Dick went up a draw, where young pines huddled together in the trough; and from the upper end of this he emerged upon a steep ridge, eyes and ears alert for the least sign of human presence. A third shot had rung out while he was in the dense mass of foliage of the evergreens, but now silence lay heavy all about him. The gathering darkness blurred detail, so that any one of a dozen bowlders might be a shield for a crouching man.

Once, nerves at a wire edge from the strain on him, he thought he saw a moving figure. Throwing up his gun, he fired quickly. But he must have been mistaken, for, shortly afterward, he heard some one crashing through dead brush at a distance.

"He's on the run, whoever he is. Guess I'll get back to Steve," decided France wisely.

He found his friend stretched on the ground, with his head in Arlie's lap.

"Is it very bad?" he asked the girl.

"I don't know. There's no light. Whatever shall we do?" she moaned.

"I'm a right smart of a nuisance, ain't I?" drawled the wounded man unexpectedly.

She leaned forward quickly. "Where are you hit?"

"In the shoulder, ma'am."

"Can you ride, Steve? Do you reckon you could make out the five miles?" Dick asked.

Arlie answered for him. She had felt the inert weight of his heavy body and knew that he was beyond helping himself. "No. Is there no house near? There's Alec Howard's cabin."

"He's at the round-up, but I guess we had better take Steve there— if we could make out to get him that far."

The girl took command quietly. "Unsaddle Teddy."

She had unloosened his shirt and was tying her silk kerchief over the wound, from which blood was coming in little jets.

"We can't carry him," she decided. "It's too far. We'll have to lift him to the back of the horse, and let him lie there. Steady, Dick. That's right. You must hold him on, while I lead the horse."

Heavy as he was, they somehow hoisted him, and started. He had fainted again, and hung limply, with his face buried in the mane of the pony. It seemed an age before the cabin loomed, shadow-like, out of the darkness. They found the door unlocked, as usual, and carried him in to the bed.

"Give me your knife, Dick," Arlie ordered quietly. "And I want water. If that's a towel over there, bring it."

"Just a moment. I'll strike a light, and we'll see where we're at."

"No. We'll have to work in the dark. A light might bring them down on us." She had been cutting the band of the shirt, and now ripped it so as to expose the wounded shoulder.

Dick took a bucket to the creek, and presently returned with it. In his right hand he carried his revolver. When he reached the cabin he gave an audible sigh of relief and quickly locked the door.

"Of course you'll have to go for help, Dick. Bring old Doc Lee."

"Why, Arlie, I can't leave you here alone. What are you talking about?"

"You'll have to. It's the only thing to do. You'll have to give me your revolver. And, oh, Dick, don't lose a moment on the way."

He was plainly troubled. "I just can't leave you here alone, girl. What would your father say if anything happened? I don't reckon anything will, but we can't tell. No, I'll stay here, too. Steve must take his chance."

"You'll not stay." She flamed round upon him, with the fierce passion of a tigress fighting for her young. "You'll go this minute— this very minute!"

"But don't you see I oughtn't to leave you? Anybody would tell you that," he pleaded.

"And you call yourself his friend," she cried, in a low, bitter voice.

"I call myself yours, too," he made answer doggedly.

"Then go. Go this instant. You'll go, anyway; but if you're my friend, you'll go gladly, and bring help to save us both."

"I wisht I knew what to do," he groaned.

Her palms fastened on his shoulders. She was a creature transformed. Such bravery, such feminine ferocity, such a burning passion of the spirit, was altogether outside of his experience of her or any other woman. He could no more resist her than he could fly to the top of Bald Knob.

"I'll go, Arlie."

"And bring help soon. Get Doc Lee here soon as you can. Leave word for armed men to follow. Don't wait for them."

"No."

"Take his Teddy horse. It can cover ground faster than yours,"

"Yes."

With plain misgivings, he left her, and presently she heard the sound of his galloping horse. It seemed to her for a moment as if she must call him back, but she strangled the cry in her throat. She locked the door and bolted it, then turned back to the bed, upon which the wounded man was beginning to moan in his delirium.

CHAPTER X

DOC LEE

Arlie knew nothing of wounds or their treatment. All she could do was to wash the shoulder in cold water and bind it with strips torn from her white underskirt. When his face and hands grew hot with the fever, she bathed them with a wet towel. How badly he was hurt— whether he might not even die before Dick's return— she had no way of telling. His inconsequent babble at first frightened her, for she had never before seen a person in delirium, nor heard of the insistence with which one harps upon some fantasy seized upon by a diseased mind.

"She thinks you're a skunk, Steve. So you are. She's dead right— dead right— dead right. You lied to her, you coyote! Stand up in the corner, you liar, while she whangs at you with a six-gun! You're a skunk— dead right."

So he would run on in a variation of monotony, the strong, supple, masterful man as helpless as a child, all the splendid virility stricken from him by the pressure of an enemy's finger. The eyes that she had known so full of expression, now like half-scabbarded steel, and now again bubbling from the inner mirth of him, were glazed and unmeaning. The girl had felt in him a capacity for silent self-containment; and here he was, picking at the coverlet with restless fingers, prattling foolishly, like an infant.

She was a child of impulse, sensitive and plastic. Because she had been hard on him before he was struck down, her spirit ran open-armed to make amends. What manner of man he was she did not know. But what availed that to keep her, a creature of fire and dew, from the clutch of emotions strange and poignant? He had called himself a liar and a coyote, yet she knew it was not true, or at worst, true in some qualified sense. He might be hard, reckless, even wicked in some ways. But, vaguely, she felt that if he were a sinner he sinned with self-respect. He was in no moral collapse, at least. It was impossible to fit him to her conception of a spy. No, no! Anything but that!

So she sat there, her fingers laced about her knee, as she leaned forward to wait upon the needs she could imagine for him, the dumb tragedy of despair in her childish face.

The situation was one that made for terror. To be alone with a wounded man, his hurt undressed, to hear his delirium and not to know whether he might not die any minute— this would have been enough to cause apprehension. Add to it the darkness, her deep interest in him, the struggle of her soul, and the dread of unseen murder stalking in the silent night.

Though her thought was of him, it was not wholly upon him. She sat where she could watch the window, Dick's revolver in another chair beside her. It was a still, starry night, and faintly she could see the hazy purple, mountain line. Somewhere beneath those uncaring stars was the man who had done this awful thing. Was he far, or was he near? Would he come to make sure he had not failed? Her fearful heart told her that he would come.

She must have fought her fears nearly an hour before she heard the faintest of sounds outside. Her hand leaped to the revolver. She sat motionless, listening, with nerves taut. It came again presently, a deadened footfall, close to the door. Then, after an eternity, the latch clicked softly. Some one, with infinite care, was trying to discover whether the door was locked.

His next move she anticipated. Her eyes fastened on the window, while she waited breathlessly. Her heart was stammering furiously. Moments passed, in which she had to set her teeth to keep from screaming aloud. The revolver was shaking so that she had to steady the barrel with her left hand. A shadow crossed one pane, the shadow of a head in profile, and pushed itself forward till shoulders, arm, and poised revolver covered the lower sash. Very, very slowly the head itself crept into sight.

Arlie fired and screamed simultaneously. The thud of a fall, the scuffle of a man gathering himself to his feet again, the rush of retreating steps, all merged themselves in one single impression of fierce, exultant triumph.

Her only regret was that she had not killed him. She was not even sure that she had hit him, for her bullet had gone through the glass within an inch of the inner woodwork. Nevertheless, she knew that he had had a shock that would carry him far. Unless he had accomplices with him— and of that there had been no evidence at the time of the attack from Bald Knob— he would not venture another attempt. Of one thing she was sure. The face that had looked in at the window was one she had never seen before, In this, too, she found relief— for she knew now that the face she had expected to see follow the shadow over the pane had been that of Jed Briscoe; and Jed had too much of the courage of Lucifer incarnate in him to give up because an unexpected revolver had been fired in his face.

Time crept slowly, but it could hardly have been a quarter of an hour later that she heard the galloping of horses.

"It is Dick!" she cried joyfully, and, running to the door, she unbolted and unlocked it just as France dragged Teddy to a halt and flung himself to the ground.

The young man gave a shout of gladness at sight of her.

"Is it all right, Arlie?"

"Yes. That is— I don't know. He is delirious. A man came to the window, and I shot at him. Oh, Dick, I'm so glad you're back."

In her great joy, she put her arms round his neck and kissed him. Old Doctor Lee, dismounting more leisurely, drawled his protest.

"Look-a-here, Arlie. I'm the doctor. Where do I come in?"

"I'll kiss you, too, when you tell me he'll get well." The half-hysterical laugh died out of her voice, and she caught him fiercely by the arm. "Doc, doc, don't let him die," she begged.

He had known her all her life, had been by the bedside when she came into the world, and he put his arm round her shoulders and gave her a little hug as they passed into the room.

"We'll do our level best, little girl."

She lit a lamp, and drew the window curtain, so that none could see from the outside. While the old doctor arranged his instruments and bandages on chairs, she waited on him. He noticed how white she was, for he said, not unkindly:

"I don't want two patients right now, Arlie. If you're going to keel over in a faint right in the middle of it, I'll have Dick help."

"No, no, I won't, doc. Truly, I won't," she promised.

"All right, little girl. We'll see how game you are. Dick, hold the light. Hold it right there. See?"

The Texan had ceased talking, and was silent, except for a low moan, repeated at regular intervals. The doctor showed Arlie how to administer the anaesthetic after he had washed the wound. While he was searching for the bullet with his probe she flinched as if he had touched a bare nerve, but she stuck to her work regardless of her feelings, until the lead was found and extracted and the wound dressed.

Afterward, Dick found her seated on a rock outside crying hysterically. He did not attempt to cope with the situation, but returned to the house and told Lee.

"Best thing for her. Her nerves are overwrought and unstrung. She'll be all right, once she has her cry out. I'll drift around, and jolly her along."

The doctor presently came up and took a seat beside her.

"Wha— what do you think, doctor?" she sobbed.

"Well, I think it's tarnation hot operating with a big kerosene lamp six inches from your haid," he said, as he mopped his forehead.

"I mean— will he— get well?"

Lee snorted. "Well, I'd be ashamed of him if he didn't. If he lets a nice, clean, flesh wound put him out of business he don't deserve to live. Don't worry any about him, young lady. Say, I wish I had zwei beer right now, Arlie."

"You mean it? You're not just saying it to please me?"

"Of course, I mean it," he protested indignantly. "I wish I had three."

"I mean, are you sure he'll get well?" she explained, a faint smile touching her wan face.

"Yes, I mean that, too, but right now I mean the beer most. Now, honest, haven't I earned a beer?"

"You've earned a hundred thousand, doc. You're the kindest and dearest man that ever lived," she cried.

"Ain't that rather a large order, my dear?" he protested mildly. "I couldn't really use a hundred thousand. And I'd hate to be better than Job and Moses and Pharaoh and them Bible characters. Wouldn't I have to give up chewing? Somehow, a halo don't seem to fit my haid. It's most too bald to carry one graceful.... You may do that again if you want to." This last, apropos of the promised reward which had just been paid in full.

Arlie found she could manage a little laugh by this time.

"Well, if you ain't going to, we might as well go in and have a look at that false-alarm patient of ours," he continued. "We'll have to sit up all night with him. I was sixty-three yesterday. I'm going to quit this doctor game. I'm too old to go racing round the country nights just because you young folks enjoy shooting each other up. Yes, ma'am, I'm going to quit. I serve notice right here. What's the use of having a good ranch and some cattle if you can't enjoy them?"

As the doctor had been serving notice of his intention to quit doctoring for over ten years, Arlie did not take him too seriously. She knew him for what he was— a whimsical old fellow, who would drop in the saddle before he would let a patient suffer; one of the old school, who loved his work but liked to grumble over it.

"Maybe you'll be able to take a rest soon. You know that young doctor from Denver, who was talking about settling here——"

This, as she knew, was a sore point with him. "So you're tired of me, are you? Want a new-fangled appendix cutter from Denver, do you? Time to shove old Doc Lee aside, eh?"

"I didn't say that, doc," she repented.

"Huh! You meant it. Wonder how many times he'd get up at midnight and plow through three-foot snow for six miles to see the most ungrateful, squalling little brat——"

"Was it me, doc?" she ungrammatically demanded.

"It was you, Miss Impudence."

They had reached the door, but she held him there a moment, while she laughed delightedly and hugged him. "I knew it was me. As if we'd let our old doc go, or have anything to do with a young ignoramus from Denver! Didn't you know I was joking? Of course you did."

He still pretended severity. "Oh, I know you. When it comes to wheedling an old fool, you've got the rest of the girls in this valley beat to a fare-you-well."

"Is that why you always loved me?" she asked, with a sparkle of mischief in her eye.

"I didn't love you. I never did. The idea!" he snorted. "I don't know what you young giddy pates are coming to. Huh! Love you!"

"I'll forgive you, even if you did," she told him sweetly.

"That's it! That's it!" he barked. "You forgive all the young idiots when they do. And they all do— every last one of them. But I'm too old for you, young lady. Sixty-three yesterday. Huh!"

"I like you better than the younger ones."

"Want us all, do you? Young and old alike. Well, count me out."

He broke away, and went into the house. But there was an unconquerably youthful smile dancing in his eyes. This young lady and he had made love to each other in some such fashion ever since she had been a year old. He was a mellow and confirmed old bachelor, but he proposed to continue their innocent coquetry until he was laid away, no matter which of the young bucks of the valley had the good fortune to win her for a wife.

CHAPTER XI

THE FAT IN THE FIRE

For two days Fraser remained in the cabin of the stockman Howard, France making it his business to see that the place was never left unguarded for a moment. At the end of that time the fever had greatly abated, and he was doing so well that Doctor Lee decided it would be better to move him to the Dillon ranch for the convenience of all parties.

This was done, and the patient continued steadily to improve. His vigorous constitution, helped by the healthy, clean, outdoor life he had led, stood him in good stead. Day by day he renewed the blood he had lost. Soon he was eating prodigious dinners, and between meals was drinking milk with an egg beaten in it.

On a sunny forenoon, when he lay in the big window of the living room, reading a magazine, Arlie entered, a newspaper in her hand. Her eyes were strangely bright, even for her, and she had a manner of repressed excitement, Her face was almost colorless.

"Here's some more in the Avalanche about our adventure near Gimlet Butte," she told him, waving the paper.

"Nothing like keeping in the public eye," said Steve, grinning. "I don't reckon our little picnic at Bald Knob is likely to get in the Avalanche, though. It probably hasn't any correspondent at Lost Valley. Anyhow, I'm hoping not."

"Mr. Fraser, there is something in this paper I want you to explain. But tell me first when it was you shot this man Faulkner. I mean at just what time in the fight."

"Why, I reckon it must have been just before I ducked."

"That's funny, too." She fixed her direct, fearless gaze on him. "The evidence at the coroner's jury shows that it was in the early part of the fight he was shot, before father and I left you."

"No, that couldn't have been, Miss Arlie, because——"

"Because——" she prompted, smiling at him in a peculiar manner.

He flushed, and could only say that the newspapers were always getting things wrong.

"But this is the evidence at the coroner's inquest," she said, falling grave again on the instant. "I understand one thing now, very clearly, and that is that Faulkner was killed early in the fight, and the other man was wounded in the ankle near the finish."

He shook his head obstinately. "No, I reckon not."

"Yet it is true. What's more, you knew it all the time."

"You ce'tainly jump to conclusions, Miss Arlie."

"And you let them arrest you, without telling them the truth! And they came near lynching you! And there's a warrant out now for your arrest for the murder of Faulkner, while all the time I killed him, and you knew it!"

He gathered together his lame defense. "You run ahaid too fast for me, ma'am. Supposing he was hit while we were all there together, how was I to know who did it?"

"You knew it couldn't have been you, for he wasn't struck with a revolver. It couldn't have been dad, since he had his shotgun loaded with buckshot."

"What difference did it make?" he wanted to know impatiently. "Say I'd have explained till kingdom come that I borrowed the rifle from a friend five minutes after Faulkner was hit— would anybody have believed me? Would it have made a bit of difference?"

Her shining eyes were more eloquent than a thousand tongues. "I don't say it would, but there was always the chance. You didn't take it. You would have let them hang you, without speaking the word that brought me into it. Why?"

"I'm awful obstinate when I get my back up," he smiled.

"That wasn't it. You did it to save a girl you had never seen but once. I want to know why."

"All right. Have it your own way. But don't ask me to explain the whyfors. I'm no Harvard professor."

"I know," she said softly. She was not looking at him, but out of the window, and there were tears in her voice.

"Sho! Don't make too much of it. We'll let it go that I ain't all coyote, after all. But that don't entitle me to any reward of merit. Now, don't you cry, Miss Arlie. Don't you."

She choked back the tears, and spoke in deep self-scorn. "No! You don't deserve anything except what you've been getting from me— suspicion and distrust and hard words! You haven't done anything worth speaking of— just broke into a quarrel that wasn't yours, at the risk of your life; then took it on your shoulders to let us escape; and, afterward, when you were captured, refused to drag me in, because I happen to be a girl! But it's not worth mentioning that you did all this for strangers, and that later you did not tell even me, because you knew it would trouble me that I had killed him, though in self-defense. And to think that all the time I've been full of hateful suspicions about you! Oh, you don't know how I despise myself!"

She let her head fall upon her arm on the table, and sobbed.

Fraser, greatly disturbed, patted gently the heavy coil of blue-black hair.

"Now, don't you, Arlie; don't you. I ain't worth it. Honest, I ain't. I did what it was up to me to do. Not a thing more. Dick would have done it. Any of the boys would. Now, let's look at what you've done for me."

From under the arm a muffled voice insisted she had done nothing but suspect him.

"Hold on, girl. Play fair. First off you ride sixty miles to help me when I'm hunted right hard. You bring me to your home in this valley where strangers ain't over and above welcome just now. You learn I'm an officer and still you look out for me and fight for me, till you make friends for me. It's through you I get started right with the boys. On your say-so they give me the glad hand. You learn I've lied to you, and two or three hours later you save my life. You sit there steady, with my haid in your lap, while some one is plugging away at us. You get me to a house, take care of my wounds, and hold the fort alone in the night till help comes. Not only that, but you drive my enemy away. Later, you bring me home, and nurse me like I was a long-lost brother. What I did for you ain't in the same class with what you've done for me."

"But I was suspicious of you all the time."

"So you had a right to be. That ain't the point, which is that a girl did all that for a man she thought might be an enemy and a low-down spy. Men are expected to take chances like I did, but girls ain't. You took 'em. If I lived a thousand years, I couldn't tell you all the thanks I feel."

"Ah! It makes it worse that you're that kind of a man. But I'm going to show you whether I trust you." Her eyes were filled with the glad light of her resolve. She spoke with a sort of proud humility. "Do you know, there was a time when I thought you might have— I didn't really believe it, but I thought it just possible— that you might have come here to get evidence against the Squaw Creek raiders? You'll despise me, but it's the truth."

His face lost color. "And now?" he asked quietly.

"Now? I would as soon suspect my father— or myself! I'll show you what I think. The men in it were Jed Briscoe and Yorky and Dick France "Stop," he cried hoarsely.

"Is it your wound?" she said quickly.

"No. That's all right. But you musn't tell——"

"I'm telling, to show whether I trust you. Jed and Yorky and Dick and Slim——"

She stopped to listen. Her father's voice was calling her. She rose from her seat.

"Wait a moment. There's something I've got to tell you," the Texan groaned.

"I'll be back in a moment. Dad wants to see me about some letters."

And with that she was gone. Whatever the business was, it detained her longer than she expected. The minutes slipped away, and still she did not return. A step sounded in the hall, a door opened, and Jed Briscoe stood before him.

"You're here, are you?" he said.

The Texan measured looks with him. "Yes, I'm here."

"Grand-standing still, I reckon."

"If you could only learn to mind your own affairs," the Texan suggested evenly.

"You'll wish I could before I'm through with you."

"Am I to thank you for that little courtesy from Bald Knob the other evening?"

"Not directly. At three hundred yards, I could have shot a heap straighter than that. The fool must have been drunk."

"You'll have to excuse him. It was beginning to get dark. His intentions were good."

There was a quick light step behind him, and Arlie came into the room. She glanced quickly from one to the other, and there was apprehension in her look.

"I've come to see Lieutenant Fraser on business," Briscoe explained, with an air patently triumphant.

Arlie made no offer to leave the room. "He's hardly up to business yet, is he?" she asked, as carelessly as she could.

"Then we'll give it another name. I'm making a neighborly call to ask how he is, and to return some things he lost."

Jed's hand went into his pocket and drew forth leisurely a photograph. This he handed to Arlie right side up, smiling the while, with a kind of masked deviltry.

"Found it in Alec Howard's cabin. Seems your coat was hanging over the back of a chair, lieutenant, and this and a paper fell out. One of the boys must have kicked it to one side, and it was overlooked. Later, I ran across it. So I'm bringing it back to you."

In spite of herself Arlie's eyes fell to the photograph. It was a snapshot of the ranger and a very attractive young woman. They were smiling into each other's eyes with a manner of perfect and friendly understanding. To see it gave Arlie a pang. Flushing at her mistake, she turned the card over and handed it to the owner.

"Sorry. I looked without thinking," she said in a low voice.

Fraser nodded his acceptance of her apology, but his words and his eyes were for his enemy. "You mentioned something else you had found, seems to me."

Behind drooping eyelids Jed was malevolently feline. "Seems to me I did."

From his pocket came slowly a folded paper. He opened and looked it over at leisure before his mocking eyes lifted again to the wounded man. "This belongs to you, too, but I know you'll excuse me if I keep it to show to the boys before returning it."

"So you've read it," Arlie broke in scornfully.

He grinned at her, and nodded. "Yes, I've read it, my dear. I had to read it, to find out whose it was. Taken by and large, it's a right interesting document, too."

He smiled at the ranger maliciously, yet with a certain catlike pleasure in tormenting his victim. Arlie began to feel a tightening of her throat, a sinking of the heart. But Fraser looked at the man with a quiet, scornful steadfastness. He knew what was coming, and had decided upon his course.

"Seems to be a kind of map, lieutenant. Here's Gimlet Butte and the Half Way House and Sweetwater Dam and the blasted pine. Looks like it might be a map from the Butte to this part of the country. Eh, Mr. Fraser from Texas?"

"And if it is?"

"Then I should have to ask you how you come by it, seeing as the map is drawn on Sheriff Brandt's official stationery," Jed rasped swiftly.

"I got it from Sheriff Brandt, Mr. Briscoe, since you want to know. You're not entitled to the information, but I'll make you a gift of it. He gave it to me to guide me here."

Even Briscoe was taken aback. He had expected evasion, denial, anything but a bold acceptance of his challenge. His foe watched the wariness settle upon him by the narrowing of his eyes.

"So the sheriff knew you were coming?"

"Yes."

"I thought you broke jail. That was the story I had dished up to me."

"I did, with the help of the sheriff."

"Oh, with the help of the sheriff? Come to think of it, that sounds right funny— a sheriff helping his prisoner to escape."

"Yet it is true, as it happens."

"I don't doubt it, lieutenant. Fact is, I had some such notion all the time. Now, I wonder why-for he took so friendly an interest in you."

"I had a letter of introduction to him from a friend in Texas. When he knew who I was, he decided he couldn't afford to have me lynched without trying to save me."

"I see. And the map?"

"This was the only part of the country in which I would be safe from capture. He knew I had a claim on some of the Cedar Mountain people, because it was to help them I had got into trouble."

"Yes, I can see that." Arlie nodded quickly. "Of course, that is just what the sheriff would think."

"Folks can always see what they want to, Arlie," Jed commented. "Now, I can't see all that, by a lot."

"It isn't necessary you should, Mr. Briscoe," Fraser retorted.

"Or else I see a good deal more, lieutenant," Jed returned, with his smooth smile. "Mebbe the sheriff helped you on your way because you're such a good detective. He's got ambitions, Brandt has. So has Hilliard, the prosecuting attorney. Happen to see him, by the way?"

"Yes."

Jed nodded. "I figured you had. Yes, it would be Hilliard worked the scheme out, I expect."

"You're a good deal of a detective yourself, Mr. Briscoe," the Texan laughed hardily. "Perhaps I could get you a job in the rangers."

"There may be a vacancy there soon," Jed agreed.

"What's the use of talking that way, Jed? Are you threatening Mr. Fraser? If anything happens to him, I'll remember this," Arlie told him.

"Have I mentioned any threats, Arlie? It is well known that Lieutenant Fraser has enemies here. It don't take a prophet to tell that, after what happened the other night."

"Any more than it takes a prophet to tell that you are one of them."

"I play my own hand. I don't lie down before him, or any other man. He'd better not get in my way, unless he's sure he's a better man than I am."

"But he isn't in your way," Arlie insisted. "He has told a plain story. I believe every word of it."

"I notice he didn't tell any of his plain story until we proved it on him. He comes through with his story after he's caught with the goods. Don't you know that every criminal that is caught has a smooth explanation?"

"I haven't any doubt Mr. Briscoe will have one when his turn comes," the ranger remarked.

Jed wheeled on him. His eyes glittered menace. "You've said one word too much. I'll give you forty-eight hours to get out of this valley."

"How dare you, Jed— and in my house!" Arlie cried. "I won't have it. I won't have blood shed between you."

"It's up to him," answered the cattleman, his jaw set like a vise. "Persuade him to git out, and there'll be no blood shed."

"You have no right to ask it of him. You ought not——" She stopped, aware of the futility of urging a moral consideration upon the man, and fell back upon the practical. "He couldn't travel that soon, even if he wanted to. He's not strong enough. You know that."

"All right. We'll call it a week. If he's still here a week from to-day, there will be trouble."

With that, he turned on his heel and left the room. They heard his spurs trailing across the porch and jingling down the steps, after which they caught a momentary vision of him, dark and sinister, as his horse flashed past the window.

The ranger smiled, but rather seriously. "The fat's in the fire now, sure enough, ma'am."

She turned anxiously upon him. "Why did you tell him all that? Why did you let him go away, believing you were here as a spy to trap him and his friends?"

"I let him have the truth. Anyhow, I couldn't have made good with a denial. He had the evidence. I can't keep him from believing what he wants to."

"He'll tell all his friends. He'll exaggerate the facts and stir up sentiment against you. He'll say you came here as a detective, to get evidence against the Squaw Creek raiders." "Then he'll tell the truth!"

She took it in slowly, with a gathering horror. "The truth!" she repeated, almost under her breath. "You don't mean—— You can't mean—— Are you here as a spy upon my friends?"

"I didn't know they were your friends when I took the job. If you'll listen, I'll explain."

Words burst from her in gathering bitterness.

"What is there to explain, sir? The facts cry to heaven. I brought you into this valley, gave you the freedom of our home against my father's first instinct. I introduced you to my friends, and no doubt they told you much you wanted to know. They are simple, honest folks, who don't know a spy when they see one. And I— fool that I am— I vouched for you. More, I stood between you and the fate you deserved. And, lastly, in my blind conceit, I have told you the names of the men in the Squaw Creek trouble. If I had only known— and I had all the evidence, but I was so blind I would not see you were a snake in the grass."

He put out a hand to stop her, and she drew back as if his touch were pollution. From the other side of the room, she looked across at him in bitter scorn.

"I shall make arrangements to have you taken out of the valley at once, sir."

"You needn't take the trouble, Miss Arlie. I'm not going out of the valley. If you'll have me taken to Alec Howard's shack, which is where you brought me from, I'll be under obligations to you."

"Whatever you are, I'm not going to have your blood on my hands. You've got to leave the valley."

"I have to thank you for all your kindness to me. If you'd extend it a trifle further and listen to what I've got to say, I'd be grateful."

"I don't care to hear your excuses. Go quickly, sir, before you meet the end you deserve, and give up the poor men I have betrayed to you." She spoke in a choked voice, as if she could scarce breathe.

"If you'd only listen before you——"

"I've listened to you too long. I was so sure I knew more than my father, than my friends. I'll listen no more."

The Texan gave it up. "All right, ma'am. Just as you say. If you'll order some kind of a rig for me, I'll not trouble you longer. I'm sorry that it's got to be this way. Maybe some time you'll see it different."

"Never," she flashed passionately, and fled from the room.

He did not see her again before he left. Bobbie came to get him in a light road trap they had. The boy looked at him askance, as if he knew something was wrong. Presently they turned a corner and left the ranch shut from sight in a fold of the hills.

At the first division of the road Fraser came to a difference of opinion with Bobbie.

"Arlie said you was going to leave the valley. She told me I was to take you to Speed's place."

"She misunderstood. I am going to Alec Howard's."

"But that ain't what she told me."

Steve took the reins from him, and turned into the trail that led to Howard's place. "You can explain to her, Bobbie, that you couldn't make me see it that way."

An hour later, he descended upon Howard— a big, rawboned ranchman, who had succumbed quickly to a deep friendship for this "Admirable Crichton" of the plains.

"Hello, Steve! Glad to death to see you. Hope you've come to stay, you old pie eater," he cried joyously, at sight of the Texan.

Fraser got down. "Wait here a moment, Bobbie. I want to have a talk with Alec. I may go on with you."

They went into the cabin, and Fraser sat down. He was still far from strong.

"What's up, Steve?" the rancher asked.

"You asked me to stay, Alec. Before I say whether I will or not, I've got a story to tell you. After I've told it, you can ask me again if you want me to stop with you. If you don't ask me, I'll ride off with the boy."

"All right. Fire ahead, old hoss. I'll ask you fast enough."

The Texan told his story from the beginning. Only one thing he omitted— that Arlie had told him the name of the Squaw Creek raiders.

"There are the facts, Alec. You've got them from beginning to end. It's up to you. Do you want me here?"

"Before I answer that, I'll have to put a question myse'f, Steve. Why do you want to stay? Why not leave the valley while you're still able to?"

"Because Jed Briscoe put it up to me that I'd got to leave within a week. I'll go when I'm good and ready."

Alec nodded his appreciation of the point. "Sure. You don't want to sneak out, with yore tail betwixt yore laigs. That brings up another question, Steve. What about the Squaw Creek sheep raiders? Just for argument, we'll put it that some of them are my friends. You understand— just for argument. Are you still aiming to run them down?"

Fraser met his frank question frankly. "No, Alec, I've had to give up that notion long since— soon as I began to guess they were friends of Miss Arlie. I'm going back to tell Hilliard so. But I ain't going to be run out by Briscoe."

"Good enough. Put her there, son. This shack's yore home till hell freezes over, Steve."

"You haven't any doubts about me, Alec. If you have, better say so now."

"Doubts? I reckon not. Don't I know a man when I see one? I'm plumb surprised at Arlie." He strode to the door, and called to Bobbie: "Roll along home, son. Yore passenger is going to stay a spell with me."

"Of course, I understand what this means, Alec. Jed and his crowd aren't going to be any too well pleased when they learn you have taken me in. They may make you trouble," the ranger said.

The big cow man laughed. "Oh, cut it out, Steve. Jed don't have to O. K. my guest list. Not on yore life. I'm about ready for a ruction with that young man, anyway. He's too blamed bossy. I ain't wearing his brand. Fact is, I been having notions this valley has been suffering from too much Briscoe. Others are sharing that opinion with me. Ask Dick France. Ask Arlie, for that matter."

"I'm afraid I'm off that young lady's list of friends."

"Sho! She'll come round. She's some hot-haided. It always was her way to get mad first, and find out why afterward. But don't make any mistake about her, Steve. She's the salt of the earth, Arlie Dillon is. She figured it out you wasn't playing it quite on the square with her. Onct she's milled it around a spell, she'll see things different. I've knowed her since she was knee-high, and I tell you she's a game little thoroughbred."

The Texan looked at him a moment, then stared out of the window.

"We won't quarrel about that any, Alec. I'll indorse those sentiments, and then some, even if she did call me a snake in the grass."

CHAPTER XII

THE DANCE

The day after Fraser changed his quarters, Dick France rode up to the Howard ranch. Without alighting, he nodded casually to Alec, and then to his guest.

"Hello, Steve! How's the shoulder?"

"Fine and dandy."

"You moved, I see." The puncher grinned.

"If you see it for yourself, I'll not attempt to deny it."

"Being stood in the corner some more, looks like! Little Willie been telling some more lies?"

"Come in, Dick, and I'll put you wise."

Steve went over the story again. When he mentioned the Squaw Creek raid, he observed that his two friends looked quickly at each other and then away. He saw, however, that Dick took his pledge in regard to the raiders at face value, without the least question of doubt. He made only one comment on the situation.

"If Jed has served notice that he's going after you, Steve, he'll ce'tainly back the play. What's more, he won't be any too particular how he gets you, just so he gets you. He may come a-shooting in the open. Then, again, he may not. All according to how the notion strikes him."

"That's about it," agreed Howard.

"While it's fresh on my mind, I'll unload some more comfort. You've got an enemy in this valley you don't know about."

"The one that shot me?"

"I ain't been told that. I was to say, 'One enemy more than he knows of.' "

"Who told you to say it?"

"I was to forget to tell you that, Steve."

"Then I must have a friend more than I know of, too."

"I ain't so sure about that. You might call her a hostile friend."

"It's a lady, then. I can guess who."

"Honest, I didn't mean to tell you, Steve. It slipped out."

"I won't hold it against you."

"She sent for me last night, and this morning I dropped round. Now, what do you reckon she wanted with me?"

"Give it up."

"I'm to take a day off and ride around among the boys, so as to see them before Jed does. I'm to load 'em up with misrepresentations about how you and the sheriff happen to be working in cahoots. I gathered that the lady is through with you, but she don't want your scalp collected by the boys."

"I'm learning to be thankful for small favors," Fraser said dryly. "She figures me up a skunk, but hates to have me massacreed in her back yard. Ain't that about it, Dick?"

"Somewheres betwixt and between," France nodded. "Say, you lads going to the dance at Millikan's?"

"Didn't know there was one."

"Sure. Big doings. Monday night. Always have a dance after the spring round-up. Jed and his friends will be there— that ought to fetch you!" Dick grinned.

"I haven't noticed any pressing invitation to my address yet," said Steve.

"I'm extending it right now. Millikan told me to pass the word among the boys. Everybody and his neighbor invited." Dick lit a cigar, and gathered up his reins. "So-long, boys. I got to be going." Over his shoulder he fired another joyous shot as he cantered away. "I reckon that hostile friend will be there, too, Steve, if that's any inducement."

Whether it was an inducement is not a matter of record, but certain it is that the Texan found it easy to decide to go. Everybody in the valley would be there, and absence on his part would be construed as weakness, even as a confession of guilt. He had often observed that a man's friends are strong for him only when he is strong for himself.

Howard and his guest drove to Millikan's Draw, for the wound of the latter was still too new to stand so long a horseback ride. They arrived late, and the dance was already in full swing. As they stabled and fed the team, they could hear the high notes of the fiddles and the singsong chant of the caller.

"Alemane left. Right han' t'yer pardner, an' gran' right and left. Ev-v-rybody swing."

The ranch house was a large one, the most pretentious in the valley. A large hall opened into a living room and a dining room, by means of large double doors, which had been drawn back, so as to make one room of them.

As they pushed their way through the crowd of rough young fellows who clustered round the door, as if afraid their escape might be cut off, Fraser observed that the floor was already crowded with dancers.

The quadrille came to an end as he arrived, and, after they had seated their partners, red-faced perspiring young punchers swelled the knot around the door.

Alec stayed to chaff with them, while the Texan sauntered across the floor and took a seat on one of the benches which lined the walls. As he did so, a man and his partner, so busy in talk with each other that they had not observed who he was, sat down beside him in such position that the young woman was next him. Without having looked directly at either of them, Fraser knew that the girl was Arlie Dillon, and her escort Jed Briscoe. She had her back half turned toward him, so that, even after she was seated she did not recognize her neighbor.

Steve smiled pleasantly, and became absorbed in a rather noisy bout of repartee going on between one swain and his lass, not so absorbed, however, as not to notice that he and his unconscious neighbors were becoming a covert focus of attention. He had already noticed a shade of self-consciousness in the greeting of those whom he met, a hint of a suggestion that he was on trial. Among some this feeling was evidently more pronounced. He met more than one pair of eyes that gave back to his genial nod cold hostility.

At such an affair as this, Jed Briscoe was always at his best. He was one of the few men in the valley who knew how to waltz well, and music and rhythm always brought out in him a gay charm women liked. His lithe grace, his assurance, his ease of manner and speech, always differentiated him from the other ranchmen.

No wonder rumor had coupled his name with that of Arlie as her future husband. He knew how to make light love by implication, to skate around the subject skilfully and boldly with innuendo and suggestion.

Arlie knew him for what he was— a man passionate and revengeful, the leader of that side of the valley's life which she deplored. She did not trust him. Nevertheless, she felt his fascination. He made that appeal to her which a graceless young villain often does to a good woman who lets herself become interested in trying to understand the sinner and his sins. There was another reason why just now she showed him special favor. She wanted to blunt the edge of his anger against the Texan ranger, though her reason for this she did not admit even to herself.

She had— oh, she was quite sure of this— no longer any interest in Fraser except the impersonal desire to save his life. Having thought it all over, she was convinced that her friends had nothing to fear from him as a spy. That was what he had tried to tell her when she would not listen.

Deep in her heart she knew why she had not listened. It had to do with that picture of a pretty girl smiling up happily into his eyes— a thing she had not forgotten for one waking moment since. Like a knife the certainty had stabbed her heart that they were lovers. Her experience had been limited. Kodaks had not yet reached Lost Valley as common possessions. In the mountains no girl had her photograph taken beside a man unless they had a special interest in each other. And the manner of these two had implied the possession of a secret not known to the world.

So Arlie froze her heart toward the Texan, all the more because he had touched her girlish imagination to sweet hidden dreams of which her innocence had been unnecessarily ashamed. He had spoken no love to her, nor had he implied it exactly. There had been times she had thought something more than friendship lay under his warm smile. But now she scourged herself for her folly, believed she had been unmaidenly, and set her heart to be like flint against him. She had been ready to give him what he had not wanted. Before she would let him guess it she would rather die, a thousand times rather, she told herself passionately.

She presently became aware that attention was being directed toward her and Jed and somebody who sat on the other side of her. Without looking round, she mentioned the fact in a low voice to her partner of the dance just finished. Jed looked up, and for the first time observed the man behind her. Instantly the gayety was sponged from his face.

"Who is it?" she asked.

"That man from Texas."

Arlie felt the blood sting her cheeks. The musicians were just starting a waltz. She leaned slightly toward Jed, and said, in a low voice:

"Did you ask me to dance this with you?"

He had not, but he did now. He got to his feet, with shining eyes, and whirled her off. The girl did not look toward the Texan. Nevertheless, as they circled the room, she was constantly aware of him. Sitting there, with a smile on his strong face, apparently unperturbed, he gave no hint of the stern fact that he was circled by enemies, any one of whom might carry his death in a hip pocket. His gaze was serene, unabashed, even amused.

The young woman was irritably suspicious that he found her anger amusing, just as he seemed to find the dangerous position in which he was placed. Yet her resentment coexisted with a sympathy for him that would not down. She believed he was marked for death by a coterie of those present, chief of whom was the man smiling down into her face from half-shut, smouldering eyes.

Her heart was a flame of protest against their decree, all the more so because she held herself partly responsible for it. In a panic of repentance, she had told Dick of her confession to the ranger of the names of the Squaw Creek raiders, and France had warned his confederates. He had done this, not because he distrusted Fraser, but because he felt it was their due to get a chance to escape if they wanted to do so.

Always a creature of impulse, Arlie had repented her repentance when too late. Now she would have fought to save the Texan, but the horror of it was that she could not guess how the blow would fall. She tried to believe he was safe, at least until the week was up.

When Dick strolled across the floor, sat down beside Steve, and began casually to chat with him, she could have thanked the boy with tears. It was equivalent to a public declaration of his intentions. At least, the ranger was not friendless. One of the raiders was going to stand by him. Besides Dick, he might count on Howard; perhaps on others.

Jed was in high good humor. All along the line he seemed to be winning. Arlie had discarded this intruder from Texas and was showing herself very friendly to the cattleman. The suspicion of Fraser which he had disseminated was bearing fruit; and so, more potently, was the word the girl had dropped incautiously. He had only to wait in order to see his rival wiped out. So that, when Arlie put in her little plea, he felt it would not cost him anything to affect a large generosity.

"Let him go, Jed. He is discredited. Folks are all on their guard before him now. He can't do any harm here. Dick says he is only waiting out his week because of your threat. Don't make trouble. Let him sneak back home, like a whipped cur," she begged.

"I don't want any trouble with him, girl. All I ask is that he leave the valley. Let Dick arrange that, and I'll give him a chance."

She thanked him, with a look that said more than words.

It was two hours later, when she was waltzing with Jed again, that Arlie caught sight of a face that disturbed her greatly. It was a countenance disfigured by a ragged scar, running from the bridge of the nose. She had last seen it gazing into the window of Alec Howard's cabin on a certain never-to-be-forgotten night.

"Who is that man— the one leaning against the door jamb, just behind Slim Leroy?" she asked.

"He's a fellow that calls himself Johnson. His real name is Struve," Jed answered carelessly.

"He's the man that shot the Texas lieutenant," she said.

"I dare say. He's got a good reason for shooting him. The man broke out of the Arizona penitentiary, and Fraser came north to rearrest him. At least, that's my guess. He wouldn't have been here to-night if he hadn't figured Fraser too sick to come. Watch him duck when he learns the ranger's here."

At the first opportunity Arlie signaled to Dick that she wanted to see him. Fraser, she observed, was no longer in the dancing rooms. Dick took her out from the hot room to the porch.

"Let's walk a little, Dick. I want to tell you something."

They sauntered toward the fine grove of pines that ran up the hillside back of the house.

"Did you notice that man with the scar, Dick?" she presently asked.

"Yes. I ain't seen him before. Must be one of the Rabbit Run guys, I take it."

"I've seen him. He's the man that shot your friend. He was the man I shot at when he looked in the window,"

"Sure, Arlie?"

"Dead sure, Dick. He's an escaped convict, and he has a grudge at your friend. He is afraid of him, too. Look out for Lieutenant Fraser to-night. Don't let him wander around outside. If he does, there may be murder done."

Even as she spoke, there came a sound from the wooded hillside— the sound of a stifled cry, followed by an imprecation and the heavy shuffling of feet.

"Listen, Dick!"

For an instant he listened. Then: "There's trouble in the grove, and I'm not armed," he cried.

"Never mind! Go— go!" she shrieked, pushing him forward.

For herself, she turned, and ran like a deer for the house.

Siegfried was sitting on the porch, whittling a stick.

"They— they're killing Steve— in the grove," she panted.

Without a word he rolled off, like a buffalo cow, toward the scene of action.

Arlie pushed into the house and called for Jed.

CHAPTER XIII

THE WOLF HOWLS

As Steve strolled out into the moonlight, he left behind him the monotonous thumping of heavy feet and the singsong voice of the caller.

"Birdie fly out, Crow hop in, Join all hands And circle ag'in."

came to him, in the high, strident voice of Lute Perkins. He took a deep breath of fresh, clean air, and looked about him. After the hot, dusty room, the grove, with its green foliage, through which the moonlight filtered, looked invitingly cool. He sauntered forward, climbed the hill up which the wooded patch straggled, and sat down, with his back to a pine.

Behind the valley rampart, he could see the dim, saw-toothed Teton peaks, looking like ghostly shapes in the moonlight. The night was peaceful. Faint and mellow came the sound of jovial romping from the house; otherwise, beneath the distant stars, a perfect stillness held.

How long he sat there, letting thoughts happen dreamily rather than producing them of gray matter, he did not know. A slight sound, the snapping of a twig, brought his mind to alertness without causing the slightest movement of his body.

His first thought was that, in accordance with dance etiquette in the ranch country, his revolver was in its holster under the seat of the trap in which they had driven over. Since his week was not up, he had expected no attack from Jed and his friends. As for the enemy, of whom Arlie had advised him, surely a public dance was the last place to tempt one who apparently preferred to attack from cover. But his instinct was certain. He did not need to look round to know he was trapped.

"I'm unarmed. You'd better come round and shoot me from in front. It will look better at the inquest," he said quietly.

"Don't move. You're surrounded," a voice answered.

A rope snaked forward and descended over the ranger's head, to be jerked tight, with a suddenness that sent a pain like a knife thrust through the wounded shoulder. The instinct for self-preservation was already at work in him. He fought his left arm free from the rope that pressed it to his side, and dived toward the figure at the end of the rope. Even as he plunged, he found time to be surprised that no revolver shot echoed through the night, and to know that the reason was because his enemies preferred to do their work in silence.

The man upon whom he leaped gave a startled oath and stumbled backward over a root.

Fraser, his hand already upon the man's throat, went down too. Upon him charged men from all directions. In the shadows, they must have hampered each other, for the ranger, despite his wound— his shoulder was screaming with pain— got to his knees, and slowly from his knees to his feet, shaking the clinging bodies from him.

Wrenching his other hand from under the rope, he fought them back as a hurt grizzly does the wolf pack gathered for the kill. None but a very powerful man could ever have reached his feet. None less agile and sinewy than a panther could have beaten them back as at first he did. They fought in grim silence, yet the grove was full of the sounds of battle. The heavy breathing, the beat of shifting feet, the soft impact of flesh striking flesh, the thud of falling bodies— of these the air was vocal. Yet, save for the gasps of sudden pain, no man broke silence save once.

"The snake'll get away yet!" a hoarse voice cried, not loudly, but with an emphasis that indicated strong conviction.

Impossible as it seemed, the ranger might have done it but for an accident. In the struggle, the rope had slipped to a point just below his knees. Fighting his way down the hill, foot by foot, the Texan felt the rope tighten. One of his attackers flung himself against his chest and he was tripped. The pack was on him again. Here there was more light, and though for a time the mass swayed back and forth, at last they hammered him down by main strength. He was bound hand and foot, and dragged back to the grove.

They faced their victim, panting deeply from their exertions. Fraser looked round upon the circle of distorted faces, and stopped at one. Seen now, with the fury and malignancy of its triumph painted upon it, the face was one to bring bad dreams.

The lieutenant, his chest still laboring heavily, racked with the torture of his torn shoulder, looked into that face out of the only calm eyes in the group.

"So it's you, Struve?"

"Yes, it's me— me and my friends."

"I've been looking for you high and low."

"Well, you've found me," came the immediate exultant answer.

"I reckon I'm indebted to you for this." Fraser moved his shoulder slightly.

"You'll owe me a heap more than that before the night's over."

"Your intentions were good then, I expect. Being shy a trigger finger spoils a man's aim."

"Not always."

"Didn't like to risk another shot from Bald Knob, eh? Must be some discouraging to hit only once out of three times at three hundred yards, and a scratch at that."

The convict swore. "I'll not miss this time, Mr. Lieutenant."

"You'd better not, or I'll take you back to the penitentiary where I put you before."

"You'll never put another man there, you meddling spy," Struve cried furiously.

"I'm not so sure of that. I know what you've got against me, but I should like to know what kick your friends have coming," the ranger retorted.

"You may have mine, right off the reel, Mr. Fraser, or whatever you call yourself. You came into this valley with a lie on your lips. We played you for a friend, and you played us for suckers. All the time you was in a deal with the sheriff for you know what. I hate a spy like I do a rattlesnake."

It was the man Yorky that spoke. Steve's eyes met his.

"So I'm a spy, am I?"

"You know best."

"Anyhow, you're going to shoot me first, and find out afterward?"

"Wrong guess. We're going to hang you." Struve, unable to keep back longer his bitter spleen, hissed this at him.

"Yes, that's about your size, Struve. You can crow loud now, when the odds are six to one, with the one unarmed and tied at that. But what I want to know is— are you playing fair with your friends? Have you told them that every man in to-night's business will hang, sure as fate? Have you told them of those cowardly murders you did in Arizona and Texas? Have you told them that your life is forfeit, anyway? Do they know you're trying to drag them into your troubles? No? You didn't tell them that. I'm surprised at you, Struve."

"My name's Johnson."

"Not in Arizona, it isn't. Wolf Struve it is there, wanted for murder and other sundries." He turned swiftly from him to his confederates. "You fools, you're putting your heads into a noose. He's in already, and wants you in, too. Test him. Throw the end of that rope over the limb, and stand back, while he pulls me up alone. He daren't— not for his life, he daren't. He knows that whoever pulls on that rope hangs himself as surely as he hangs me."

The men looked at each other, and at Struve. Were they being led into trouble to pay this man's scores off for him? Suspicion stirred uneasily in them.

"That's right, too. Let Johnson pull him up," Slim Leroy said sullenly.

"Sure. You've got more at stake than we have. It's up to you, Johnson," Yorky agreed.

"That's right," a third chipped in.

"We'll all pull together, boys," Struve insinuated. "It's only a bluff of his. Don't let him scare you off."

"He ain't scaring me off any," declared Yorky. "He's a spy, and he's getting what is coming to him. But you're a stranger too, Johnson. I don't trust you any— not any farther than I can see you, my friend. I'll stand for being an aider and abettor, but I reckon if there's any hanging to be done you'll have to be the sheriff," replied Yorky stiffly.

Struve turned his sinister face on one and another of them. His lips were drawn back, so that the wolfish teeth gleamed in the moonlight. He felt himself being driven into a trap, from which there was no escape. He dared not let Fraser go with his life, for he knew that, sooner or later, the ranger would run him to earth, and drag him back to the punishment that was awaiting him in the South. Nor did he want to shoulder the responsibility of murdering this man before five witnesses.

Came the sound of running footsteps.

"What's that?" asked Slim nervously.

"Where are you, Steve?" called a voice.

"Here," the ranger shouted back.

A moment later Dick France burst into the group. "What's doing?" he panted.

The ranger laughed hardily. "Nothing, Dick. Nothing at all. Some of the boys had notions of a necktie party, but they're a little shy of sand. Have you met Mr. Struve, Dick? I know you're acquainted with the others, Mr. Struve is from Yuma. An old friend of mine. Fact is, I induced him to locate at Yuma."

Dick caught at the rope, but Yorky flung him roughly back.

"This ain't your put in, France," he said. "It's up to Johnson." And to the latter: "Get busy, if you're going to."

"He's a spy on you-all, just the same as he is on me," blurted the convict.

"That's a lie, Struve," pronounced the lieutenant evenly. "I'm going to take you back with me, but I've got nothing against these men. I want to announce right now, no matter who tells a different story, that I haven't lost any Squaw Creek raiders and I'm not hunting any."

"You hear? He came into this valley after me."

"Wrong again, Struve. I didn't know you were here. But I know now, and I serve notice that I'm going to take you back with me, dead or alive. That's what I'm paid for, and that's what I'm going to do."

It was amazing to hear this man, with a rope round his neck, announce calmly what he was going to do to the man who had only to pull that rope to send him into eternity. The very audacity of it had its effect.

Slim spoke up. "I don't reckon we better go any farther with this thing, Yorky."

"No, I don't reckon you had," cut in Dick sharply. "I'll not stand for it."

Again the footsteps of a running man reached them. It was Siegfried. He plunged into the group like a wild bull, shook the hair out of his eyes, and planted himself beside Fraser. With one backward buffet of his great arm he sent Johnson heels over head. He caught Yorky by the shoulders, strong man though the latter was, and shook him till his teeth rattled, after which he flung him reeling a dozen yards to the ground. The Norwegian was reaching for Dick when Fraser stopped him.

"That's enough of a clean-up right now, Sig. Dick butted in like you to help me," he explained.

"The durned coyotes!" roared the big Norseman furiously, leaping at Leroy and tossing him over his head as an enraged bull does. He turned upon the other three, shaking his tangled mane, but they were already in flight.

"I'll show them. I'll show them," he kept saying as he came back to the man he had rescued.

"You've showed them plenty, Sig. Cut out the rough house before you maim some of these gents who didn't invite you to their party."

The ranger felt the earth sway beneath him as he spoke. His wound had been torn loose in the fight, and was bleeding. Limply he leaned against the tree for support.

It was at this moment he caught sight of Arlie and Briscoe as they ran up. Involuntarily he straightened almost jauntily. The girl looked at him with that deep, eager look of fear he had seen before, and met that unconquerable smile of his.

The rope was still round his neck and the coat was stripped from his back. He was white to the lips, and she could see he could scarce stand, even with the support of the pine trunk. His face was bruised and battered. His hat was gone; and hidden somewhere in his crisp short hair was a cut from which blood dripped to the forehead. The bound arm had been torn from its bandages in the unequal battle he had fought. But for all his desperate plight he still carried the invincible look that nothing less than death can rob some men of.

The fretted moonlight, shifting with the gentle motion of the foliage above, fell full upon him now and showed a wet, red stain against the white shirt. Simultaneously outraged nature collapsed, and he began to sink to the ground.

Arlie gave a little cry and ran forward. Before he reached the ground he had fainted; yet scarcely before she was on her knees beside him with his head in her arms.

"Bring water, Dick, and tell Doc Lee to come at once. He'll be in the back room smoking. Hurry!" She looked fiercely round upon the men assembled. "I think they have killed him. Who did this? Was it you, Yorky? Was it you that murdered him?"

"I bane t'ink it take von hoondred of them to do it," said Siegfried. "Dat fallar, Johnson, he bane at the bottom of it."

"Then why didn't you kill him? Aren't you Steve's friend? Didn't he save your life?" she panted, passion burning in her beautiful eyes.

Siegfried nodded. "I bane Steve's friend, yah! And Ay bane kill Johnson eef Steve dies."

Briscoe, furious at this turn of the tide which had swept Arlie's sympathies back to his enemy, followed Struve as he sneaked deeper into the shadow of the trees. The convict was nursing a sprained wrist when Jed reached him.

"What do you think you've been trying to do, you sap-headed idiot?" Jed demanded. "Haven't you sense enough to choose a better time than one when the whole settlement is gathered to help him? And can't you ever make a clean job of it, you chuckle-minded son of a greaser?"

Struve turned, snarling, on him. "That'll be enough from you, Briscoe. I've stood about all I'm going to stand just now."

"You'll stand for whatever I say," retorted Jed. "You've cooked your goose in this valley by to-night's fool play. I'm the only man that can pull you through. Bite on that fact, Mr. Struve, before you unload your bile on me."

The convict's heart sank. He felt it to be the truth. The last thing he had heard was Siegfried's threat to kill him.

Whether Fraser lived or died he was in a precarious position and he knew it.

"I know you're my friend, Jed," he whined. "I'll do what you say. Stand by me and I'll sure work with you."

"Then if you take my advice you'll sneak down to the corral, get your horse, and light out for the run. Lie there till I see you."

"And Siegfried?"

"The Swede won't trouble you unless this Texan dies. I'll send you word in time if he does."

Later a skulking shadow sneaked into the corral and out again. Once out of hearing, it leaped to the back of the horse and galloped wildly into the night.

CHAPTER XIV

HOWARD EXPLAINS

Two horsemen rode into Millikan's Draw and drew up in front of the big ranch house. To the girl who stepped to the porch to meet them they gave friendly greeting. One of them asked:

"How're things coming, Arlie?"

"Better and better every day, Dick. Yesterday the doctor said he was out of danger."

"It's been a tough fight for Steve," the other broke in. "Proper nursing is what pulled him through. Doc says so."

"Did he say that, Alec? I'll always think it was doc. He fought for that life mighty hard, boys."

Alec Howard nodded: "Doc Lee's the stuff. Here he comes now, talking of angels."

Doctor Lee dismounted and grinned. "Which of you lads is she making love to now?"

Arlie laughed. "He can't understand that I don't make love to anybody but him," she explained to the younger men.

"She never did to me, doc," Dick said regretfully.

"No, we were just talking about you, doc."

"Fire ahead, young woman," said the doctor, with assumed severity. "I'm here to defend myself now."

"Alec was calling you an angel, and I was laughing at him," said the girl demurely.

"An angel— huh!" he snorted.

"I never knew an angel that chewed tobacco, or one that could swear the way you do when you're mad," continued Arlie.

"I don't reckon your acquaintance with angels is much greater than mine, Miss Arlie Dillon. How's the patient?"

"He's always wanting something to eat, and he's cross as a bear."

"Good for him! Give him two weeks now and he'll be ready to whip his weight in wild cats."

The doctor disappeared within, and presently they could hear his loud, cheerful voice pretending to berate the patient.

Arlie sat down on the top step of the porch.

"Boys, I don't know what I would have done if he had died. It would have been all my fault. I had no business to tell him the names of you boys that rode in the raid, and afterward to tell you that I told him," she accused herself.

"No, you had no business to tell him, though it happens he's safe as a bank vault," Howard commented.

"I don't know how I came to do it," the girl continued. "Jed had made me suspicious of him, and then I found out something fine he had done for me. I wanted him to know I trusted him. That was the first thing I thought of, and I told it. He tried to stop me, but I'm such an impulsive little fool."

"We all make breaks, Arlie. You'll not do it again, anyhow," France comforted.

Doctor Lee presently came out and pronounced that the wounded man was doing well. "Wants to see you boys. Don't stay more than half an hour. If they get in your way, sweep 'em out, Arlie."

The cowpunchers entered the sick room with the subdued, gingerly tread of professional undertakers.

"I ain't so had as that yet, boys," the patient laughed. "You're allowed to speak above a whisper. Doc thinks I'll last till night, mebbe, if I'm careful."

They told him all the gossip of the range— how young Ford had run off with Sallie Laundon and got married to her down at the Butte; how Siegfried had gone up and down the valley swearing he would clean out Jack Rabbit Run if Steve died; how Johnson had had another row with Jed and had chosen to take water rather than draw. Both of his visitors, however, had something on their minds they found some difficulty in expressing.

Alec Howard finally broached it.

"Arlie told you the names of some of the boys that were in the Squaw Creek sheep raid. She made a mistake in telling you anything, but we'll let that go in the discard. It ain't necessary that you should know the names of the others, but I'm going to tell you one of them, Steve."

"No, I don't want to know."

"This is my say-so. His name is Alec Howard."

"I'm sorry to hear that, Alec. I don't know why you have told me."

"Because I want you to know the facts of that raid, Steve. No killing was on the program. That came about in a way none of us could foresee."

"This is how it was, Steve," explained Dick. "Word came that Campeau was going to move his sheep into the Squaw Creek district. Sheep never had run there. It was understood the range there was for our cattle. We had set a dead line, and warned them not to cross it. Naturally, it made us sore when we heard about Campeau.

"So some of us gathered together hastily and rode over. Our intentions were declared. We meant to drive the sheep back and patrol the dead line. It was solemnly agreed that there was to be no shooting, not even of sheep."

The story halted here for a moment before Howard took it up again. "Things don't always come out the way you figure them. We didn't anticipate any trouble. We outnumbered them two to one. We had the advantage of the surprise. You couldn't guess that for anything but a cinch, could you?"

"And it turned out different?"

"One of us stumbled over a rock as we were creeping forward. Campeau heard us and drew. The first shot came from them. Now, I'm going to tell you something you're to keep under your own hat. It will surprise you a heap when I tell you that one man on our side did all the damage. He was at the haid of the line, and it happens he is a dead shot. He is liable to rages, when he acts like a crazy man. He got one now. Before we could put a stopper on him, he had killed Campeau and Jennings, and wounded the herders. The whole thing was done before you could wink an eye six times. For just about that long we stood there like roped calves. Then we downed the man in his tracks, slammed him with the butt of a revolver."

Howard stopped and looked at the ranger before he spoke again. His voice was rough and hoarse.

"Steve, I've seen men killed before, but I never saw anything so awful as that. It was just like they had been struck by lightning for suddenness. There was that devil scattering death among them and the poor fellows crumpling up like rabbits. I tell you every time I think of it the thing makes me sick."

The ranger nodded. He understood. The picture rose before him of a man in a Berserk rage, stark mad for the moment, playing Destiny on that lonely, moonlit hill. The face his instinct fitted to the irresponsible murderer was that of Jed Briscoe. Somehow he was sure of that, beyond the shadow of a doubt. His imagination conceived that long ride back across the hills, the deep agonies of silence, the fierce moments of vindictive accusation. No doubt for long the tug of conscience was with them in all their waking hours, for these men were mostly simple-minded cattlemen caught in the web of evil chance.

"That's how it was, Steve. In as long as it takes to empty a Winchester, we were every one of us guilty of a murder we'd each have given a laig to have stopped. We were all in it, all tied together, because we had broke the law to go raiding in the first place. Technically, the man that emptied that rifle wasn't any more guilty than us poor wretches that stood frozen there while he did it. Put it that we might shave the gallows, even then the penitentiary would bury us. There was only one thing to do. We agreed to stand together, and keep mum."

"Is that why you're telling me, Alec?" Fraser smiled.

"We ain't telling you, not legally," the cow-puncher answered coolly. "If you was ever to say we had, Dick and me would deny it. But we ain't worrying any about you telling it. You're a clam, and we know it. No, we're telling you, son, because we want you to know about how it was. The boys didn't ride out to do murder. They rode out simply to drive the sheep off their range."

The Texan nodded. "That's about how I figured it. I'm glad you told me, boys. I reckon I don't need to tell you I'm padlocked in regard to this."

Arlie came to the door and looked in. "It's time you boys were going. Doc said a half hour"

"All right, Arlie," responded Dick. "So-long, Steve. Be good, you old pie eater."

After they had gone, the Texan lay silent for a long time. He understood perfectly their motive in telling him the story. They had not compromised themselves legally, since a denial would have given them two to one in the matter of witnesses. But they wished him to see that, morally, every man but one who rode on that raid was guiltless of the Squaw Creek murders.

Arlie came in presently, and sat down near the window with some embroidery.

"Did the boys tire you?" she asked, noting his unusual silence.

"No. I was thinking about what they told me. They were giving me the inside facts of the Squaw Creek raid."

She looked up in surprise. "They were?" A little smile began to dimple the corners of her mouth. "That's funny, because they had just got through forgiving me for what I told you."

"What they told me was how the shooting occurred."

"I don't know anything about that. When I told you their names I was only telling what I had heard people whisper. That's all I knew."

"You've been troubled because your friends were in this, haven't you? You hated to think it of them, didn't you?" he asked.

"Yes. It has troubled me a lot."

"Don't let it trouble you any more. One man was responsible for all the bloodshed. He went mad and saw red for half a minute. Before the rest could stop him, the slaughter was done. The other boys aren't guilty of that, any more than you or I."

"Oh, I'm glad— I'm glad," she cried softly. Then, looking up quickly to him: "Who was the man?" she asked.

"I don't know. It is better that neither of us should know that."

"I'm glad the boys told you. It shows they trust you."

"They figure me out a white man," he answered carelessly.

"Ah! That's where I made my mistake." She looked at him bravely, though the color began to beat into her cheeks beneath the dusky tan. "Yet I knew it all the time— in my heart. At least, after I had given myself time to think it over. I knew you couldn't be that. If I had given you time to explain— but I always think too late."

His eyes, usually so clear and steely, softened at her words. "I'm satisfied if you knew— in your heart."

"I meant——" she began, with a flush.

"Now, don't spoil it, please," he begged.

Under his steady, half-smiling gaze, her eyes fell. Two weeks ago she had been a splendid young creature, as untaught of life as one of the wild forest animals and as unconsciously eager for it. But there had come a change over her, a birth of womanhood from that night when she had stood between Stephen Fraser and death. No doubt she would often regret it, but she had begun to live more deeply. She could never go back to the care-free days when she could look all men in the face with candid, girlish eyes. The time had come to her, as it must to all sensitive of life, when she must drink of it, whether she would or no.

"Because I'd rather you would know it in your heart than in your mind," he said.

Something sweet and terrifying, with the tingle and warmth of rare wine in it, began to glow in her veins. Eyes shy, eager, frightened, met his for an instant. Then she remembered the other girl. Something hard as steel ran through her. She turned on her heel and left the room.

CHAPTER XV

THE TEXAN PAYS A VISIT

From that day Fraser had a new nurse. Arlie disappeared, and her aunt replaced her a few hours later and took charge of the patient. Steve took her desertion as an irritable convalescent does, but he did not let his disappointment make him unpleasant to Miss Ruth Dillon.

"I'm a chump," he told himself, with deep disgust. "Hadn't any more sense than to go scaring off the little girl by handing out a line of talk she ain't used to. I reckon now she's done with me proper."

He continued to improve so rapidly that within the prescribed two weeks he was on horseback again, though still a little weak and washed out. His first ride of any length was to the Dillon ranch. Siegfried accompanied him, and across the Norwegian's saddle lay a very business-like rifle.

As they were passing the mouth of a caon, the ranger put a casual question: "This Jack Rabbit Run, Sig?"

"Yah. More men wanted bane lost in that gulch than any place Ay knows of."

"That so? I'm going in there to-morrow to find that man Struve," his friend announced carelessly.

The big blonde giant looked at him. "Yuh bain't, Steve? Why, yuh bain't fit to tackle a den uh wild cats." An admiring grin lit the Norwegian's face. "Durn my hide, yuh've got 'em all skinned for grit, Steve. Uh course, Ay bane goin' with yuh."

"If it won't get you in bad with your friends I'll be glad to have you, Sig."

"They bain't my friends. Ay bane shook them, an' served notice to that effect."

"Glad of it."

"Yuh bane goin' in after Struve only?"

"Yes. He's the only man I want."

"Then Ay bane go in, and bring heem out to yuh."

Fraser shook his head. "No, old man, I've got to play my own hand."

"Ay t'ink it be a lot safer f'r me to happen in an' get heem," remonstrated Siegfried.

"Safer for me," corrected the lieutenant, smiling. "No, I can't work that way. I've got to take my own chances. You can go along, though, on one condition. You're not to interfere between me and Struve. If some one else butts in, you may ask him why, if you like.

"Ay bane t'ink yuh von fool, Steve. But Ay bane no boss. Vat yuh says goes."

They found Arlie watering geraniums in front of the house. Siegfried merely nodded to her and passed on to the stables with the horses. Fraser dismounted, offering her his hand and his warm smile.

He had caught her without warning, and she was a little shy of him. Not only was she embarrassed, but she saw that he knew it. He sat down on the step, while she continued to water her flowers.

"You see your bad penny turned up again, Miss Arlie," he said.

"I didn't know you were able to ride yet, Lieutenant Fraser."

"This is my first try at it. Thought I'd run over and say 'Thank you' to my nurse."

"I'll call auntie," she said quickly.

He shook his head. "Not necessary, Miss Arlie. I settled up with her. I was thinking of the nurse that ran off and left me."

She was beginning to recover herself. "You want to thank her for leaving while there was still hope," she said, with a quick little smile.

"Why did you do it? I've been mighty lonesome the past two weeks," he said quietly.

"You would be, of course. You are used to an active outdoor life, and I suppose the boys couldn't get round to see you very often."

"I wasn't thinking of the boys," he meditated aloud.

Arlie blushed; and to hide her embarrassment she called to Jimmie, who was passing: "Bring up Lieutenant Fraser's Teddy. I want him to see how well we're caring for his horse."

As a diversion, Teddy served very well. Horse and owner were both mightily pleased to see each other. While the animal rubbed its nose against his coat, the ranger teased and petted it.

"Hello, you old Teddy hawss. How air things a-comin', pardner?" he drawled, with a reversion to his Texas speech. "Plumb tickled to death to meet up with yore old master, ain't you? How come it you ain't fallen in love with this young lady and forgot Steve?"

"He thinks a lot of me, too," Arlie claimed promptly.

"Don't blame you a bit, Teddy. I'll ce'tainly shake hands with you on that. But life's jest meetin' and partin', old hawss. I got to take you away for good, day after to-morrow."

"Where are you going?" the girl asked quickly. Then, to cover the swift interest of her question: "But, of course, it is time you were going back to your business."

"No, ma'am, that is just it. Seems to me either too soon or too late to be going."

She had her face turned from him, and was busy over her plants, to hide the tremulous dismay that had shaken her at his news.

She did not ask him what he meant, nor did she ask again where he was going. For the moment, she could not trust her voice to say more.

"Too late, because I've seen in this valley some one I'll never forget, and too soon because that some one will forget me, sure as a gun," he told her.

"Not if you write to him."

"It isn't a him. It's my little nurse."

"I'll tell auntie how you feel about it, and I'm sure she won't forget you."

"You know mighty well I ain't talking about auntie."

"Then I suppose you must mean me."

"That's who I'm meaning."

"I think I'll be able to remember you if I try— by Teddy," she answered, without looking at him, and devoted herself to petting the horse.

"Is it— would it be any use to say any more, Arlie?" he asked, in a low voice, as he stood beside her, with Teddy's nose in his hands.

"I— I don't know what you mean, sir. Please don't say anything more about it." Then again memory of the other girl flamed through her. "No, it wouldn't— not a bit of use, not a bit," she broke out fiercely.

"You mean you couldn't——"

The flame in her face, the eyes that met his, as if drawn by a magnet, still held their anger, but mingled with it was a piteous plea for mercy. "I— I'm only a girl. Why don't you let me alone?" she cried bitterly, and hard upon her own words turned and ran from the room.

Steve looked after her in amazed surprise. "Now don't it beat the band the way a woman takes a thing."

Dubiously he took himself to the stable and said good-by to Dillon.

An hour later she went down to dinner still flushed and excited. Before she had been in the room two minutes her father gave her a piece of startling news.

"I been talking to Steve. Gracious, gyurl, what do you reckon that boy's a-goin' to do?"

Arlie felt the color leap into her cheeks.

"What, dad?"

"He's a'goin' back to Gimlet Butte, to give himself up to Brandt, day after to-morrow."

"But— what for?" she gasped.

"Durned if I know! He's got some fool notion about playin' fair. Seems he came into the Cedar Mountain country to catch the Squaw Creek raiders. Brandt let him escape on that pledge. Well, he's give up that notion, and now he thinks, dad gum it, that it's up to him to surrender to Brandt again."

The girl's eyes were like stars. "And he's going to go back there and give himself up, to be tried for killing Faulkner."

Dillon scratched his head. "By gum, gyurl, I didn't think of that. We cayn't let him go."

"Yes, we can."

"Why, honey, he didn't kill Faulkner, looks like. We cayn't let him go back there and take our medicine for us. Mebbe he would be lynched. It's a sure thing he'd be convicted."

"Never mind. Let him go. I've got a plan, dad." Her vivid face was alive with the emotion which spoke in it. "When did he say he was going?" she asked buoyantly.

"Day after to-morrow. Seems he's got business that keeps him hyer to-morrow. What's yore idee, honey?"

She got up, and whispered it in his ear. His jaw dropped, and he stared at her in amazement.

CHAPTER XVI

THE WOLF BITES

Steve came drowsily to consciousness from confused dreams of a cattle stampede and the click of rifles in the hands of enemies who had the drop on him. The rare, untempered sunshine of the Rockies poured into his window from a world outside, wonderful as the early morning of creation. The hillside opposite was bathed miraculously in a flood of light, in which grasshoppers fiddled triumphantly their joy in life. The sources of his dreams discovered themselves in the bawl of thirsty cattle and the regular clicking of a windmill.

A glance at his watch told him that it was six o'clock.

"Time to get up, Steve," he told himself, and forthwith did.

He chose a rough crash towel, slipped on a pair of Howard's moccasins, and went down to the river through an ambient that had the sparkle and exhilaration of champagne. The mountain air was still finely crisp with the frost, in spite of the sun warmth that was beginning to mellow it. Flinging aside the Indian blanket he had caught up before leaving the cabin, he stood for an instant on the bank, a human being with the physical poise, compactness, and lithe-muscled smoothness of a tiger.

Even as he plunged a rifle cracked. While he dived through the air, before the shock of the icy water tingled through him, he was planning his escape. The opposite bank rose ten feet above the stream. He kept under the water until he came close to this, then swam swiftly along it with only his head showing, so as to keep him out of sight as much as possible.

Half a stone's throw farther the bank fell again to the water's edge, the river having broadened and grown shallow, as mountain creeks do. The ranger ran, stooping, along the bank, till it afforded him no more protection, then dashed across the stony-bottomed stream to the shelter of the thick aspens beyond.

Just as he expected, a shot rang from far up the mountainside. In another instant he was safe in the foliage of the young aspens.

In the sheer exhilaration of his escape he laughed aloud.

"Last show to score gone, Mr. Struve. I figured it just right. He waited too long for his first shot. Then the bank hid me. He wasn't expecting to see me away down the stream, so he hadn't time to sight his second one."

Steve wound his way in and out among the aspens, working toward the tail of them, which ran up the hill a little way and dropped down almost to the back door of the cabin. Upon this he was presently pounding.

Howard let him in. He had a revolver in his hand, the first weapon he could snatch up.

"You durned old idiot! It's a wonder you ain't dead three ways for Sunday," he shouted joyfully at sight of him. "Ain't I told you 'steen times to do what bathin' you got to do, right here in the shack?"

The Texan laughed again. Naked as that of Father Adam, his splendid body was glowing with the bath and the exercise.

"He's ce'tainly the worst chump ever, Alec. Had me in sight all the way down to the creek, but waited till I wasn't moving. Reckon he was nervous. Anyhow, he waited just one-tenth of a second too late. Shot just as I leaned forward for my dive. He gave me a free hair-cut though."

A swath showed where the bullet had mowed a furrow of hair so close that in one place it had slightly torn the scalp.

"He shot again, didn't he?"

"Yep. I swam along the far bank, so that he couldn't get at me, and crossed into the aspens. He got another chance as I was crossing, but he had to take it on the fly, and missed."

The cattleman surveyed the hillside cautiously through the front window. "I reckon he's pulled his freight, most likely. But we'll stay cooped for a while, on the chance. You're the luckiest cuss I ever did see. More lives than a cat."

Howard laid his revolver down within reach, and proceeded to light a fire in the stove, from which rose presently the pleasant odors of aromatic coffee and fried ham and eggs.

"Come and get it, Steve," said Howard, by way of announcing breakfast. "No, you don't. I'll take the window seat, and at that we'll have the curtain drawn."

They were just finishing breakfast when Siegfried cantered up.

"You bane ready, Steve?" he called in.

Howard appeared in the doorway. "Say, Sig, go down to the corral and saddle up Teddy for Steve, will you? Some of his friends have been potshotting at him again. No damage done, except to my feelings, but there's nothing like being careful."

Siegfried's face darkened. "Ay bane like for know who it vas?"

Howard laughed. "Now, if you'll tell Steve that he'll give you as much as six bits, Sig. He's got notions, but they ain't worth any more than yours or mine. Say, where you boys going to-day? I've a notion to go along."

"Oh, just out for a little pasear," Steve answered casually. "Thought you were going to work on your south fence to-day."

"Well, I reckon I better. It sure needs fixing. You lads take good care of yourselves. I don't need to tell you not to pass anywhere near the run, Sig," he grinned, with the manner of one giving a superfluous warning.

Fraser looked at Siegfried, with a smile in his eyes. "No, we'll not pass the run to-day, Alec."

A quarter of an hour later they were in the saddle and away. Siegfried did not lead his friend directly up the caon that opened into Jack Rabbit Run, but across the hills to a pass, which had to be taken on foot. They left the horses picketed on a grassy slope, and climbed the faint trail that went steeply up the bowlder-strewn mountain.

The ascent was so steep that the last bit had to be done on all fours. It was a rock face, though by no means an impossible one, since projecting ledges and knobs offered a foothold all the way. From the summit, the trail edged its way down so precipitously that twice fallen pines had to be used as ladders for the descent.

As soon as they were off the rocks, the big blonde gave the signal for silence. "Ay bane t'ink we might meet up weeth some one," he whispered, and urged Steve to follow him as closely as possible.

It was half an hour later that Sig pointed out a small clearing ahead of them. "Cabin's right oop on the edge of the aspens. See it?"

The ranger nodded assent.

"Ay bane go down first an' see how t'ings look."

When the Norwegian entered the cabin, he saw two men seated at a table, playing seven up. The one facing him was Tommie, the cook; the other was an awkward heavy-set fellow, whom he knew for the man he wanted, even before the scarred, villainous face was twisted toward him.

Struve leaped instantly to his feet, overturning his chair in his haste. He had not met the big Norseman since the night he had attempted to hang Fraser.

"Ay bane not shoot yuh now," Siegfried told him.

"Right sure of that, are you?" the convict snarled, his hand on his weapon. "If you've got any doubts, now's the time to air them, and we'll settle this thing right now."