the
+huge trunks and played fantastically over the brooding men.
+This camp-fire did not burn or blaze cheerily; it had no
+glow, no sputter, no white heart, no red, living embers.  One
+by one the outlaws, as if with common consent, tried their
+hands at making the fire burn aright.  What little wood had
+been collected was old; it would burn up with false flare,
+only to die quickly.
+
+After a while not one of the outlaws spoke or stirred.  Not
+one smoked.  Their gloomy eyes were fixed on the fire.  Each
+one was concerned with his own thoughts, his own lonely soul
+unconsciously full of a doubt of the future.  That brooding
+hour severed him from comrade.
+
+At night nothing seemed the same as it was by day.  With
+success and plenty, with full-blooded action past and more
+in store, these outlaws were as different from their present
+state as this black night was different from the bright day
+they waited for.  Wilson, though he played a deep game of
+deceit for the sake of the helpless girl -- and thus did not
+have haunting and superstitious fears on her account -- was
+probably more conscious of impending catastrophe than any of
+them.
+
+The evil they had done spoke in the voice of nature, out of
+the darkness, and was interpreted by each according to his
+hopes and fears.  Fear was their predominating sense.  For
+years they had lived with some species of fear -- of honest
+men or vengeance, of pursuit, of starvation, of lack of
+drink or gold, of blood and death, of stronger men, of luck,
+of chance, of fate, of mysterious nameless force.  Wilson was
+the type of fearless spirit, but he endured the most gnawing
+and implacable fear of all -- that of himself -- that he
+must inevitably fall to deeds beneath his manhood.
+
+So they hunched around the camp-fire, brooding because hope
+was at lowest ebb; listening because the weird, black
+silence, with its moan of wind and hollow laugh of brook,
+compelled them to hear; waiting for sleep, for the hours to
+pass, for whatever was to come.
+
+And it was Anson who caught the first intimation of an
+impending doom.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+
+"Listen!"
+
+Anson whispered tensely.  His poise was motionless, his eyes
+roved everywhere.  He held up a shaking, bludgy finger, to
+command silence.
+
+A third and stranger sound accompanied the low, weird moan
+of the wind, and the hollow mockery of the brook -- and it
+seemed a barely perceptible, exquisitely delicate wail or
+whine.  It filled in the lulls between the other sounds.
+
+"If thet's some varmint he's close," whispered Anson.
+
+"But shore, it's far off," said Wilson.
+
+Shady Jones and Moze divided their opinions in the same way.
+
+All breathed freer when the wail ceased, relaxing to their
+former lounging positions around the fire.  An impenetrable
+wall of blackness circled the pale space lighted by the
+camp-fire; and this circle contained the dark, somber group
+of men in the center, the dying camp-fire, and a few
+spectral trunks of pines and the tethered horses on the
+outer edge.  The horses scarcely moved from their tracks, and
+their erect, alert heads attested to their sensitiveness to
+the peculiarities of the night.
+
+Then, at an unusually quiet lull the strange sound gradually
+arose to a wailing whine.
+
+"It's thet crazy wench cryin'," declared the outlaw leader.
+
+Apparently his allies accepted that statement with as much
+relief as they had expressed for the termination of the
+sound.
+
+"Shore, thet must be it," agreed Jim Wilson, gravely.
+
+"We'll git a lot of sleep with thet gurl whinin' all night,"
+growled Shady Jones.
+
+"She gives me the creeps," said Moze.
+
+Wilson got up to resume his pondering walk, head bent, hands
+behind his back, a grim, realistic figure of perturbation.
+
+"Jim -- set down.  You make me nervous," said Anson,
+irritably.
+
+Wilson actually laughed, but low, as if to keep his strange
+mirth well confined.
+
+"Snake, I'll bet you my hoss an' my gun ag'in' a biscuit
+thet in aboot six seconds more or less I'll be stampedin
+like them hosses."
+
+Anson's lean jaw dropped.  The other two outlaws stared with
+round eyes.  Wilson was not drunk, they evidently knew; but
+what he really was appeared a mystery.
+
+"Jim Wilson, are you showin' yellow?" queried Anson,
+hoarsely.
+
+"Mebbe.  The Lord only knows.  But listen heah. . . .  Snake,
+you've seen an' heard people croak?"
+
+"You mean cash in -- die?"
+
+"Shore."
+
+"Wal, yes -- a couple or so," replied Anson, grimly.
+
+"But you never seen no one die of shock -- of an orful
+scare?"
+
+"No, I reckon I never did."
+
+"I have.  An' thet's what's ailin' Jim Wilson," and he
+resumed his dogged steps.
+
+Anson and his two comrades exchanged bewildered glances with
+one another.
+
+"A-huh!  Say, what's thet got to do with us hyar?  asked
+Anson, presently.
+
+"Thet gurl is dyin'!" retorted Wilson, in a voice cracking
+like a whip.
+
+The three outlaws stiffened in their seats, incredulous, yet
+irresistibly swayed by emotions that stirred to this dark,
+lonely, ill-omened hour.
+
+Wilson trudged to the edge of the lighted circle, muttering
+to himself, and came back again; then he trudged farther,
+this time almost out of sight, but only to return; the third
+time he vanished in the impenetrable wall of light.  The
+three men scarcely moved a muscle as they watched the place
+where he had disappeared.  In a few moments he came stumbling
+back.
+
+"Shore she's almost gone," he said, dismally.  "It took my
+nerve, but I felt of her face. . . .  Thet orful wail is her
+breath chokin' in her throat. . . .  Like a death-rattle,
+only long instead of short."
+
+"Wal, if she's gotta croak it's good she gits it over
+quick," replied Anson.  "I 'ain't hed sleep fer three nights.
+. . .  An' what I need is whisky."
+
+"Snake, thet's gospel you're spoutin'," remarked Shady
+Jones, morosely.
+
+The direction of sound in the glen was difficult to be
+assured of, but any man not stirred to a high pitch of
+excitement could have told that the difference in volume of
+this strange wail must have been caused by different
+distances and positions.  Also, when it was loudest, it was
+most like a whine.  But these outlaws heard with their
+consciences.
+
+At last it ceased abruptly.
+
+Wilson again left the group to be swallowed up by the night.
+His absence was longer than usual, but he returned
+hurriedly.
+
+"She's daid!" he exclaimed, solemnly.  "Thet innocent kid --
+who never harmed no one -- an' who'd make any man better fer
+seein' her -- she's daid!  . . .  Anson, you've shore a heap
+to answer fer when your time comes."
+
+"What's eatin' you?" demanded the leader, angrily.  "Her
+blood ain't on my hands."
+
+"It shore is," shouted Wilson, shaking his hand at Anson.
+"An' you'll hev to take your medicine.  I felt thet comin'
+all along.  An' I feel some more."
+
+"Aw!  She's jest gone to sleep," declared Anson, shaking his
+long frame as he rose.  "Gimme a light."
+
+"Boss, you're plumb off to go near a dead gurl thet's jest
+died crazy," protested Shady Jones.
+
+"Off!  Haw!  Haw!  Who ain't off in this outfit, I'd like to
+know?" Anson possessed himself of a stick blazing at one
+and, and with this he stalked off toward the lean-to where
+the girl was supposed to be dead.  His gaunt figure, lighted
+by the torch, certainly fitted the weird, black
+surroundings.  And it was seen that once near the girl's
+shelter he proceeded more slowly, until he halted.  He bent
+to peer inside.
+
+"SHE'S GONE!" he yelled, in harsh, shaken accents.
+
+Than the torch burned out, leaving only a red glow.  He
+whirled it about, but the blaze did not rekindle.  His
+comrades, peering intently, lost sight of his tall form and
+the end of the red-ended stick.  Darkness like pitch
+swallowed him.  For a moment no sound intervened.  Again the
+moan of wind, the strange little mocking hollow roar,
+dominated the place.  Then there came a rush of something,
+perhaps of air, like the soft swishing of spruce branches
+swinging aside.  Dull, thudding footsteps followed it.  Anson
+came running back to the fire.  His aspect was wild, his face
+pale, his eyes were fierce and starting from their sockets.
+He had drawn his gun.
+
+"Did -- ye -- see er hear -- anythin'?" he panted, peering
+back, then all around, and at last at his man.
+
+"No.  An' I shore was lookin' an' listenin'," replied Wilson.
+
+"Boss, there wasn't nothin'," declared Moze.
+
+"I ain't so sartin," said Shady Jones, with doubtful,
+staring eyes.  "I believe I heerd a rustlin'."
+
+"She wasn't there!" ejaculated Anson, in wondering awe.
+"She's gone!  . . .  My torch went out.  I couldn't see.  An'
+jest then I felt somethin' was passin'.  Fast!  I jerked
+'round.  All was black, an' yet if I didn't see a big gray
+streak I'm crazier 'n thet gurl.  But I couldn't swear to
+anythin' but a rushin' of wind.  I felt thet."
+
+"Gone!" exclaimed Wilson, in great alarm.  "Fellars, if
+thet's so, then mebbe she wasn't daid an' she wandered off.
+. . .  But she was daid!  Her heart hed quit beatin'.  I'll
+swear to thet."
+
+"I move to break camp," said Shady Jones, gruffly, and he
+stood up.  Moze seconded that move by an expressive flash of
+his black visage.
+
+"Jim, if she's dead -- an' gone -- what 'n hell's come off?"
+huskily asked Anson.  "It, only seems thet way.  We're all
+worked up. . . .  Let's talk sense."
+
+"Anson, shore there's a heap you an' me don't know," replied
+Wilson.  "The world come to an end once.  Wal, it can come to
+another end. . . .  I tell you I ain't surprised --"
+
+"THAR!" cried Anson, whirling, with his gun leaping out.
+
+Something huge, shadowy, gray against the black rushed
+behind the men and trees; and following it came a
+perceptible acceleration of the air.
+
+"Shore, Snake, there wasn't nothin'," said Wilson,
+presently."
+
+"I heerd," whispered Shady Jones.
+
+"It was only a breeze blowin' thet smoke," rejoined Moze.
+
+"I'd bet my soul somethin' went back of me," declared Anson,
+glaring into the void.
+
+"Listen an' let's make shore," suggested Wilson.
+
+The guilty, agitated faces of the outlaws showed plain
+enough in the flickering light for each to see a convicting
+dread in his fellow.  Like statues they stood, watching and
+listening.
+
+Few sounds stirred in the strange silence.  Now and then the
+horses heaved heavily, but stood still; a dismal, dreary
+note of the wind in the pines vied with a hollow laugh of
+the brook.  And these low sounds only fastened attention upon
+the quality of the silence.  A breathing, lonely spirit of
+solitude permeated the black dell.  Like a pit of unplumbed
+depths the dark night yawned.  An evil conscience, listening
+there, could have heard the most peaceful, beautiful, and
+mournful sounds of nature only as strains of a calling hell.
+
+Suddenly the silent, oppressive, surcharged air split to a
+short, piercing scream.
+
+Anson's big horse stood up straight, pawing the air, and
+came down with a crash.  The other horses shook with terror.
+
+"Wasn't -- thet -- a cougar?" whispered Anson, thickly.
+
+"Thet was a woman's scream," replied Wilson, and he appeared
+to be shaking like a leaf in the wind.
+
+"Then -- I figgered right -- the kid's alive -- wonderin'
+around -- an' she let out thet orful scream," said Anson.
+
+"Wonderin' 'round, yes -- but she's daid!"
+
+"My Gawd!  it ain't possible!"
+
+"Wal, if she ain't wonderin' round daid she's almost daid,"
+replied Wilson.  And he began to whisper to himself.
+
+"If I'd only knowed what thet deal meant I'd hev plugged
+Beasley instead of listenin'. . . .  An' I ought to hev
+knocked thet kid on the head an' made sartin she'd croaked.
+If she goes screamin' 'round thet way --"
+
+His voice failed as there rose a thin, splitting,
+high-pointed shriek, somewhat resembling the first scream,
+only less wild.  It came apparently from the cliff.
+
+From another point in the pitch-black glen rose the wailing,
+terrible cry of a woman in agony.  Wild, haunting, mournful
+wail!
+
+Anson's horse, loosing the halter, plunged back, almost
+falling over a slight depression in the rocky ground.  The
+outlaw caught him and dragged him nearer the fire.  The other
+horses stood shaking and straining.  Moze ran between them
+and held them.  Shady Jones threw green brush on the fire.
+With sputter and crackle a blaze started, showing Wilson
+standing tragically, his arms out, facing the black shadows.
+
+The strange, live shriek was not repeated.  But the cry, like
+that of a woman in her death-throes, pierced the silence
+again.  It left a quivering ring that softly died away.  Then
+the stillness clamped down once more and the darkness seemed
+to thicken.  The men waited, and when they had begun to relax
+the cry burst out appallingly close, right behind the trees.
+It was human -- the personification of pain and terror --
+the tremendous struggle of precious life against horrible
+death.  So pure, so exquisite, so wonderful was the cry that
+the listeners writhed as if they saw an innocent, tender,
+beautiful girl torn frightfully before their eyes.  It was
+full of suspense; it thrilled for death; its marvelous
+potency was the wild note -- that beautiful and ghastly note
+of self-preservation.
+
+In sheer desperation the outlaw leader fired his gun at the
+black wall whence the cry came.  Then he had to fight his
+horse to keep him from plunging away.  Following the shot was
+an interval of silence; the horses became tractable; the men
+gathered closer to the fire, with the halters still held
+firmly.
+
+"If it was a cougar -- thet 'd scare him off," said Anson.
+
+"Shore, but it ain't a cougar," replied Wilson.  "Wait an'
+see!"
+
+They all waited, listening with ears turned to different
+points, eyes roving everywhere, afraid of their very
+shadows.  Once more the moan of wind, the mockery of brook,
+deep gurgle, laugh and babble, dominated the silence of the
+glen.
+
+"Boss, let's shake this spooky hole," whispered Moze.
+
+The suggestion attracted Anson, and he pondered it while
+slowly shaking his head.
+
+"We've only three hosses.  An' mine 'll take ridin' -- after
+them squalls," replied the leader.  "We've got packs, too.
+An' hell 'ain't nothin' on this place fer bein' dark."
+
+"No matter.  Let's go.  I'll walk an' lead the way," said
+Moze, eagerly.  "I got sharp eyes.  You fellars can ride an'
+carry a pack.  We'll git out of here an' come back in
+daylight fer the rest of the outfit."
+
+"Anson, I'm keen fer thet myself," declared Shady Jones.
+
+"Jim, what d'ye say to thet?" queried Anson.  "Rustlin' out
+of this black hole?"
+
+"Shore it's a grand idee," agreed Wilson.
+
+"Thet was a cougar," avowed Anson, gathering courage as the
+silence remained unbroken.  "But jest the same it was as
+tough on me as if it hed been a woman screamin' over a blade
+twistin' in her gizzards."
+
+"Snake, shore you seen a woman heah lately?" deliberately
+asked Wilson.
+
+"Reckon I did.  Thet kid," replied Anson, dubiously.
+
+"Wal, you seen her go crazy, didn't you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"'An' she wasn't heah when you went huntin' fer her?"
+
+"Correct."
+
+"Wal, if thet's so, what do you want to blab about cougars
+for?"
+
+Wilson's argument seemed incontestable.  Shady and Moze
+nodded gloomily and shifted restlessly from foot to foot.
+Anson dropped his head.
+
+"No matter -- if we only don't hear --" he began, suddenly
+to grow mute.
+
+Right upon them, from some place, just out the circle of
+light, rose a scream, by reason of its proximity the most
+piercing and agonizing yet heard, simply petrifying the
+group until the peal passed.  Anson's huge horse reared, and
+with a snort of terror lunged in tremendous leap, straight
+out.  He struck Anson with thudding impact, knocking him over
+the rocks into the depression back of the camp-fire, and
+plunging after him.  Wilson had made a flying leap just in
+time to avoid being struck, and he turned to see Anson go
+down.  There came a crash, a groan, and then the strike and
+pound of hoofs as the horse struggled up.  Apparently he had
+rolled over his master.
+
+"Help, fellars!" yelled Wilson, quick to leap down over the
+little bank, and in the dim light to grasp the halter.  The
+three men dragged the horse out and securely tied him close
+to a tree.  That done, they peered down into the depression.
+Anson's form could just barely be distinguished in the
+gloom.  He lay stretched out.  Another groan escaped him.
+
+"Shore I'm scared he's hurt," said Wilson.
+
+"Hoss rolled right on top of him.  An' thet hoss's heavy,"
+declared Moze.
+
+They got down and knelt beside their leader.  In the darkness
+his face looked dull gray.  His breathing was not right.
+
+"Snake, old man, you ain't -- hurt?" asked Wilson, with a
+tremor in his voice.  Receiving no reply, he said to his
+comrades, "Lay hold an' we'll heft him up where we can see."
+
+The three men carefully lifted Anson up on the bank and laid
+him near the fire in the light.  Anson was conscious.  His
+face was ghastly.  Blood showed on his lips.
+
+Wilson knelt beside him.  The other outlaws stood up, and
+with one dark gaze at one another damned Anson's chance of
+life.  And on the instant rose that terrible distressing
+scream of acute agony -- like that of a woman being
+dismembered.  Shady Jones whispered something to Moze.  Then
+they stood up, gazing down at their fallen leader.
+
+"Tell me where you're hurt?" asked Wilson.
+
+"He -- smashed -- my chest," said Anson, in a broken,
+strangled whisper.
+
+Wilson's deft hands opened the outlaw's shirt and felt of
+his chest.
+
+<TT>-335-</TT>
+
+
+"No.  Shore your breast-bone ain't smashed," replied Wilson,
+hopefully.  And he began to run his hand around one side of
+Anson's body and then the other.  Abruptly he stopped,
+averted his gaze, then slowly ran the hand all along that
+side.  Anson's ribs had been broken and crushed in by the
+weight of the horse.  He was bleeding at the mouth, and his
+slow, painful expulsions of breath brought a bloody froth,
+which showed that the broken bones had penetrated the lungs.
+An injury sooner or later fatal!
+
+"Pard, you busted a rib or two," said Wilson.
+
+"Aw, Jim -- it must be -- wuss 'n thet!" he whispered.  "I'm
+-- in orful -- pain.  An' I can't -- git any -- breath."
+
+"Mebbe you'll be better," said Wilson, with a cheerfulness
+his face belied.
+
+Moze bent close over Anson, took a short scrutiny of that
+ghastly face, at the blood-stained lips, and the lean hands
+plucking at nothing.  Then he jerked erect.
+
+"Shady, he's goin' to cash.  Let's clear out of this."
+
+"I'm yours pertickler previous," replied Jones.
+
+Both turned away.  They untied the two horses and led them up
+to where the saddles lay.  Swiftly the blankets went on,
+swiftly the saddles swung up, swiftly the cinches snapped.
+Anson lay gazing up at Wilson, comprehending this move.  And
+Wilson stood strangely grim and silent, somehow detached
+coldly from that self of the past few hours.
+
+"Shady, you grab some bread an' I'll pack a bunk of meat,"
+said Moze.  Both men came near the fire, into the light,
+within ten feet of where the leader lay.
+
+"Fellars -- you ain't -- slopin'?" he whispered, in husky
+amaze.
+
+"Boss, we air thet same.  We can't do you no good an' this
+hole ain't healthy," replied Moze.
+
+Shady Jones swung himself astride his horse, all about him
+sharp, eager, strung.
+
+"Moze, I'll tote the grub an' you lead out of hyar, till we
+git past the wust timber," he said.
+
+"Aw, Moze --you wouldn't leave -- Jim hyar -- alone,"
+implored Anson.
+
+"Jim can stay till he rots," retorted Moze.  "I've hed enough
+of this hole."
+
+"But, Moze -- it ain't square --" panted Anson.  "Jim
+wouldn't -- leave me.  I'd stick -- by you. . . .  I'll make
+it -- all up to you."
+
+"Snake, you're goin' to cash," sardonically returned Moze.
+
+A current leaped all through Anson's stretched frame.  His
+ghastly face blazed.  That was the great and the terrible
+moment which for long had been in abeyance.  Wilson had known
+grimly that it would come, by one means or another.  Anson
+had doggedly and faithfully struggled against the tide of
+fatal issues.  Moze and Shady Jones, deep locked in their
+self-centered motives, had not realized the inevitable trend
+of their dark lives.
+
+Anson, prostrate as he was, swiftly drew his gun and shot
+Moze.  Without sound or movement of hand Moze fell.  Then the
+plunge of Shady's horse caused Anson's second shot to miss.
+A quick third shot brought no apparent result but Shady's
+cursing resort to his own weapon.  He tried to aim from his
+plunging horse.  His bullets spattered dust and gravel over
+Anson.  Then Wilson's long arm stretched and his heavy gun
+banged.  Shady collapsed in the saddle, and the frightened
+horse, throwing him, plunged out of the circle of light.
+Thudding hoofs, crashings of brush, quickly ceased.
+
+"Jim -- did you -- git him?" whispered Anson.
+
+"Shore did, Snake," was the slow, halting response.  Jim
+Wilson must have sustained a sick shudder as he replied.
+Sheathing his gun, he folded a blanket and put it under
+Anson's head.
+
+"Jim -- my feet -- air orful cold," whispered Anson.
+
+"Wal, it's gittin' chilly," replied Wilson, and, taking a
+second blanket, he laid that over Anson's limbs.  "Snake, I'm
+feared Shady hit you once."
+
+"A-huh!  But not so I'd care -- much -- if I hed -- no wuss
+hurt."
+
+"You lay still now.  Reckon Shady's hoss stopped out heah a
+ways.  An' I'll see."
+
+"Jim -- I 'ain't heerd -- thet scream fer -- a little."
+
+"Shore it's gone. . . .  Reckon now thet was a cougar."
+
+"I knowed it!"
+
+Wilson stalked away into the darkness.  That inky wall did
+not seem so impenetrable and black after he had gotten out
+of the circle of light.  He proceeded carefully and did not
+make any missteps.  He groped from tree to tree toward the
+cliff and presently brought up against a huge flat rock as
+high as his head.  Here the darkness was blackest, yet he was
+able to see a light form on the rock.
+
+"Miss, are you there -- all right?" he called, softly.
+
+"Yes, but I'm scared to death," she whispered in reply.
+
+"Shore it wound up sudden.  Come now.  I reckon your trouble's
+over."
+
+He helped her off the rock, and, finding her unsteady on her
+feet, he supported her with one arm and held the other out
+in front of him to feel for objects.  Foot by foot they
+worked out from under the dense shadow of the cliff,
+following the course of the little brook.  It babbled and
+gurgled, and almost drowned the low whistle Wilson sent out.
+The girl dragged heavily upon him now, evidently weakening.
+At length he reached the little open patch at the head of
+the ravine.  Halting here, he whistled.  An answer came from
+somewhere behind him and to the right.  Wilson waited, with
+the girl hanging on his arm.
+
+"Dale's heah," he said.  "An' don't you keel over now --
+after all the nerve you hed."
+
+A swishing of brush, a step, a soft, padded footfall; a
+looming, dark figure, and a long, low gray shape, stealthily
+moving -- it was the last of these that made Wilson jump.
+
+"Wilson!" came Dale's subdued voice.
+
+"Heah.  I've got her, Dale.  Safe an sound," replied Wilson,
+stepping toward the tall form.  And he put the drooping girl
+into Dale's arms.
+
+"Bo!  Bo!  You're all right?" Dale's deep voice was tremulous.
+
+She roused up to seize him and to utter little cries of joy
+
+"Oh, Dale!  . . .  Oh, thank Heaven!  I'm ready to drop now. .
+. .  Hasn't it been a night -- an adventure?  . . .  I'm well
+-- safe -- sound. . . .  Dale, we owe it to this Jim Wilson."
+
+"Bo, I -- we'll all thank him -- all our lives," replied
+Dale.  "Wilson, you're a man!  . . .  If you'll shake that gang
+--"
+
+"Dale, shore there ain't much of a gang left, onless you let
+Burt git away," replied Wilson.
+
+"I didn't kill him -- or hurt him.  But I scared him so I'll
+bet he's runnin' yet. . . .  Wilson, did all the shootin'
+mean a fight?"
+
+"Tolerable."
+
+"Oh, Dale, it was terrible!  I saw it all.  I --"
+
+"Wal, Miss, you can tell him after I go. . . .  I'm wishin'
+you good luck."
+
+His voice was a cool, easy drawl, slightly tremulous.
+
+The girl's face flashed white in the gloom.  She pressed
+against the outlaw -- wrung his hands.
+
+"Heaven help you, Jim Wilson!  You ARE from Texas!  . . .  I'll
+remember you -- pray for you all my life!"
+
+Wilson moved away, out toward the pale glow of light under
+the black pines.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+
+As Helen Rayner watched Dale ride away on a quest perilous
+to him, and which meant almost life or death for her, it was
+surpassing strange that she could think of nothing except
+the thrilling, tumultuous moment when she had put her arms
+round his neck.
+
+It did not matter that Dale -- splendid fellow that he was
+-- had made the ensuing moment free of shame by taking her
+action as he had taken it -- the fact that she had actually
+done it was enough.  How utterly impossible for her to
+anticipate her impulses or to understand them, once they
+were acted upon!  Confounding realization then was that when
+Dale returned with her sister, Helen knew she would do the
+same thing over again!"
+
+"If I do -- I won't be two-faced about it," she
+soliloquized, and a hot blush flamed her cheeks.
+
+She watched Dale until he rode out of sight.
+
+When he had gone, worry and dread replaced this other
+confusing emotion.  She turned to the business of meeting
+events.  Before supper she packed her valuables and books,
+papers, and clothes, together with Bo's, and had them in
+readiness so if she was forced to vacate the premises she
+would have her personal possessions.
+
+The Mormon boys and several other of her trusted men slept
+in their tarpaulin beds on the porch of the ranch-house that
+night, so that Helen at least would not be surprised.  But
+the day came, with its manifold duties undisturbed by any
+event.  And it passed slowly with the leaden feet of
+listening, watching vigilance.
+
+Carmichael did not come back, nor was there news of him to
+be had.  The last known of him had been late the afternoon of
+the preceding day, when a sheep-herder had seen him far out
+on the north range, headed for the hills.  The Beemans
+reported that Roy's condition had improved, and also that
+there was a subdued excitement of suspense down in the
+village.
+
+This second lonely night was almost unendurable for Helen.
+When she slept it was to dream horrible dreams; when she lay
+awake it was to have her heart leap to her throat at a
+rustle of leaves near the window, and to be in torture of
+imagination as to poor Bo's plight.  A thousand times Helen
+said to herself that Beasley could have had the ranch and
+welcome, if only Bo had been spared.  Helen absolutely
+connected her enemy with her sister's disappearance.  Riggs
+might have been a means to it.
+
+Daylight was not attended by so many fears; there were
+things to do that demanded attention.  And thus it was that
+the next morning, shortly before noon, she was recalled to
+her perplexities by a shouting out at the corrals and a
+galloping of horses somewhere near.  From the window she saw
+a big smoke.
+
+"Fire!  That must be one of the barns -- the old one,
+farthest out," she said, gazing out of the window.  "Some
+careless Mexican with his everlasting cigarette!"
+
+Helen resisted an impulse to go out and see what had
+happened.  She had decided to stay in the house.  But when
+footsteps sounded on the porch and a rap on the door, she
+unhesitatingly opened it.  Four Mexicans stood close.  One of
+them, quick as thought, flashed a hand in to grasp her, and
+in a single motion pulled her across the threshold.
+
+"No hurt, Senuora," he said, and pointed -- making motions
+she must go.
+
+Helen did not need to be told what this visit meant.  Many as
+her conjectures had been, however, she had not thought of
+Beasley subjecting her to this outrage.  And her blood
+boiled.
+
+"How dare you!" she said, trembling in her effort to control
+her temper.  But class, authority, voice availed nothing with
+these swarthy Mexicans.  They grinned.  Another laid hold of
+Helen with dirty, brown hand.  She shrank from the contact.
+
+"Let go!" she burst out, furiously.  And instinctively she
+began to struggle to free herself.  Then they all took hold
+of her.  Helen's dignity might never have been!  A burning,
+choking rush of blood was her first acquaintance with the
+terrible passion of anger that was her inheritance from the
+Auchinclosses.  She who had resolved never to lay herself
+open to indignity now fought like a tigress.  The Mexicans,
+jabbering in their excitement, had all they could do, until
+they lifted her bodily from the porch.  They handled her as
+if she had been a half-empty sack of corn.  One holding each
+hand and foot they packed her, with dress disarranged and
+half torn off, down the path to the lane and down the lane
+to the road.  There they stood upright and pushed her off her
+property.
+
+Through half-blind eyes Helen saw them guarding the gateway,
+ready to prevent her entrance.  She staggered down the road
+to the village.  It seemed she made her way through a red
+dimness -- that there was a congestion in her brain -- that
+the distance to Mrs.  Cass's cottage was insurmountable.  But
+she got there, to stagger up the path, to hear the old
+woman's cry.  Dizzy, faint, sick, with a blackness enveloping
+all she looked at, Helen felt herself led into the
+sitting-room and placed in the big chair.
+
+Presently sight and clearness of mind returned to her.  She
+saw Roy, white as a sheet, questioning her with terrible
+eyes.  The old woman hung murmuring over her, trying to
+comfort her as well as fasten the disordered dress.
+
+"Four greasers -- packed me down -- the hill -- threw me off
+my ranch -- into the road!" panted Helen.
+
+She seemed to tell this also to her own consciousness and to
+realize the mighty wave of danger that shook her whole body.
+
+"If I'd known -- I would have killed them!"
+
+She exclaimed that, full-voiced and hard, with dry, hot eyes
+on her friends.  Roy reached out to take her hand, speaking
+huskily.  Helen did not distinguish what he said.  The
+frightened old woman knelt, with unsteady fingers fumbling
+over the rents in Helen's dress.  The moment came when
+Helen's quivering began to subside, when her blood quieted
+to let her reason sway, when she began to do battle with her
+rage, and slowly to take fearful stock of this consuming
+peril that had been a sleeping tigress in her veins.
+
+"Oh, Miss Helen, you looked so turrible, I made sure you was
+hurted," the old woman was saying.
+
+Helen gazed strangely at her bruised wrists, at the one
+stocking that hung down over her shoe-top, at the rent I
+which had bared her shoulder to the profane gaze of those
+grinning, beady-eyed Mexicans.
+
+"My body's -- not hurt," she whispered.
+
+Roy had lost some of his whiteness, and where his eyes had
+been fierce they were now kind.
+
+"Wal, Miss Nell, it's lucky no harm's done. . . .  Now if
+you'll only see this whole deal clear!  . . .  Not let it
+spoil your sweet way of lookin' an' hopin'!  If you can only
+see what's raw in this West -- an' love it jest the same!"
+
+Helen only half divined his meaning, but that was enough for
+a future reflection.  The West was beautiful, but hard.  In
+the faces of these friends she began to see the meaning of
+the keen, sloping lines, and shadows of pain, of a lean,
+naked truth, cut as from marble.
+
+"For the land's sakes, tell us all about it," importuned
+Mrs.  Cass.
+
+Whereupon Helen shut her eyes and told the brief narrative
+of her expulsion from her home.
+
+"Shore we-all expected thet," said Roy.  "An' it's jest as
+well you're here with a whole skin.  Beasley's in possession
+now an' I reckon we'd all sooner hev you away from thet
+ranch."
+
+"But, Roy, I won't let Beasley stay there," cried Helen.
+
+"Miss Nell, shore by the time this here Pine has growed big
+enough fer law you'll hev gray in thet pretty hair.  You
+can't put Beasley off with your honest an' rightful claim.
+Al Auchincloss was a hard driver.  He made enemies an' he
+made some he didn't kill.  The evil men do lives after them.
+An' you've got to suffer fer Al's sins, though Al was as
+good as any man who ever prospered in these parts."
+
+"Oh, what can I do?  I won't give up.  I've been robbed.  Can't
+the people help me?  Must I meekly sit with my hands crossed
+while that half-breed thief -- Oh, it's unbelievable!"
+
+"I reckon you'll jest hev to be patient fer a few days,"
+said Roy, calmly.  "It'll all come right in the end."
+
+"Roy!  You've had this deal, as you call it, all worked out
+in mind for a long time!" exclaimed Helen.
+
+"Shore, an' I 'ain't missed a reckonin' yet."
+
+"Then what will happen -- in a few days?"
+
+"Nell Rayner, are you goin' to hev some spunk an' not lose
+your nerve again or go wild out of your head?"
+
+"I'll try to be brave, but -- but I must be prepared," she
+replied, tremulously.
+
+"Wal, there's Dale an' Las Vegas an' me fer Beasley to
+reckon with.  An', Miss Nell, his chances fer long life are
+as pore as his chances fer heaven!"
+
+"But, Roy, I don't believe in deliberate taking of life,"
+replied Helen, shuddering.  "That's against my religion.  I
+won't allow it. . . .  And -- then -- think, Dale, all of you
+-- in danger!"
+
+"Girl, how 're you ever goin' to help yourself ?  Shore you
+might hold Dale back, if you love him, an' swear you won't
+give yourself to him. . . .  An' I reckon I'd respect your
+religion, if you was goin' to suffer through me. . . .  But
+not Dale nor you -- nor Bo -- nor love or heaven or hell can
+ever stop thet cowboy Las Vegas!"
+
+"Oh, if Dale brings Bo back to me -- what will I care for my
+ranch?" murmured Helen.
+
+"Reckon you'll only begin to care when thet happens.  Your
+big hunter has got to be put to work," replied Roy, with his
+keen smile.
+
+
+Before noon that day the baggage Helen had packed at home
+was left on the porch of Widow Cass's cottage, and Helen's
+anxious need of the hour was satisfied.  She was made
+comfortable in the old woman's one spare room, and she set
+herself the task of fortitude and endurance.
+
+To her surprise, many of Mrs.  Cass's neighbors came
+unobtrusively to the back door of the little cottage and
+made sympathetic inquiries.  They appeared a subdued and
+apprehensive group, and whispered to one another as they
+left.  Helen gathered from their visits a conviction that the
+wives of the men dominated by Beasley believed no good could
+come of this high-handed taking over of the ranch.  Indeed,
+Helen found at the end of the day that a strength had been
+borne of her misfortune.
+
+The next day Roy informed her that his brother John had come
+down the preceding night with the news of Beasley's descent
+upon the ranch.  Not a shot had been fired, and the only
+damage done was that of the burning of a hay-filled barn.
+This had been set on fire to attract Helen's men to one
+spot, where Beasley had ridden down upon them with three
+times their number.  He had boldly ordered them off the land,
+unless they wanted to acknowledge him boss and remain there
+in his service.  The three Beemans had stayed, having planned
+that just in this event they might be valuable to Helen's
+interests.  Beasley had ridden down into Pine the same as
+upon any other day.  Roy reported also news which had come in
+that morning, how Beasley's crowd had celebrated late the
+night before.
+
+The second and third and fourth days endlessly wore away,
+and Helen believed they had made her old.  At night she lay
+awake most of the time, thinking and praying, but during the
+afternoon she got some sleep.  She could think of nothing and
+talk of nothing except her sister, and Dale's chances of
+saving her.
+
+"Well, shore you pay Dale a pore compliment," finally
+protested the patient Roy.  "I tell you -- Milt Dale can do
+anythin' he wants to do in the woods.  You can believe thet.
+. . .  But I reckon he'll run chances after he comes back."
+
+This significant speech thrilled Helen with its assurance of
+hope, and made her blood curdle at the implied peril
+awaiting the hunter.
+
+On the afternoon of the fifth day Helen was abruptly
+awakened from her nap.  The sun had almost set.  She heard
+voices -- the shrill, cackling notes of old Mrs.  Cass, high
+in excitement, a deep voice that made Helen tingle all over,
+a girl's laugh, broken but happy.  There were footsteps and
+stamping of hoofs.  Dale had brought Bo back!  Helen knew it.
+She grew very weak, and had to force herself to stand erect.
+Her heart began to pound in her very ears.  A sweet and
+perfect joy suddenly flooded her soul.  She thanked God her
+prayers had been answered.  Then suddenly alive with sheer
+mad physical gladness, she rushed out.
+
+She was just in time to see Roy Beeman stalk out as if he
+had never been shot, and with a yell greet a big, gray-clad,
+gray-faced man -- Dale.
+
+"Howdy, Roy!  Glad to see you up," said Dale.  How the quiet
+voice steadied Helen!  She beheld Bo.  Bo, looking the same,
+except a little pale and disheveled!  Then Bo saw her and
+leaped at her, into her arms.
+
+"Nell!  I'm here!  Safe -- all right!  Never was so happy in my
+life. . . .  Oh-h!  talk about your adventures!  Nell, you dear
+old mother to me -- I've had e-enough forever!"
+
+Bo was wild with joy, and by turns she laughed and cried.
+But Helen could not voice her feelings.  Her eyes were so dim
+that she could scarcely see Dale when he loomed over her as
+she held Bo.  But he found the hand she put shakily out.
+
+"Nell!  . . .  Reckon it's been harder -- on you." His voice
+was earnest and halting.  She felt his searching gaze upon
+her face.  "Mrs.  Cass said you were here.  An' I know why."
+
+Roy led them all indoors.
+
+"Milt, one of the neighbor boys will take care of thet
+hoss," he said, as Dale turned toward the dusty and weary
+Ranger.  "Where'd you leave the cougar?"
+
+"I sent him home," replied Date.
+
+"Laws now, Milt, if this ain't grand!" cackled Mrs.  Cass.
+"We've worried some here.  An' Miss Helen near starved
+a-hopin' fer you."
+
+"Mother, I reckon the girl an' I are nearer starved than
+anybody you know," replied Dale, with a grim laugh.
+
+"Fer the land's sake!  I'll be fixin' supper this minit."
+
+"Nell, why are you here?" asked Bo, suspiciously.
+
+For answer Helen led her sister into the spare room and
+closed the door.  Bo saw the baggage.  Her expression changed.
+The old blaze leaped to the telltale eyes.
+
+"He's done it!" she cried, hotly.
+
+"Dearest -- thank God.  I've got you -- back again!" murmured
+Helen, finding her voice.  "Nothing else matters!  . . .  I've
+prayed only for that!"
+
+"Good old Nell!" whispered Bo, and she kissed and embraced
+Helen.  "You really mean that, I know.  But nix for yours
+truly!  I'm back alive and kicking, you bet. . . .  Where's my
+-- where's Tom?"
+
+"Bo, not a word has been heard of him for five days.  He's
+searching for you, of course."
+
+"And you've been -- been put off the ranch?"
+
+"Well, rather," replied Helen, and in a few trembling words
+she told the story of her eviction.
+
+Bo uttered a wild word that had more force than elegance,
+but it became her passionate resentment of this outrage done
+her sister.
+
+"Oh!  . . .  Does Tom Carmichael know this?" she added,
+breathlessly.
+
+"How could he?"
+
+"When he finds out, then -- Oh, won't there be hell?  I'm
+glad I got here first. . . .  Nell, my boots haven't been off
+the whole blessed time.  Help me.  And oh, for some soap and
+hot water and some clean clothes!  Nell, old girl, I wasn't
+raised right for these Western deals.  Too luxurious!"
+
+And then Helen had her ears filled with a rapid-fire account
+of running horses and Riggs and outlaws and Beasley called
+boldly to his teeth, and a long ride and an outlaw who was a
+hero -- a fight with Riggs -- blood and death -- another
+long ride -- a wild camp in black woods -- night -- lonely,
+ghostly sounds -- and day again -- plot -- a great actress
+lost to the world -- Ophelia -- Snakes and Ansons --
+hoodooed outlaws -- mournful moans and terrible cries --
+cougar -- stampede -- fight and shots, more blood and death
+-- Wilson hero -- another Tom Carmichael -- fallen in love
+with outlaw gun-fighter if -- black night and Dale and horse
+and rides and starved and, "Oh, Nell, he WAS from Texas!"
+
+Helen gathered that wonderful and dreadful events had hung
+over the bright head of this beloved little sister, but the
+bewilderment occasioned by Bo's fluent and remarkable
+utterance left only that last sentence clear.
+
+Presently Helen got a word in to inform Bo that Mrs.  Cass
+had knocked twice for supper, and that welcome news checked
+Bo's flow of speech when nothing else seemed adequate.
+
+It was obvious to Helen that Roy and Dale had exchanged
+stories.  Roy celebrated this reunion by sitting at table the
+first time since he had been shot; and despite Helen's
+misfortune and the suspended waiting balance in the air the
+occasion was joyous.  Old Mrs.  Cass was in the height of her
+glory.  She sensed a romance here, and, true to her sex, she
+radiated to it.
+
+Daylight was still lingering when Roy got up and went out on
+the porch.  His keen ears had heard something.  Helen fancied
+she herself had heard rapid hoof-beats.
+
+"Dale, come out!" called Roy, sharply.
+
+The hunter moved with his swift, noiseless agility.  Helen
+and Bo followed, halting in the door.
+
+"Thet's Las Vegas," whispered Dale.
+
+To Helen it seemed that the cowboy's name changed the very
+atmosphere.
+
+Voices were heard at the gate; one that, harsh and quick,
+sounded like Carmichael's.  And a spirited horse was pounding
+and scattering gravel.  Then a lithe figure appeared,
+striding up the path.  It was Carmichael -- yet not the
+Carmichael Helen knew.  She heard Bo's strange little cry, a
+corroboration of her own impression.
+
+Roy might never have been shot, judging from the way he
+stepped out, and Dale was almost as quick.  Carmichael
+reached them -- grasped them with swift, hard hands.
+
+"Boys -- I jest rode in.  An' they said you'd found her!"
+
+"Shore, Las Vegas.  Dale fetched her home safe an' sound. . .
+.  There she is."
+
+The cowboy thrust aside the two men, and with a long stride
+he faced the porch, his piercing eyes on the door.  All that
+Helen could think of his look was that it seemed terrible.
+Bo stepped outside in front of Helen.  Probably she would
+have run straight into Carmichael's arms if some strange
+instinct had not withheld her.  Helen judged it to be fear;
+she found her heart lifting painfully.
+
+"Bo!" he yelled, like a savage, yet he did not in the least
+resemble one.
+
+"Oh -- Tom!" cried Bo, falteringly.  She half held out her
+arms.
+
+"You, girl?" That seemed to be his piercing query, like the
+quivering blade in his eyes.  Two more long strides carried
+him close up to her, and his look chased the red out of Bo's
+cheek.  Then it was beautiful to see his face marvelously
+change until it was that of the well remembered Las Vegas
+magnified in all his old spirit.
+
+"Aw!" The exclamation was a tremendous sigh.  "I shore am
+glad!"
+
+That beautiful flash left his face as he wheeled to the men.
+He wrung Dale's hand long and hard, and his gaze confused
+the older man.
+
+"RIGGS!" he said, and in the jerk of his frame as he whipped
+out the word disappeared the strange, fleeting signs of his
+kindlier emotion.
+
+"Wilson killed him," replied Dale.
+
+"Jim Wilson -- that old Texas Ranger!  . . .  Reckon he lent
+you a hand?"
+
+"My friend, he saved Bo," replied Dale, with emotion.  "My
+old cougar an' me -- we just hung 'round."
+
+"You made Wilson help you?" cut in the hard voice.
+
+"Yes.  But he killed Riggs before I come up an' I reckon he'd
+done well by Bo if I'd never got there."
+
+"How about the gang?"
+
+"All snuffed out, I reckon, except Wilson."
+
+"Somebody told me Beasley hed ran Miss Helen off the ranch.
+Thet so?"
+
+"Yes.  Four of his greasers packed her down the hill -- most
+tore her clothes off, so Roy tells me."
+
+"Four greasers!  . . .  Shore it was Beasley's deal clean
+through?"
+
+"Yes.  Riggs was led.  He had an itch for a bad name, you
+know.  But Beasley made the plan.  It was Nell they wanted
+instead of Bo."
+
+Abruptly Carmichael stalked off down the darkening path, his
+silver heel-plates ringing, his spurs jingling.
+
+"Hold on, Carmichael," called Dale, taking a step.
+
+"Oh, Tom!" cried Bo.
+
+"Shore folks callin' won't be no use, if anythin would be,"
+said Roy.  "Las Vegas has hed a look at red liquor."
+
+"He's been drinking!  Oh, that accounts!  . . .  he never --
+never even touched me!"
+
+For once Helen was not ready to comfort Bo.  A mighty tug at
+her heart had sent her with flying, uneven steps toward
+Dale.  He took another stride down the path, and another.
+
+"Dale -- oh -- please stop!" she called, very low.
+
+He halted as if he had run sharply into a bar across the
+path.  When he turned Helen had come close.  Twilight was deep
+there in the shade of the peach-trees, but she could see his
+face, the hungry, flaring eyes.
+
+"I -- I haven't thanked you -- yet -- for bringing Bo home,"
+she whispered.
+
+"Nell, never mind that," he said, in surprise.  "If you must
+-- why, wait.  I've got to catch up with that cowboy."
+
+"No.  Let me thank you now," she whispered, and, stepping
+closer, she put her arms up, meaning to put them round his
+neck.  That action must be her self-punishment for the other
+time she had done it.  Yet it might also serve to thank him.
+But, strangely, her hands got no farther than his breast,
+and fluttered there to catch hold of the fringe of his
+buckskin jacket.  She felt a heave of his deep chest.
+
+"I -- I do thank you -- with all my heart," she said,
+softly.  "I owe you now -- for myself and her -- more than I
+can ever repay."
+
+"Nell, I'm your friend," he replied, hurriedly.  "Don't talk
+of repayin' me.  Let me go now -- after Las Vegas."
+
+"What for?" she queried, suddenly.
+
+"I mean to line up beside him -- at the bar -- or wherever
+he goes," returned Dale.
+
+"Don't tell me that.  _I_ know.  You're going straight to meet
+Beasley."
+
+"Nell, if you hold me up any longer I reckon I'll have to
+run -- or never get to Beasley before that cowboy."
+
+Helen locked her fingers in the fringe of his jacket --
+leaned closer to him, all her being responsive to a bursting
+gust of blood over her.
+
+"I'll not let you go," she said.
+
+He laughed, and put his great hands over hers.  "What 're you
+sayin', girl?  You can't stop me."
+
+"Yes, I can.  Dale, I don't want you to risk your life."
+
+He stared at her, and made as if to tear her hands from
+their hold.
+
+"Listen -- please -- oh -- please!" she implored.  "If you go
+deliberately to kill Beasley -- and do it -- that will be
+murder. . . .  It's against my religion. . . .  I would be
+unhappy all my life."
+
+"But, child, you'll be ruined all your life if Beasley is
+not dealt with -- as men of his breed are always dealt with
+in the West," he remonstrated, and in one quick move he had
+freed himself from her clutching fingers.
+
+Helen, with a move as swift, put her arms round his neck and
+clasped her hands tight.
+
+"Milt, I'm finding myself," she said.  "The other day, when I
+did -- this -- you made an excuse for me. . . .  I'm not
+two-faced now."
+
+She meant to keep him from killing Beasley if she sacrificed
+every last shred of her pride.  And she stamped the look of
+his face on her heart of hearts to treasure always.  The
+thrill, the beat of her pulses, almost obstructed her
+thought of purpose.
+
+"Nell, just now -- when you're overcome -- rash with
+feelin's -- don't say to me -- a word -- a --"
+
+He broke down huskily.
+
+"My first friend -- my -- Oh Dale, I KNOW you love me!  she
+whispered.  And she hid her face on his breast, there to feel
+a tremendous tumult.
+
+"Oh, don't you?" she cried, in low, smothered voice, as his
+silence drove her farther on this mad, yet glorious purpose.
+
+"If you need to be told -- yes -- I reckon I do love you,
+Nell Rayner," he replied.
+
+It seemed to Helen that he spoke from far off.  She lifted
+her face, her heart on her lips.
+
+"If you kill Beasley I'll never marry you," she said.
+
+"Who's expectin' you to?" he asked, with low, hoarse laugh.
+"Do you think you have to marry me to square accounts?
+This's the only time you ever hurt me, Nell Rayner. . . .
+I'm 'shamed you could think I'd expect you -- out of
+gratitude --"
+
+"Oh -- you -- you are as dense as the forest where you
+live," she cried.  And then she shut her eyes again, the
+better to remember that transfiguration of his face, the
+better to betray herself.
+
+"Man -- I love you!" Full and deep, yet tremulous, the words
+burst from her heart that had been burdened with them for
+many a day.
+
+Then it seemed, in the throbbing riot of her senses, that
+she was lifted and swung into his arms, and handled with a
+great and terrible tenderness, and hugged and kissed with
+the hunger and awkwardness of a bear, and held with her feet
+off the ground, and rendered blind, dizzy, rapturous, and
+frightened, and utterly torn asunder from her old calm,
+thinking self.
+
+He put her down -- released her.
+
+"Nothin' could have made me so happy as what you said." He
+finished with a strong sigh of unutterable, wondering joy.
+
+"Then you will not go to -- to meet --"
+
+Helen's happy query froze on her lips.
+
+"I've got to go!" he rejoined, with his old, quiet voice.
+"Hurry in to Bo. . . .  An' don't worry.  Try to think of
+things as I taught you up in the woods."
+
+Helen heard his soft, padded footfalls swiftly pass away.
+She was left there, alone in the darkening twilight,
+suddenly cold and stricken, as if turned to stone.
+
+Thus she stood an age-long moment until the upflashing truth
+galvanized her into action.  Then she flew in pursuit of
+Dale.  The truth was that, in spite of Dale's' early training
+in the East and the long years of solitude which had made
+him wonderful in thought and feeling, he had also become a
+part of this raw, bold, and violent West.
+
+It was quite dark now and she had run quite some distance
+before she saw Dale's tall, dark form against the yellow
+light of Turner's saloon.
+
+Somehow, in that poignant moment, when her flying feet kept
+pace with her heart, Helen felt in herself a force opposing
+itself against this raw, primitive justice of the West.  She
+was one of the first influences emanating from civilized
+life, from law and order.  In that flash of truth she saw the
+West as it would be some future time, when through women and
+children these wild frontier days would be gone forever.
+Also, just as clearly she saw the present need of men like
+Roy Beeman and Dale and the fire-blooded Carmichael.  Beasley
+and his kind must be killed.  But Helen did not want her
+lover, her future husband, and the probable father of her
+children to commit what she held to be murder.
+
+At the door of the saloon she caught up with Dale.
+
+"Milt -- oh -- wait!' -- wait!" she panted.
+
+She heard him curse under his breath as he turned.  They were
+alone in the yellow flare of light.  Horses were champing
+bits and drooping before the rails.
+
+"You go back!" ordered Dale, sternly.  His face was pale, his
+eyes were gleaming.
+
+"No!  Not till -- you take me -- or carry me!" she replied,
+resolutely, with all a woman's positive and inevitable
+assurance.
+
+Then he laid hold of her with ungentle hands.  His violence,
+especially the look on his face, terrified Helen, rendered
+her weak.  But nothing could have shaken her resolve.  She
+felt victory.  Her sex, her love, and her presence would be
+too much for Dale.
+
+As he swung Helen around, the low hum of voices inside the
+saloon suddenly rose to sharp, hoarse roars, accompanied by
+a scuffling of feet and crashing of violently sliding chairs
+or tables.  Dale let go of Helen and leaped toward the door.
+But a silence inside, quicker and stranger than the roar,
+halted him.  Helen's heart contracted, then seemed to cease
+beating.  There was absolutely not a perceptible sound.  Even
+the horses appeared, like Dale, to have turned to statues.
+
+Two thundering shots annihilated this silence.  Then quickly
+came a lighter shot -- the smash of glass.  Dale ran into the
+saloon.  The horses began to snort, to rear, to pound.  A low,
+muffled murmur terrified Helen even as it drew her.  Dashing
+at the door, she swung it in and entered.
+
+The place was dim, blue-hazed, smelling of smoke.  Dale stood
+just inside the door.  On the floor lay two men.  Chairs and
+tables were overturned.  A motley, dark, shirt-sleeved,
+booted, and belted crowd of men appeared hunched against the
+opposite wall, with pale, set faces, turned to the bar.
+Turner, the proprietor, stood at one end, his face livid,
+his hands aloft and shaking.  Carmichael leaned against the
+middle of the bar.  He held a gun low down.  It was smoking.
+
+With a gasp Helen flashed her eyes back to Dale.  He had seen
+her -- was reaching an arm toward her.  Then she saw the man
+lying almost at her feet.  Jeff Mulvey -- her uncle's old
+foreman!  His face was awful to behold.  A smoking gun lay
+near his inert hand.  The other man had fallen on his face.
+His garb proclaimed him a Mexican.  He was not yet dead.  Then
+Helen, as she felt Dale's arm encircle her, looked farther,
+because she could not prevent it -- looked on at that
+strange figure against the bar -- this boy who had been such
+a friend in her hour of need -- this nai;ve and frank
+sweetheart of her sister's.
+
+She saw a man now -- wild, white, intense as fire, with some
+terrible cool kind of deadliness in his mien.  His left elbow
+rested upon the bar, and his hand held a glass of red
+liquor.  The big gun, low down in his other hand, seemed as
+steady as if it were a fixture.
+
+"Heah's to thet -- half-breed Beasley an' his outfit!"
+
+Carmichael drank, while his flaming eyes held the crowd;
+then with savage action of terrible passion he flung the
+glass at the quivering form of the still living Mexican on
+the floor.
+
+Helen felt herself slipping.  All seemed to darken around
+her.  She could not see Dale, though she knew he held her.
+Then she fainted.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+
+Las Vegas Carmichael was a product of his day.
+
+The Pan Handle of Texas, the old Chisholm Trail along which
+were driven the great cattle herds northward, Fort Dodge,
+where the cowboys conflicted with the card-sharps -- these
+hard places had left their marks on Carmichael.  To come from
+Texas was to come from fighting stock.  And a cowboy's life
+was strenuous, wild, violent, and generally brief.  The
+exceptions were the fortunate and the swiftest men with
+guns; and they drifted from south to north and west, taking
+with them the reckless, chivalrous, vitriolic spirit
+peculiar to their breed.
+
+The pioneers and ranchers of the frontier would never have
+made the West habitable had it not been for these wild
+cowboys, these hard-drinking, hard-riding, hard-living
+rangers of the barrens, these easy, cool, laconic, simple
+young men whose blood was tinged with fire and who possessed
+a magnificent and terrible effrontery toward danger and
+death.
+
+Las Vegas ran his horse from Widow Cass's cottage to
+Turner's saloon, and the hoofs of the goaded steed crashed
+in the door.  Las Vegas's entrance was a leap.  Then he stood
+still with the door ajar and the horse pounding and snorting
+back.  All the men in that saloon who saw the entrance of Las
+Vegas knew what it portended.  No thunderbolt could have more
+quickly checked the drinking, gambling, talking crowd.  They
+recognized with kindred senses the nature of the man and his
+arrival.  For a second the blue-hazed room was perfectly
+quiet, then men breathed, moved, rose, and suddenly caused a
+quick, sliding crash of chairs and tables.
+
+The cowboy's glittering eyes flashed to and fro, and then
+fixed on Mulvey and his Mexican companion.  That glance
+singled out these two, and the sudden rush of nervous men
+proved it.  Mulvey and the sheep-herder were left alone in
+the center of the floor.
+
+"Howdy, Jeff !  Where's your boss?" asked Las Vegas.  His
+voice was cool, friendly; his manner was easy, natural; but
+the look of him was what made Mulvey pale and the Mexican
+livid.
+
+"Reckon he's home," replied Mulvey.
+
+"Home?  What's he call home now?"
+
+"He's hangin' out hyar at Auchincloss's," replied Mulvey.
+His voice was not strong, but his eyes were steady,
+watchful.
+
+Las Vegas quivered all over as if stung.  A flame that seemed
+white and red gave his face a singular hue.
+
+"Jeff, you worked for old Al a long time, an' I've heard of
+your differences," said Las Vegas.  "Thet ain't no mix of
+mine. . . .  But you double-crossed Miss Helen!"
+
+Mulvey made no attempt to deny this.  He gulped slowly.  His
+hands appeared less steady, and he grew paler.  Again Las
+Vegas's words signified less than his look.  And that look
+now included the Mexican.
+
+"Pedro, you're one of Beasley's old hands," said Las Vegas,
+accusingly.  "An' -- you was one of them four greasers thet
+--"
+
+Here the cowboy choked and bit over his words as if they
+were a material poison.  The Mexican showed his guilt and
+cowardice.  He began to jabber.
+
+"Shet up!" hissed Las Vegas, with a savage and significant
+jerk of his arm, as if about to strike.  But that action was
+read for its true meaning.  Pell-mell the crowd split to rush
+each way and leave an open space behind the three.
+
+Las Vegas waited.  But Mulvey seemed obstructed.  The Mexican
+looked dangerous through his fear.  His fingers twitched as
+if the tendons running up into his arms were being pulled.
+
+An instant of suspense -- more than long enough for Mulvey
+to be tried and found wanting -- and Las Vegas, with laugh
+and sneer, turned his back upon the pair and stepped to the
+bar.  His call for a bottle made Turner jump and hold it out
+with shaking hands.  Las Vegas poured out a drink, while his
+gaze was intent on the scarred old mirror hanging behind the
+bar.
+
+This turning his back upon men he had just dared to draw
+showed what kind of a school Las Vegas had been trained in.
+If those men had been worthy antagonists of his class he
+would never have scorned them.  As it was, when Mulvey and
+the Mexican jerked at their guns, Las Vegas swiftly wheeled
+and shot twice.  Mulvey's gun went off as he fell, and the
+Mexican doubled up in a heap on the floor.  Then Las Vegas
+reached around with his left hand for the drink he had
+poured out.
+
+At this juncture Dale burst into the saloon, suddenly to
+check his impetus, to swerve aside toward the bar and halt.
+The door had not ceased swinging when again it was propelled
+inward, this time to admit Helen Rayner, white and
+wide-eyed.
+
+In another moment then Las Vegas had spoken his deadly toast
+to Beasley's gang and had fiercely flung the glass at the
+writhing Mexican on the floor.  Also Dale had gravitated
+toward the reeling Helen to catch her when she fainted.
+
+Las Vegas began to curse, and, striding to Dale, he pushed
+him out of the saloon.
+
+"--!  What 're you doin' heah?" he yelled, stridently.
+"Hevn't you got thet girl to think of?  Then do it, you big
+Indian!  Lettin' her run after you heah -- riskin' herself
+thet way!  You take care of her an' Bo an' leave this deal to
+me!"
+
+The cowboy, furious as he was at Dale, yet had keen, swift
+eyes for the horses near at hand, and the men out in the dim
+light.  Dale lifted the girl into his arms, and, turning
+without a word, stalked away to disappear in the darkness.
+Las Vegas, holding his gun low, returned to the bar-room.  If
+there had been any change in the crowd it was slight.  The
+tension had relaxed.  Turner no longer stood with hands up.
+
+"You-all go on with your fun," called the cowboy, with a
+sweep of his gun.  "But it'd be risky fer any one to start
+leavin'."
+
+With that he backed against the bar, near where the black
+bottle stood.  Turner walked out to begin righting tables and
+chairs, and presently the crowd, with some caution and
+suspense, resumed their games and drinking.  It was
+significant that a wide berth lay between them and the door.
+From time to time Turner served liquor to men who called for
+it.
+
+Las Vegas leaned with back against the bar.  After a while he
+sheathed his gun and reached around for the bottle.  He drank
+with his piercing eyes upon the door.  No one entered and no
+one went out.  The games of chance there and the drinking
+were not enjoyed.  It was a hard scene -- that smoky, long,
+ill-smelling room, with its dim, yellow lights, and dark,
+evil faces, with the stealthy-stepping Turner passing to and
+fro, and the dead Mulvey staring in horrible fixidity at the
+ceiling, and the Mexican quivering more and more until he
+shook violently, then lay still, and with the drinking,
+somber, waiting cowboy, more fiery and more flaming with
+every drink, listening for a step that did not come.
+
+Time passed, and what little change it wrought was in the
+cowboy.  Drink affected him, but he did not become drunk.  It
+seemed that the liquor he drank was consumed by a mounting
+fire.  It was fuel to a driving passion.  He grew more sullen,
+somber, brooding, redder of eye and face, more crouching and
+restless.  At last, when the hour was so late that there was
+no probability of Beasley appearing, Las Vegas flung himself
+out of the saloon.
+
+All lights of the village had now been extinguished.  The
+tired horses drooped in the darkness.  Las Vegas found his
+horse and led him away down the road and out a lane to a
+field where a barn stood dim and dark in the starlight.
+Morning was not far off.  He unsaddled the horse and, turning
+him loose, went into the barn.  Here he seemed familiar with
+his surroundings, for he found a ladder and climbed to a
+loft, where be threw himself on the hay.
+
+He rested, but did not sleep.  At daylight he went down and
+brought his horse into the barn.  Sunrise found Las Vegas
+pacing to and fro the short length of the interior, and
+peering out through wide cracks between the boards.  Then
+during the succeeding couple of hours he watched the
+occasional horseman and wagon and herder that passed on into
+the village.
+
+About the breakfast hour Las Vegas saddled his horse and
+rode back the way he had come the night before.  At Turner's
+he called for something to eat as well as for whisky.  After
+that he became a listening, watching machine.  He drank
+freely for an hour; then he stopped.  He seemed to be drunk,
+but with a different kind of drunkenness from that usual in
+drinking men.  Savage, fierce, sullen, he was one to avoid.
+Turner waited on him in evident fear.
+
+At length Las Vegas's condition became such that action was
+involuntary.  He could not stand still nor sit down.  Stalking
+out, he passed the store, where men slouched back to avoid
+him, and he went down the road, wary and alert, as if he
+expected a rifle-shot from some hidden enemy.  Upon his
+return down that main thoroughfare of the village not a
+person was to be seen.  He went in to Turner's.  The
+proprietor was there at his post, nervous and pale.  Las
+Vegas did not order any more liquor.
+
+"Turner, I reckon I'll bore you next time I run in heah," he
+said, and stalked out.
+
+He had the stores, the road, the village, to himself; and he
+patrolled a beat like a sentry watching for an Indian
+attack.
+
+Toward noon a single man ventured out into the road to
+accost the cowboy.
+
+"Las Vegas, I'm tellin' you -- all the greasers air leavin'
+the range," he said.
+
+"Howdy, Abe!" replied Las Vegas.  "What 'n hell you talkin'
+about?"
+
+The man repeated his information.  And Las Vegas spat out
+frightful curses.
+
+"Abe -- you heah what Beasley's doin'?"
+
+"Yes.  He's with his men -- up at the ranch.  Reckon he can't
+put off ridin' down much longer."
+
+That was where the West spoke.  Beasley would be forced to
+meet the enemy who had come out single-handed against him.
+Long before this hour a braver man would have come to face
+Las Vegas.  Beasley could not hire any gang to bear the brunt
+of this situation.  This was the test by which even his own
+men must judge him.  All of which was to say that as the
+wildness of the West had made possible his crimes, so it now
+held him responsible for them.
+
+"Abe, if thet -- greaser don't rustle down heah I'm goin'
+after him."
+
+"Sure.  But don't be in no hurry," replied Abe.
+
+"I'm waltzin' to slow music. . . .  Gimme a smoke."
+
+With fingers that slightly trembled Abe rolled a cigarette,
+lit it from his own, and handed it to the cowboy.
+
+"Las Vegas, I reckon I hear hosses," he said, suddenly.
+
+"Me, too," replied Las Vegas, with his head high like that
+of a listening deer.  Apparently he forgot the cigarette and
+also his friend.  Abe hurried back to the store, where he
+disappeared.
+
+Las Vegas began his stalking up and down, and his action now
+was an exaggeration of all his former movements.  A rational,
+ordinary mortal from some Eastern community, happening to
+meet this red-faced cowboy, would have considered him drunk
+or crazy.  Probably Las Vegas looked both.  But all the same
+he was a marvelously keen and strung and efficient
+instrument to meet the portending issue.  How many thousands
+of times, on the trails, and in the wide-streeted little
+towns all over the West, had this stalk of the cowboy's been
+perpetrated!  Violent, bloody, tragic as it was, it had an
+importance in that pioneer day equal to the use of a horse
+or the need of a plow.
+
+At length Pine was apparently a deserted village, except for
+Las Vegas, who patrolled his long beat in many ways -- he
+lounged while he watched; he stalked like a mountaineer; he
+stole along Indian fashion, stealthily, from tree to tree,
+from corner to corner; he disappeared in the saloon to
+reappear at the back; he slipped round behind the barns to
+come out again in the main road; and time after time he
+approached his horse as if deciding to mount.
+
+The last visit he made into Turner's saloon he found no one
+there.  Savagely he pounded on the bar with his gun.  He got
+no response.  Then the long-pent-up rage burst.  With wild
+whoops he pulled another gun and shot at the mirror, the
+lamps.  He shot the neck off a bottle and drank till be
+choked, his neck corded, bulging, and purple.  His only slow
+and deliberate action was the reloading of his gun.  Then he
+crashed through the doors, and with a wild yell leaped sheer
+into the saddle, hauling his horse up high and goading him
+to plunge away.
+
+Men running to the door and windows of the store saw a
+streak of dust flying down the road.  And then they trooped
+out to see it disappear.  The hour of suspense ended for
+them.  Las Vegas had lived up to the code of the West, had
+dared his man out, had waited far longer than needful to
+prove that man a coward.  Whatever the issue now, Beasley was
+branded forever.  That moment saw the decline of whatever
+power he had wielded.  He and his men might kill the cowboy
+who had ridden out alone to face him, but that would not
+change the brand.
+
+The preceding night Beasley bad been finishing a late supper
+at his newly acquired ranch, when Buck Weaver, one of his
+men, burst in upon him with news of the death of Mulvey and
+Pedro.
+
+"Who's in the outfit?  How many?" he had questioned, quickly.
+
+"It's a one-man outfit, boss," replied Weaver.
+
+Beasley appeared astounded.  He and his men had prepared to
+meet the friends of the girl whose property he had taken
+over, and because of the superiority of his own force he had
+anticipated no bloody or extended feud.  This amazing
+circumstance put the case in very much more difficult form.
+
+"One man!" he ejaculated.
+
+"Yep.  Thet cowboy Las Vegas.  An,' boss, he turns out to be a
+gun-slinger from Texas.  I was in Turner's.  Hed jest happened
+to step in the other room when Las Vegas come bustin' in on
+his boss an' jumped off. . . .  Fust thing he called Jeff an'
+Pedro.  They both showed yaller.  An' then, damn if thet
+cowboy didn't turn his back on them an' went to the bar fer
+a drink.  But he was lookin' in the mirror an' when Jeff an'
+Pedro went fer their guns why he whirled quick as lightnin'
+an' bored them both. . . .  I sneaked out an --"
+
+"Why didn't you bore him?" roared Beasley.
+
+Buck Weaver steadily eyed his boss before he replied.  "I
+ain't takin' shots at any fellar from behind doors.  An' as
+fer meetin' Las Vegas -- excoose me, boss!  I've still a
+hankerin' fer sunshine an' red liquor.  Besides, I 'ain't got
+nothin' ag'in' Las Vegas.  If he's rustled over here at the
+head of a crowd to put us off I'd fight, jest as we'd all
+fight.  But you see we figgered wrong.  It's between you an'
+Las Vegas!  . . .  You oughter seen him throw thet hunter Dale
+out of Turner's."
+
+"Dale!  Did he come?" queried Beasley.
+
+"He got there just after the cowboy plugged Jeff.  An' thet
+big-eyed girl, she came runnin' in, too.  An' she keeled over
+in Dale's arms.  Las Vegas shoved him out -- cussed him so
+hard we all heerd. . . .  So, Beasley, there ain't no fight
+comin, off as we figgered on."
+
+Beasley thus heard the West speak out of the mouth of his
+own man.  And grim, sardonic, almost scornful, indeed, were
+the words of Buck Weaver.  This rider had once worked for Al
+Auchincloss and had deserted to Beasley under Mulvey's
+leadership.  Mulvey was dead and the situation was vastly
+changed.
+
+Beasley gave Weaver a dark, lowering glance, and waved him
+away.  From the door Weaver sent back a doubtful,
+scrutinizing gaze, then slouched out.  That gaze Beasley had
+not encountered before.
+
+It meant, as Weaver's cronies meant, as Beasley's
+long-faithful riders, and the people of the range, and as
+the spirit of the West meant, that Beasley was expected to
+march down into the village to face his single foe.
+
+But Beasley did not go.  Instead he paced to and fro the
+length of Helen Rayner's long sitting-room with the nervous
+energy of a man who could not rest.  Many times he hesitated,
+and at others he made sudden movements toward the door, only
+to halt.  Long after midnight he went to bed, but not to
+sleep.  He tossed and rolled all night, and at dawn arose,
+gloomy and irritable.
+
+He cursed the Mexican serving-women who showed their
+displeasure at his authority.  And to his amaze and rage not
+one of his men came to the house.  He waited and waited.  Then
+he stalked off to the corrals and stables carrying a rifle
+with him.  The men were there, in a group that dispersed
+somewhat at his advent.  Not a Mexican was in sight.
+
+Beasley ordered the horses to be saddled and all hands to go
+down into the village with him.  That order was disobeyed.
+Beasley stormed and raged.  His riders sat or lounged, with
+lowered faces.  An unspoken hostility seemed present.  Those
+who had been longest with him were least distant and
+strange, but still they did not obey.  At length Beasley
+roared for his Mexicans.
+
+"Boss, we gotta tell you thet every greaser on the ranch hes
+sloped -- gone these two hours -- on the way to Magdalena,"
+said Buck Weaver.
+
+Of all these sudden-uprising perplexities this latest was
+the most astounding.  Beasley cursed with his questioning
+wonder.
+
+"Boss, they was sure scared of thet gun-slingin' cowboy from
+Texas," replied Weaver, imperturbably.
+
+Beasley's dark, swarthy face changed its hue.  What of the
+subtle reflection in Weaver's slow speech!  One of the men
+came out of a corral leading Beasley's saddled and bridled
+horse.  This fellow dropped the bridle and sat down among his
+comrades without a word.  No one spoke.  The presence of the
+horse was significant.  With a snarling, muttered curse,
+Beasley took up his rifle and strode back to the
+ranch-house.
+
+In his rage and passion he did not realize what his men had
+known for hours -- that if he had stood any chance at all
+for their respect as well as for his life the hour was long
+past.
+
+Beasley avoided the open paths to the house, and when he got
+there he nervously poured out a drink.  Evidently something
+in the fiery liquor frightened him, for he threw the bottle
+aside.  It was as if that bottle contained a courage which
+was false.
+
+Again he paced the long sitting-room, growing more and more
+wrought-up as evidently he grew familiar with the singular
+state of affairs.  Twice the pale serving-woman called him to
+dinner.
+
+The dining-room was light and pleasant, and the meal,
+fragrant and steaming, was ready for him.  But the women had
+disappeared.  Beasley seated himself -- spread out his big
+hands on the table.  
+
+Then a slight rustle -- a clink of spur -- startled him.  He
+twisted his head.
+
+"Howdy, Beasley!" said Las Vegas, who had appeared as if by
+magic.
+
+Beasley's frame seemed to swell as if a flood had been
+loosed in his veins.  Sweat-drops stood out on his pallid
+face.
+
+"What -- you -- want?" he asked, huskily.
+
+"Wal now, my boss, Miss Helen, says, seein' I am foreman
+heah, thet it'd be nice an' proper fer me to drop in an' eat
+with you -- THE LAST TIME!" replied the cowboy.  His drawl
+was slow and cool, his tone was friendly and pleasant.  But
+his look was that of a falcon ready to drive deep its beak.
+
+Beasley's reply was loud, incoherent, hoarse.
+
+Las Vegas seated himself across from Beasley.
+
+"Eat or not, it's shore all the same to me," said Las Vegas,
+and he began to load his plate with his left hand.  His right
+hand rested very lightly, with just the tips of his
+vibrating fingers on the edge of the table; and he never for
+the slightest fraction of a second took his piercing eyes
+off Beasley.
+
+"Wal, my half-breed greaser guest, it shore roils up my
+blood to see you sittin' there -- thinkin' you've put my
+boss, Miss Helen, off this ranch," began Las Vegas, softly.
+And then he helped himself leisurely to food and drink.  "In
+my day I've shore stacked up against a lot of outlaws,
+thieves, rustlers, an' sich like, but fer an out an' out
+dirty low-down skunk, you shore take the dough!  . . .  I'm
+goin, to kill you in a minit or so, jest as soon as you move
+one of them dirty paws of yourn.  But I hope you'll be polite
+an' let me say a few words.  I'll never be happy again if you
+don't. . . .  Of all the -- yaller greaser dogs I ever seen,
+you're the worst!  . . .  I was thinkin' last night mebbe
+you'd come down an' meet me like a man, so 's I could wash
+my hands ever afterward without gettin' sick to my stummick.
+But you didn't come. . . .  Beasley, I'm so ashamed of myself
+thet I gotta call you -- when I ought to bore you, thet -- I
+ain't even second cousin to my old self when I rode fer
+Chisholm.  It don't mean nuthin' to you to call you liar!
+robber!  blackleg!  a sneakin' coyote!  an' a cheat thet hires
+others to do his dirty work!  . . .  By Gawd!  --"
+
+"Carmichael, gimme a word in," hoarsely broke out Beasley.
+"You're right, it won't do no good to call me. . . .  But
+let's talk. . . .  I'll buy you off.  Ten thousand dollars --"
+
+"Haw!  Haw!  Haw!" roared Las Vegas.  He was as tense as a
+strung cord and his face possessed a singular pale radiance.
+His right hand began to quiver more and more.
+
+"I'll -- double -- it!" panted Beasley.  "I'll -- make over
+-- half the ranch -- all the stock --"
+
+"Swaller thet!" yelled Las Vegas, with terrible strident
+ferocity.
+
+"Listen -- man!  . . .  I take -- it back!  . . .  I'll give up
+-- Auchincloss's ranch!" Beasley was now a shaking,
+whispering, frenzied man, ghastly white, with rolling eyes.
+
+Las Vegas's left fist pounded hard on the table.
+
+"GREASER, COME ON!" he thundered.
+
+Then Beasley, with desperate, frantic action, jerked for his
+gun.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+
+For Helen Rayner that brief, dark period of expulsion from
+her home had become a thing of the past, almost forgotten.
+
+Two months had flown by on the wings of love and work and
+the joy of finding her place there in the West.  All her old
+men had been only too glad of the opportunity to come back
+to her, and under Dale and Roy Beeman a different and
+prosperous order marked the life of the ranch.
+
+Helen had made changes in the house by altering the
+arrangement of rooms and adding a new section.  Only once had
+she ventured into the old dining-room where Las Vegas
+Carmichael had sat down to that fatal dinner for Beasley.
+She made a store-room of it, and a place she would never
+again enter.
+
+Helen was happy, almost too happy, she thought, and
+therefore made more than needful of the several bitter drops
+in her sweet cup of life.  Carmichael had ridden out of Pine,
+ostensibly on the trail of the Mexicans who had executed
+Beasley's commands.  The last seen of him had been reported
+from Show Down, where he had appeared red-eyed and
+dangerous, like a hound on a scent.  Then two months had
+flown by without a word.
+
+Dale had shaken his head doubtfully when interrogated about
+the cowboy's absence.  It would be just like Las Vegas never
+to be heard of again.  Also it would be more like him to
+remain away until all trace of his drunken, savage spell had
+departed from him and had been forgotten by his friends.  Bo
+took his disappearance apparently less to heart than Helen.
+But Bo grew more restless, wilder, and more wilful than
+ever.  Helen thought she guessed Bo's secret; and once she
+ventured a hint concerning Carmichael's return.
+
+"If Tom doesn't come back pretty soon I'll marry Milt Dale,"
+retorted Bo, tauntingly.
+
+This fired Helen's cheeks with red.
+
+"But, child," she protested, half angry, half grave.  "Milt
+and I are engaged."
+
+"Sure.  Only you're so slow.  There's many a slip -- you
+know."
+
+"Bo, I tell you Tom will come back," replied Helen,
+earnestly.  "I feel it.  There was something fine in that
+cowboy.  He understood me better than you or Milt, either. .
+. .  And he was perfectly wild in love with you."
+
+"Oh!  WAS he?"
+
+"Very much more than you deserved, Bo Rayner."
+
+Then occurred one of Bo's sweet, bewildering, unexpected
+transformations.  Her defiance, resentment, rebelliousness,
+vanished from a softly agitated face.
+
+"Oh, Nell, I know that. . . .  You just watch me if I ever
+get another chance at him!  . . .  Then -- maybe he'd never
+drink again!"
+
+"Bo, be happy -- and be good.  Don't ride off any more --
+don't tease the boys.  It'll all come right in the end."
+
+Bo recovered her equanimity quickly enough.
+
+"Humph!  You can afford to be cheerful.  You've got a man who
+can't live when you're out of his sight.  He's like a fish on
+dry land. . . .  And you -- why, once you were an old
+pessimist!"
+
+Bo was not to be consoled or changed.  Helen could only sigh
+and pray that her convictions would be verified.
+
+
+The first day of July brought an early thunder-storm, just
+at sunrise.  It roared and flared and rolled away, leaving a
+gorgeous golden cloud pageant in the sky and a fresh,
+sweetly smelling, glistening green range that delighted
+Helen's eye.
+
+Birds were twittering in the arbors and bees were humming in
+the flowers.  From the fields down along the brook came a
+blended song of swamp-blackbird and meadow-lark.  A
+clarion-voiced burro split the air with his coarse and
+homely bray.  The sheep were bleating, and a soft baa of
+little lambs came sweetly to Helen's ears.  She went her
+usual rounds with more than usual zest and thrill.
+Everywhere was color, activity, life.  The wind swept warm
+and pine-scented down from the mountain heights, now black
+and bold, and the great green slopes seemed to call to her.
+
+At that very moment she came suddenly upon Dale, in his
+shirt-sleeves, dusty and hot, standing motionless, gazing at
+the distant mountains.  Helen's greeting startled him.
+
+"I -- I was just looking away yonder," he said, smiling.  She
+thrilled at the clear, wonderful light of his eyes.
+
+"So was I -- a moment ago," she replied, wistfully.  "Do you
+miss the forest -- very much?"
+
+"Nell, I miss nothing.  But I'd like to ride with you under
+the pines once more."
+
+"We'll go," she cried.
+
+"When?" he asked, eagerly.
+
+"Oh -- soon!" And then with flushed face and downcast eyes
+she passed on.  For long Helen had cherished a fond hope that
+she might be married in Paradise Park, where she had fallen
+in love with Dale and had realized herself.  But she had kept
+that hope secret.  Dale's eager tone, his flashing eyes, had
+made her feel that her secret was there in her telltale
+face.
+
+As she entered the lane leading to the house she encountered
+one of the new stable-boys driving a pack-mule.
+
+"Jim, whose pack is that?" she asked.
+
+"Ma'am, I dunno, but I heard him tell Roy he reckoned his
+name was mud," replied the boy, smiling.
+
+Helen's heart gave a quick throb.  That sounded like Las
+Vegas.  She hurried on, and upon entering the courtyard she
+espied Roy Beeman holding the halter of a beautiful,
+wild-looking mustang.  There was another horse with another
+man, who was in the act of dismounting on the far side.  When
+he stepped into better view Helen recognized Las Vegas.  And
+he saw her at the same instant.
+
+Helen did not look up again until she was near the porch.
+She had dreaded this meeting, yet she was so glad that she
+could have cried aloud.
+
+"Miss Helen, I shore am glad to see you," he said, standing
+bareheaded before her, the same young, frank-faced cowboy
+she had seen first from the train.
+
+"Tom!" she exclaimed, and offered her hands.
+
+He wrung them hard while he looked at her.  The swift woman's
+glance Helen gave in return seemed to drive something dark
+and doubtful out of her heart.  This was the same boy she had
+known -- whom she had liked so well -- who had won her
+sister's love.  Helen imagined facing him thus was like
+awakening from a vague nightmare of doubt.  Carmichael's face
+was clean, fresh, young, with its healthy tan; it wore the
+old glad smile, cool, easy, and natural; his eyes were like
+Dale's -- penetrating, clear as crystal, without a shadow.
+What had evil, drink, blood, to do with the real inherent
+nobility of this splendid specimen of Western hardihood?
+Wherever he had been, whatever he had done during that long
+absence, he had returned long separated from that wild and
+savage character she could now forget.  Perhaps there would
+never again be call for it.
+
+"How's my girl?" he asked, just as naturally as if he had
+been gone a few days on some errand of his employer's.
+
+"Bo?  Oh, she's well -- fine.  I -- I rather think she'll be
+glad to see you," replied Helen, warmly.
+
+"An' how's thet big Indian, Dale?" he drawled.
+
+"Well, too -- I'm sure."
+
+"Reckon I got back heah in time to see you-all married?"
+
+"I -- I assure you I -- no one around here has been married
+yet," replied Helen, with a blush.
+
+"Thet shore is fine.  Was some worried," he said, lazily.
+"I've been chasin' wild hosses over in New Mexico, an' I got
+after this heah blue roan.  He kept me chasin' him fer a
+spell.  I've fetched him back for Bo."
+
+Helen looked at the mustang Roy was holding, to be instantly
+delighted.  He was a roan almost blue in color, neither large
+nor heavy, but powerfully built, clean-limbed, and racy,
+with a long mane and tail, black as coal, and a beautiful
+head that made Helen love him at once.
+
+"Well, I'm jealous," declared Helen, archly.  "I never did
+see such a pony."
+
+"I reckoned you'd never ride any hoss but Ranger," said Las
+Vegas.
+
+"No, I never will.  But I can be jealous, anyhow, can't I?"
+
+"Shore.  An I reckon if you say you're goin' to have him --
+wal, Bo 'd be funny," he drawled.
+
+"I reckon she would be funny," retorted Helen.  She was so
+happy that she imitated his speech.  She wanted to hug him.
+It was too good to be true -- the return of this cowboy.  He
+understood her.  He had come back with nothing that could
+alienate her.  He had apparently forgotten the terrible role
+he had accepted and the doom he had meted out to her
+enemies.  That moment was wonderful for Helen in its
+revelation of the strange significance of the West as
+embodied in this cowboy.  He was great.  But he did not know
+that.
+
+Then the door of the living-room opened, and a sweet, high
+voice pealed out:
+
+"Roy!  Oh, what a mustang!  Whose is he?"
+
+"Wal, Bo, if all I hear is so he belongs to you," replied
+Roy with a huge grin.
+
+Bo appeared in the door.  She stepped out upon the porch.  She
+saw the cowboy.  The excited flash of her pretty face
+vanished as she paled.
+
+"Bo, I shore am glad to see you," drawled Las Vegas, as he
+stepped forward, sombrero in hand.  Helen could not see any
+sign of confusion in him.  But, indeed, she saw gladness.
+Then she expected to behold Bo run right into the cowboys's
+arms.  It appeared, however, that she was doomed to
+disappointment.
+
+"Tom, I'm glad to see you," she replied.
+
+They shook hands as old friends.
+
+"You're lookin' right fine," he said.
+
+"Oh, I'm well. . . .  And how have you been these six
+months?" she queried.
+
+"Reckon I though it was longer," he drawled.  "Wal, I'm
+pretty tip-top now, but I was laid up with heart trouble for
+a spell."
+
+"Heart trouble?" she echoed, dubiously.
+
+"Shore. . . .  I ate too much over heah in New Mexico."
+
+"It's no news to me -- where your heart's located," laughed
+Bo.  Then she ran off the porch to see the blue mustang.  She
+walked round and round him, clasping her hands in sheer
+delight.
+
+"Bo, he's a plumb dandy," said Roy.  "Never seen a prettier
+hoss.  He'll run like a streak.  An' he's got good eyes.  He'll
+be a pet some day.  But I reckon he'll always be spunky."
+
+"Bo ventured to step closer, and at last got a hand on the
+mustang, and then another.  She smoothed his quivering neck
+and called softly to him, until he submitted to her hold.
+
+"What's his name?" she asked.
+
+"Blue somethin' or other," replied Roy.
+
+"Tom, has my new mustang a name?" asked Bo, turning to the
+cowboy.
+
+"Shore."
+
+"What then?"
+
+"Wal, I named him Blue-Bo," answered Las Vegas, with a
+smile.
+
+"Blue-Boy?"
+
+"Nope.  He's named after you.  An' I chased him, roped him,
+broke him all myself."
+
+"Very well.  Blue-Bo he is, then. . . .  And he's a wonderful
+darling horse.  Oh, Nell, just look at him. . . .  Tom, I
+can't thank you enough."
+
+"Reckon I don't want any thanks," drawled the cowboy.  "But
+see heah, Bo, you shore got to live up to conditions before
+you ride him."
+
+"What!" exclaimed Bo, who was startled by his slow, cool,
+meaning tone, of voice.
+
+Helen delighted in looking at Las Vegas then.  He had never
+appeared to better advantage.  So cool, careless, and
+assured!  He seemed master of a situation in which his terms
+must be accepted.  Yet he might have been actuated by a
+cowboy motive beyond the power of Helen to divine.
+
+"Bo Rayner," drawled Las Vegas, "thet blue mustang will be
+yours, an' you can ride him -- when you're MRS.  TOM
+CARMICHAEL!"
+
+Never had he spoken a softer, more drawling speech, nor
+gazed at Bo more mildly.  Roy seemed thunderstruck.  Helen
+endeavored heroically to restrain her delicious, bursting
+glee.  Bo's wide eyes stared at her lover -- darkened --
+dilated.  Suddenly she left the mustang to confront the
+cowboy where he lounged on the porch steps.
+
+"Do you mean that?" she cried.
+
+"Shore do."
+
+"Bah!  It's only a magnificent bluff," she retorted.  "You're
+only in fun.  It's your -- your darned nerve!"
+
+"Why, Bo," began Las Vegas, reproachfully.  "You shore know
+I'm not the four-flusher kind.  Never got away with a bluff
+in my life!  An' I'm jest in daid earnest aboot this heah."
+
+All the same, signs were not wanting in his mobile face that
+he was almost unable to restrain his mirth.
+
+Helen realized then that Bo saw through the cowboy -- that
+the ultimatum was only one of his tricks.
+
+"It IS a bluff and I CALL you!" declared Bo, ringingly.
+
+Las Vegas suddenly awoke to consequences.  He essayed to
+speak, but she was so wonderful then, so white and
+blazing-eyed, that he was stricken mute.
+
+"I'll ride Blue-Bo this afternoon," deliberately stated the
+girl.
+
+Las Vegas had wit enough to grasp her meaning, and he seemed
+about to collapse.
+
+"Very well, you can make me Mrs.  Tom Carmichael to-day --
+this morning -- just before dinner. . . .  Go get a preacher
+to marry us -- and make yourself look a more presentable
+bridegroom -- UNLESS IT WAS ONLY A BLUFF!"
+
+Her imperiousness changed as the tremendous portent of her
+words seemed to make Las Vegas a blank, stone image of a
+man.  With a wild-rose color suffusing her face, she swiftly
+bent over him, kissed him, and flashed away into the house.
+Her laugh pealed back, and it thrilled Helen, so deep and
+strange was it for the wilful sister, so wild and merry and
+full of joy.
+
+It was then that Roy Beeman recovered from his paralysis, to
+let out such a roar of mirth as to frighten the horses.
+Helen was laughing, and crying, too, but laughing mostly.
+Las Vegas Carmichael was a sight for the gods to behold.
+Bo's kiss had unclamped what had bound him.  The sudden
+truth, undeniable, insupportable, glorious, made him a
+madman.
+
+"Bluff -- she called me -- ride Blue-Bo saf'ternoon!" he
+raved, reaching wildly for Helen.  "Mrs.  -- Tom -- Carmichael
+-- before dinner -- preacher -- presentable bridegroom!  . .
+.  Aw!  I'm drunk again!  I -- who swore off forever!"
+
+"No, Tom, you're just happy," said Helen.
+
+Between her and Roy the cowboy was at length persuaded to
+accept the situation and to see his wonderful opportunity.
+
+"Now -- now, Miss Helen -- what'd Bo mean by pre --
+presentable bridegroom?  . . .  Presents?  Lord, I'm clean
+busted flat!"
+
+"She meant you must dress up in your best, of course,"
+replied Helen.
+
+"Where 'n earth will I get a preacher?  . . .  Show Down's
+forty miles. . . .  Can't ride there in time. . . .  Roy, I've
+gotta have a preacher. . . .  Life or death deal fer me."
+
+"Wal, old man, if you'll brace up I'll marry you to Bo,"
+said Roy, with his glad grin.
+
+"Aw!" gasped Las Vegas, as if at the coming of a sudden
+beautiful hope.
+
+"Tom, I'm a preacher," replied Roy, now earnestly.  "You
+didn't know thet, but I am.  An' I can marry you an' Bo as
+good as any one, an' tighter 'n most."
+
+Las Vegas reached for his friend as a drowning man might
+have reached for solid rock.
+
+"Roy, can you really marry them -- with my Bible -- and the
+service of my church?" asked Helen, a happy hope flushing
+her face.
+
+"Wal, indeed I can.  I've married more 'n one couple whose
+religion wasn't mine."
+
+"B-b-before -- d-d-din-ner!" burst out Las Vegas, like a
+stuttering idiot.
+
+"I reckon.  Come on, now, an' make yourself pre-senttible,"
+said Roy.  "Miss Helen, you tell Bo thet it's all settled."
+
+He picked up the halter on the blue mustang and turned away
+toward the corrals.  Las Vegas put the bridle of his horse
+over his arm, and seemed to be following in a trance, with
+his dazed, rapt face held high.
+
+"Bring Dale," called Helen, softly after them.
+
+
+So it came about as naturally as it was wonderful that Bo
+rode the blue mustang before the afternoon ended.
+
+Las Vegas disobeyed his first orders from Mrs.  Tom
+Carmichael and rode out after her toward the green-rising
+range.  Helen seemed impelled to follow.  She did not need to
+ask Dale the second time.  They rode swiftly, but never
+caught up with Bo and Las Vegas, whose riding resembled
+their happiness.
+
+Dale read Helen's mind, or else his own thoughts were in
+harmony with hers, for he always seemed to speak what she
+was thinking.  And as they rode homeward he asked her in his
+quiet way if they could not spare a few days to visit his
+old camp.
+
+"And take Bo -- and Tom?  Oh, of all things I'd like to'" she
+replied.
+
+"Yes -- an' Roy, too," added Dale, significantly.
+
+"Of course," said Helen, lightly, as if she had not caught
+his meaning.  But she turned her eyes away, while her heart
+thumped disgracefully and all her body was aglow.  "Will Tom
+and Bo go?"
+
+"It was Tom who got me to ask you," replied Dale.  "John an'
+Hal can look after the men while we're gone."
+
+"Oh -- so Tom put it in your head?  I guess -- maybe -- I
+won't go."
+
+"It is always in my mind, Nell," he said, with his slow
+seriousness.  "I'm goin' to work all my life for you.  But
+I'll want to an' need to go back to the woods often. . . .
+An' if you ever stoop to marry me -- an' make me the richest
+of men -- you'll have to marry me up there where I fell in
+love with you."
+
+"Ah!  Did Las Vegas Tom Carmichael say that, too?" inquired
+Helen, softly.
+
+"Nell, do you want to know what Las Vegas said?"
+
+"By all means."
+
+"He said this -- an' not an hour ago.  'Milt, old hoss, let
+me give you a hunch.  I'm a man of family now -- an' I've
+been a devil with the wimmen in my day.  I can see through
+'em.  Don't marry Nell Rayner in or near the house where I
+killed Beasley.  She'd remember.  An' don't let her remember
+thet day.  Go off into the woods.  Paradise Park!  Bo an' me
+will go with you."
+
+Helen gave him her hand, while they walked the horses
+homeward in the long sunset shadows.  In the fullness of that
+happy hour she had time for a grateful wonder at the keen
+penetration of the cowboy Carmichael.  Dale had saved her
+life, but it was Las Vegas who had saved her happiness.
+
+
+Not many days later, when again the afternoon shadows were
+slanting low, Helen rode out upon the promontory where the
+dim trail zigzagged far above Paradise Park.
+
+Roy was singing as he drove the pack-burros down the slope;
+Bo and Las Vegas were trying to ride the trail two abreast,
+so they could hold hands; Dale had dismounted to stand
+beside Helen's horse, as she gazed down the shaggy black
+slopes to the beautiful wild park with its gray meadows and
+shining ribbons of brooks.
+
+It was July, and there were no golden-red glorious flames
+and blazes of color such as lingered in Helen's memory.
+Black spruce slopes and green pines and white streaks of
+aspens and lacy waterfall of foam and dark outcroppings of
+rock-these colors and forms greeted her gaze with all the
+old enchantment.  Wildness, beauty, and loneliness were
+there, the same as ever, immutable, like the spirit of those
+heights.
+
+Helen would fain have lingered longer, but the others
+called, and Ranger impatiently snorted his sense of the
+grass and water far below.  And she knew that when she
+climbed there again to the wide outlook she would be another
+woman.
+
+"Nell, come on," said Dale, as he led on.  "It's better to
+look up."
+
+
+The sun had just sunk behind the ragged fringe of
+mountain-rim when those three strong and efficient men of
+the open had pitched camp and had prepared a bountiful
+supper.  Then Roy Beeman took out the little worn Bible which
+Helen had given him to use when he married Bo, and as he
+opened it a light changed his dark face.
+
+"Come, Helen an' Dale," he said.
+
+They arose to stand before him.  And he married them there
+under the great, stately pines, with the fragrant blue smoke
+curling upward, and the wind singing through the branches,
+while the waterfall murmured its low, soft, dreamy music,
+and from the dark slope came the wild, lonely cry of a wolf,
+full of the hunger for life and a mate.
+
+"Let us pray," said Roy, as he closed the Bible, and knelt
+with them.
+
+"There is only one God, an' Him I beseech in my humble
+office for the woman an' man I have just wedded in holy
+bonds.  Bless them an' watch them an' keep them through all
+the comin' years.  Bless the sons of this strong man of the
+woods an' make them like him, with love an' understandin' of
+the source from which life comes.  Bless the daughters of
+this woman an' send with them more of her love an' soul,
+which must be the softenin' an' the salvation of the hard
+West.  0 Lord, blaze the dim, dark trail for them through the
+unknown forest of life!  0 Lord, lead the way across the
+naked range of the future no mortal knows!  We ask in Thy
+name!  Amen."
+
+When the preacher stood up again and raised the couple from
+their kneeling posture, it seemed that a grave and solemn
+personage had left him.  This young man was again the
+dark-faced, clear-eyed Roy, droll and dry, with the
+enigmatic smile on his lips.
+
+"Mrs.  Dale," he said, taking her hands, "I wish you joy. . .
+.  An' now, after this here, my crownin' service in your
+behalf -- I reckon I'll claim a reward."
+
+Then he kissed her.  Bo came next with her warm and loving
+felicitations, and the cowboy, with characteristic action,
+also made at Helen.
+
+"Nell, shore it's the only chance I'll ever have to kiss
+you," he drawled.  "Because when this heah big Indian once
+finds out what kissin' is -- !"
+
+Las Vegas then proved how swift and hearty he could be upon
+occasions.  All this left Helen red and confused and
+unutterably happy.  She appreciated Dale's state.  His eyes
+reflected the precious treasure which manifestly he saw, but
+realization of ownership had not yet become demonstrable.
+
+Then with gay speech and happy laugh and silent look these
+five partook of the supper.  When it was finished Roy made
+known his intention to leave.  They all protested and coaxed,
+but to no avail.  He only laughed and went on saddling his
+horse.
+
+"Roy, please stay," implored Helen.  "The day's almost ended.
+You're tired."
+
+"Nope.  I'll never be no third party when there's only two."
+
+"But there are four of us."
+
+"Didn't I just make you an' Dale one?  . . .  An', Mrs.  Dale,
+you forget I've been married more 'n once."
+
+Helen found herself confronted by an unanswerable side of
+the argument.  Las Vegas rolled on the grass in his mirth.
+Dale looked strange.
+
+"Roy, then that's why you're so nice," said Bo, with a
+little devil in her eyes.  "Do you know I had my mind made up
+if Tom hadn't come around I was going to make up to you,
+Roy. . . .  I sure was.  What number wife would I have been?"
+
+It always took Bo to turn the tables on anybody.  Roy looked
+mightily embarrassed.  And the laugh was on him.  He did not
+face them again until he had mounted.
+
+"Las Vegas, I've done my best for you -- hitched you to thet
+blue-eyed girl the best I know how," he declared.  "But I
+shore ain't guaranteein' nothin'.  You'd better build a
+corral for her."
+
+"Why, Roy, you shore don't savvy the way to break these wild
+ones," drawled Las Vegas.  "Bo will be eatin' out of my hand
+in about a week."
+
+Bo's blue eyes expressed an eloquent doubt as to this
+extraordinary claim.
+
+"Good-by, friends," said Roy, and rode away to disappear in
+the spruces.
+
+Thereupon Bo and Las Vegas forgot Roy, and Dale and Helen,
+the camp chores to be done, and everything else except
+themselves.  Helen's first wifely duty was to insist that she
+should and could and would help her husband with the work of
+cleaning up after the sumptuous supper.  Before they had
+finished a sound startled them.  It came from Roy, evidently
+high on the darkening slope, and was a long, mellow pealing
+halloo, that rang on the cool air, burst the dreamy silence,
+and rapped across from slope to slope and cliff to cliff, to
+lose its power and die away hauntingly in the distant
+recesses.
+
+Dale shook his head as if he did not care to attempt a reply
+to that beautiful call.  Silence once again enfolded the
+park, and twilight seemed to be born of the air, drifting
+downward.
+
+"Nell, do you miss anythin'?" asked Dale.
+
+"No.  Nothing in all the world," she murmured.  "I am happier
+than I ever dared pray to be."
+
+"I don't mean people or things.  I mean my pets."
+
+"Ah!  I had forgotten. . . .  Milt, where are they?"
+
+"Gone back to the wild," he said.  "They had to live in my
+absence.  An' I've been away long."
+
+Just then the brooding silence, with its soft murmur of
+falling water and faint sigh of wind in the pines, was
+broken by a piercing scream, high, quivering, like that of a
+woman in exquisite agony.
+
+"That's Tom!" exclaimed Dale.
+
+"Oh -- I was so -- so frightened!" whispered Helen.
+
+Bo came running, with Las Vegas at her heels.
+
+"Milt, that was your tame cougar," cried Bo, excitedly.  "Oh,
+I'll never forget him!  I'll hear those cries in my dreams!"
+
+"Yes, it was Tom," said Dale, thoughtfully.  "But I never
+heard him cry just like that."
+
+"Oh, call him in!"
+
+Dale whistled and called, but Tom did not come.  Then the
+hunter stalked off in the gloom to call from different
+points under the slope.  After a while be returned without
+the cougar.  And at that moment, from far up the dark ravine,
+drifted down the same wild cry, only changed by distance,
+strange and tragic in its meaning.
+"He scented us.  He remembers.  But he'll never come back,"
+said Dale.
+
+
+Helen felt stirred anew with the convictions of Dale's deep
+knowledge of life and nature.  And her imagination seemed to
+have wings.  How full and perfect her trust, her happiness in
+the realization that her love and her future, her children,
+and perhaps grandchildren, would come under the guidance of
+such a man!  Only a little had she begun to comprehend the
+secrets of good and ill in their relation to the laws of
+nature.  Ages before men had lived on the earth there had
+been the creatures of the wilderness, and the holes of the
+rocks, and the nests of the trees, and rain, frost, heat,
+dew, sunlight and night, storm and calm, the honey of the
+wildflower and the instinct of the bee -- all the beautiful
+and multiple forms of life with their inscrutable design.  To
+know something of them and to love them was to be close to
+the kingdom of earth -- perhaps to the greater kingdom of
+heaven.  For whatever breathed and moved was a part of that
+creation.  The coo of the dove, the lichen on the mossy rock,
+the mourn of a hunting wolf, and the murmur of the
+waterfall, the ever-green and growing tips of the spruces,
+and the thunderbolts along the battlements of the heights --
+these one and all must be actuated by the great spirit --
+that incalculable thing in the universe which had produced
+man and soul.
+
+And there in the starlight, under the wide-gnarled pines,
+sighing low with the wind, Helen sat with Dale on the old
+stone that an avalanche of a million years past had flung
+from the rampart above to serve as camp-table and bench for
+lovers in the wilderness; the sweet scent of spruce mingled
+with the fragrance of wood-smoke blown in their faces.  How
+white the stars, and calm and true!  How they blazed their
+single task!  A coyote yelped off on the south slope, dark
+now as midnight.  A bit of weathered rock rolled and tapped
+from shelf to shelf.  And the wind moaned.  Helen felt all the
+sadness and mystery and nobility of this lonely fastness,
+and full on her heart rested the supreme consciousness that
+all would some day be well with the troubled world beyond.
+
+"Nell, I'll homestead this park," said Dale.  "Then it'll
+always be ours."
+
+"Homestead!  What's that?" murmured Helen, dreamily.  The word
+sounded sweet.
+
+"The government will give land to men who locate an' build,"
+replied Dale.  "We'll run up a log cabin."
+
+"And come here often. . . .  Paradise Park!" whispered Helen.
+
+Dale's first kisses were on her lips then, hard and cool and
+clean, like the life of the man, singularly exalting to her,
+completing her woman's strange and unutterable joy of the
+hour, and rendering her mute.
+
+Bo's melodious laugh, and her voice with its old mockery of
+torment, drifted softly on the night breeze.  And the
+cowboy's "Aw, Bo," drawling his reproach and longing, was
+all that the tranquil, waiting silence needed.
+
+Paradise Park was living again one of its romances.  Love was
+no stranger to that lonely fastness.  Helen heard in the
+whisper of the wind through the pine the old-earth story,
+beautiful, ever new, and yet eternal.  She thrilled to her
+depths.  The spar-pointed spruces stood up black and clear
+against the noble stars.  All that vast solitude breathed and
+waited, charged full with its secret, ready to reveal itself
+to her tremulous soul.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Man of the Forest, by Zane Grey
+