"Uhuh. I let Phil have a right smart bit of money on Number Ten firs' an' las', my boy. Don't want to pay it off this mornin', do you?"

Steve laughed.

"I'm broke, Grandy," he said lightly, unconsciously adopting the old title for the man who had made him love him and hate him a score of times. "My working capital, estimated last night, runs about seventy-five dollars. That wouldn't quite turn the trick, would it?"

The old man's eyes narrowed.

"You mean that seventy-five dollars is all you've got to show for twelve years?" he asked sharply.

Again, hardly understanding why, Steve flushed. Was a man to be ashamed that he had not amassed wealth, especially when there had never been in him the sustained desire for gold? He owed no man a cent, he made his own way, he asked no favors—and yet there was a glint of defiance in his eye, a hint of defiance in his tone, when he replied briefly.

"That's all. I haven't measured life in dollars and cents."

"Then you've missed a damn' good measure for it, my son! I ain't sayin' it's the only one, but it'll do firs' class. But you needn't get scared I've gone into the preaching business. . . . An' with that seventy-five dollars you're startin' out to run a big cow outfit like this, are you?"

There was a gleam of mockery in the clear blue eyes which Steve gave no sign of seeing.

"I've got a big job on my hands and I know it," he said quietly. "But I'm going to see it through."

"There's no question about the size of the job! It's life-size, man's size—Number Ten size, if you want to put it that way. It wants a real man to shove it across. Know just how much you're mortgaged for?"

"No. I was going to ask you."

"Close to fifty thousan' dollars, countin' back interest, unpaid. More'n you ever saw in a day, I reckon."

Steve shrugged. This to hide his first inclination to whistle. Fifty thousand—why, he didn't know Number Ten ranch was worth that much money. But it must be worth a good deal more if his grandfather had advanced so much on it.

"It is a nice little pile," he admitted carelessly.

The old man grunted, thrust his hands into his pockets, and drew deeply at his stogie. Steve rolled a cigarette. In the silence falling upon them they could hear the sound of the mechanician's wrench.

"Anything wrong with the car?" asked Steve for the sake of breaking unpleasant silence.

"Not that I know of. He's jus' takin' a peek to make sure, I guess. That's what he's for. He knows I got to get back to my place in a couple of shakes."

Steve smiled; by wagon road his grandfather's ranch home was fifty miles to the northward.

"You won't think of going back before noon."

"Won't I? But I will, though, son; Blenham's sticking aroun', waitin' for my say-so what he'll do nex'." He snapped open a big watch and stared at it a moment with pursed lips. "I'll be back home in jus' one hour an' a half. All I got is fifteen minutes to talk with you this mornin'."

"You mean that you can drive those fifty miles in an hour and a quarter!"

"Have done it in less; if I was in a hurry I'd do it in an hour flat. But allowin' for time out I want fifteen minutes more'n that. And now, if we're goin' to get anywhere——"

He stopped suddenly and stood toying with his big watch passing it back and forth through the loop he made of its heavy chain, his gaze steady and earnest and searching upon his grandson.

"Stephen," he said abruptly, "I ain't playin' any favorites in my ol' age. An' I ain't givin' away big chunks of money hit or miss. You wasn't countin' on anything like that, was you?"

"No, I wasn't," announced Steve quickly. "I remember your old theory; that a man should make his own way unaided, that——"

"That whatever he got he's got to get with his one head an' one set of han's. Now, the things I got to say I'll spit out one at the time: Firs', I'd like to have you come visit me for a spell at my place. Will you do it? To-day, to-morrow, any time you feel like it."

"Yes; I'll be glad to."

"That's good. Nex', not even if you was the right man for the job you can't save this ranch now; it's too late, there's to much to dig up in too short a time. I've got my hooks in deep an' whenever that happens I don't let go. I want you to quit before you get started."

Steve looked his surprise.

"Surely," he said wonderingly, "you don't want me to give you the ranch just because you happen to hold the mortgages on it?"

"Business is business, Stephen," said the old man sternly. "Sometimes, between Packards, business is hell. It'd be that for you. I've started out to get this outfit an' I'd get it. An' doin' it I'd be wastin' my time besides breakin' you all to smithereens. Better drop it."

Steve had hardly expected this. But he answered calmly, even lightly.

"I think I'd like a try at holding it."

"That's two things," old man Packard said crisply. "Number three is this here: Blenham tells, me you've put Royce in as foreman under you?"

"I offered him the place. He could have it yet if he wanted it. But he refused. I've passed the job on to a man named Barbee."

"Barbee!" cried the old man. "Barbee! That yellow canary-bird? Meaning him?"

"Yes," retorted Steve a trifle stiffly. "Anything wrong with him?"

"I didn't roll them fifty miles to talk about jay-birds an' canary-birds an' such," growled his grandfather. "But here's one thing I've got to say: This ranch is goin' to be mine real soon; that's in the cards, face up. It's as good as mine now. I've been runnin' it myself for six months. I want it right, hear me? What do you know about running a big outfit? What does a kid without whiskers like Barbee know about it? Think I want it all run down in the heel when it comes to me? No, sir! I don't. Blenham knows the lay of the land, Blenham knows my ways, Blenham knows how to run things. I want you to put Blenham back on the job!"

Steve bit his lip, holding back a hot reply.

"Grandfather," he said slowly, "suppose we take a little more time in getting squared around? I want to do what's right; I know that you want to do what's fair and square. I am willing to consult you about ranch matters; I'll come to you for advice, if you'll let me; I'll try to keep the ranch up to time and"—with a smile—"in my hands and out of yours. That's a good sporting proposition. But as for Blenham——"

"Put him back as foreman and I'll talk fair with you. I want Blenham back here, Stephen. Understand that?"

"And," cried Steve a trifle heatedly at last, "I tell you that I am going to run the ranch myself. And that I don't like Blenham."

"Damn it," cried the old man violently, "hear the boy! Don't like Blenham, huh? Goin' to run the ranch yourself, huh? Why, I tell you it's as good as mine right now! How are you goin' to pay your men, how are you goin' to buy grub for 'em, where are you goin' to find runnin'-expense money? Go an' tell folks you're mortgaged to me for fifty thousan' dollars an' see how much they'll stake you for on top of that. Or come over my way an' try to borrow some more, if you think I'm an easy guy. Why, Steve Packard, you—you're a tomfool!"

"Thanks," said Steve dryly. "I've heard that before."

"An' you'll hear it again, by the Lord! In ten languages if you'll find men talkin' that many lingos. Here I come chasin' all this way to be decent to you, to see if there ain't some way to help you out——"

"Help me out of my property," amended Steve. "I can't remember anything else you offered to do for me!"

"I said it once," shouted his grandfather, his two big fists suddenly clinched and lifted threateningly; "you're a howlin' young ass! That's what for a man you've turned out to be, Stephen Packard. Come here empty-handed an' try to buck me, would you? Me who has busted better men than you all my life, me who has got my hooks in you deep already, me who ain't no pulin' ol' dodderin' softy to turn over to a lazy, shiftless vagabond all I've piled up year after year. Buck me, would you? Tuck in an' fire my men, butt on my affairs— Why, you impudent young puppy-dog, you: I'll make you stick your tail between your legs an' howl like a kiote before I'm done with you!"

Steve looked at him hopelessly; he might have expected this all along though he had hoped for amity at least. If there were to be a conflict of purpose he could have wished that it be conducted in friendly fashion. But when did Hell-Fire Packard ever clasp hands with the man he opposed in anything, when did he ever see a business rival without cloven hoof, horns, and spiked tail?

"I am sorry you look at it that way, Grandy. It is only natural that I should seek to hold what is mine."

"Then hold your tongue, you young fool!" blazed out the old man. "But don't ask me to hold my hand! I'm goin' after you tooth and big toe-nail! If Ranch Number Ten ain't mine in all partic'lars before you're a year older I want to know why!"

"I think," said the grandson, fighting with himself for calmness and quiet speech, "that any further business I can take up with your lawyer. Past due interest——"

"Lawyer?" thundered Packard senior. "Since when did I ever have call for law an' lawyers in my play? Think I'm a crook, sir? Mean to insinuate I'm a crook?"

"I mean nothing of the kind. A mortgage is a legal matter, the payment of interest and principal——"

"Guy Little!" called the old man. "Guy Little! Goin' to stay under that car all day?"

The mechanician promptly appeared, hands and face greasy and black and took his place on the running-board.

"All ready, sir," he announced imperturbably.

With half-a-dozen strides his master reached the car; in as many seconds the powerful engine was throbbing. The screaming horn gave warning, the quiet herds in the valley heeded, lifted their heads and stood at attention, ready to scamper this way or that as need arose. The wheels turned, the car jolted over the inequalities presented by the field, swerved sharply, turned, gathered speed and whizzed away toward the valley road.

Three times before they shot back into the mouth of Blue Bird Canon the mechanician fancied that his employer had spoken; each time listening, he failed to catch any other sound than that made by the engine and speeding wheels. Once he said, "Sir?" and got only silence for an answer.

He shook his head and wondered; it was not Packard's way to mumble to himself. And again, ready to jump for his life as the big car took a dangerous turn, his eyes glued to the sheer bank a few inches from the singing tires, he caught a sound through the blast of the sparton which surely must have come from the driver's lips.

"What say?" yelled Guy Little.

No answer. He caught a fleeting glimpse of a farmer at the head of his two plunging horses where the man had hurriedly got them out of the way and up the flank of the mountain. They raced on. And again, surely Packard had said something.

"Talkin' to me?" called Little.

Then, for just a wee fraction of a second, Packard drew his eyes from the road and his look met the mechanician's. The old man's eyes were shining strangely.

"Damn it, Guy Little," he boomed out boisterously, "can't a man laugh when he feels that-away?"

And it suddenly dawned upon Guy Little that ever since they had left Ranch Number Ten the old man had been chuckling delightedly.



CHAPTER VIII

IN RED CREEK TOWN

The little town of Red Creek had an individuality all its own. It might have prided itself, had it any civic sense whatever, upon its aloofness. It stood apart from the rest of the world, at a safe distance from any of its rival settlements, even drawn apart as though distrustfully from its own railroad station which baked and blistered in the sun a good half-mile to the west. Grown up here haphazardly long before the "Gap" had been won through by the "iron trail," it ignored the beckoning of the glistening rails and refused to extend itself toward the traffic artery.

More than all this, Red Creek gave the impression, not in the least incorrect, of falling apart into two watchful sections which eyed each other suspiciously, being cynically and unsociably inclined. Its main street was as wide as Van Ness Avenue and down the middle of it, like a border line between two hostile camps, sprawled a stream which shared its name with the town.

The banks here and there were the brick-red of a soil whose chief mineral was iron; here and there were screened by willows. There were two insecure-looking bridges across which men went infrequently.

For the spirit which had brooded over the birth of Red Creek when a sheepman from the north and a cow-man from the south had set their shacks opposite each other, lived on now; long after the old feuds were dead and the whole of the grazing lands had been won over to the cattle raisers, a new basis for quarrels had offered itself at Red Creek's need.

Much of this Steve Packard knew, since it was so in his time, before he had gone wandering; much he had learned from Barbee in a long talk with him before riding the twenty-five miles into the village. Old Man Packard had drawn to himself a host of retainers since his interests were big, his hired-men many, his wages generous. And, throughout the countryside across which he cast his shadow, he had cultivated and grown a goodly crop of enemies, men with whom he had contended, men whom he had branded sweepingly as liars and thieves and cutthroats, men whose mortgages he had taken, men whom, in the big game which he played, he had broken. The northern half of Red Creek was usually and significantly known as Packard's Town; the southern half sold liquor and merchandise, offered food and lodging, to men who harbored few friendly feelings for Packard's "crowd."

Hence, in Red Creek were two saloons, confronting each other across the red scar of the creek; two stores, two lunch-counters, two blacksmith shops, each eying its rival jealously. At this time the post-office had been secured by the Packard faction; the opposition snorted contempt and called attention to the fact that the constable resided with them. Thus honors were even.

Steve Packard rode into town in the late afternoon, his motive clear-cut, his need urgent. If Blenham had stolen his ten thousand dollars for which he had so imperative a call now, then Blenham had been the one who had replaced the large bank-notes with the small; there was the chance that Blenham, just a week ago to-night, had gotten the dollar bills in Red Creek. If such were the case Packard meant to know it.

"There are things, Barbee," he had said bluntly, "which I can't tell you yet; I don't know you well enough. But this I can say: I am out to get Blenham's tag."

"So'm I," said Barbee.

"That's one reason you've got the job you're holding down right now. Here's one point though, which it's up to you to know; I very much suspect that for reasons of his own Blenham hasn't set foot for the last time on Ranch Number Ten. He'll come back; he'll come snooping around at night; he'll perhaps have a way of knowing the first night I'm away and come then. There's something he left there that he wants. At least that is the way I'm stringing my bet. And while I am away you're foreman, Barbee."

A flickering light danced in Barbee's blue eyes.

"Orders from you, if Blenham shows up at night——"

"To throw a gun on him and run him out! The quickest way. To-night I want you to squat out under a tree and keep awake—all night. For which you can have two days off if you want."

"If I thought he'd show," and the boy's voice was little more than an eager whisper, "I couldn't sleep if I tried!"

Then Packard had spoken a little about Red Creek, asking his few questions and had learned that Blenham had his friends in "Packard's Town" where Dan Hodges of the Ace of Diamonds saloon was an old pal, that "Whitey" Wimble of the Old Trusty saloon across the street hated both Hodges and Blenham like poison.

"Us boys," added Barbee, "always hung out at the Ace of Diamonds, bein' Packard's men. After now, when I go on a rampage, I'm goin' to make frien's across the street. Friends sometimes comes in handy in Red Creek," he added smilingly.

The road, as one comes into Red Creek from the east, divides at the first bridge, one fork becoming the northern half of the intersected street, the other the southern half. Steve Packard, filling his eyes with the two rows of similar shacks, hesitated briefly.

Until now he had always gone to the Packard side; when a boy he had regarded the rival section with high contempt, looking upon it as inferior, sneering at it as a thoroughbred might lift lip at an unworthy mongrel. The prejudice was old and deep-rooted; he felt a subtle sense of shame as though the eyes of the world were upon him, watching to see him turn toward the "low-down skunks an' varmints" which his grandfather had named these denizens of the defamed section.

The hesitation was brief; he reined his horse impatiently to the left, riding straight toward the flaunting sign upon the lofty false front of the Old Trusty saloon. But short as was his indecision it had not ended before he had glimpsed at the far end of the street the incongruous lines of an automobile—red racing type.

"Boyd-Merril. Twin Eight," thought Packard. "So we'll meet on the same side after all, Miss Terry Pert!"

There were seeds of content in the thought. If it were to be range war between him and his grandfather, then since obviously the Temples had already been drawn into contention with the old man Packard, it was just as well the fates decreed that he and Terry should be on the same side of the fence, the same side of the fight, the same side of Red Creek.

He tickled his horse with a light spur; despite the manner of their last encounter he could look forward with something akin to eagerness to another meeting. For, he told himself carelessly, she amused him vastly.

But the meeting was not just yet. He saw Terry, jauntily, even saucily dressed, as she came out of the store and jumped into her car, marked how the bright sunlight winked from her high boots, how it flamed upon her gay red scarf, how it glinted from a burnished steel buckle in her hat band. As bright as a sunbeam herself, loving gay colors about her, across the distance she fairly shone and twinkled.

There was a faint shadow of regret in his eyes as she let in the clutch and whizzed away. She was headed down the street, her back to him, driving toward the remote railroad station. Off to the north he saw a growing plume of black smoke.

"Going away?" he wondered. "Or just meeting some one?"

But he had come into Red Creek on a business in no way connected with Terry Temple.

He had figured it out that Blenham, if it had been Blenham who had chanced on Bill Royce's secret and no longer ago than last Saturday night, would have wasted no time in acquiring the one-dollar bills for his trick of substitution; that if he had come for them to Red Creek that same night, after post-office and stores were closed, he would have sought them at one of the two saloons; that, since currency is at all times scarce in cattle towns in the West, he might have had to go to both saloons for them.

Packard began investigations at the Old Trusty saloon whose doors stood invitingly open to the faint afternoon breeze.

In the long room half-a-dozen idle men looked up at him with mild interest, withdrawing their eyes briefly from solitaire or newspaper or cribbage game or whatever had been holding their careless attention as he entered.

A glance at them showed him no familiar face. He turned to the bar.

Behind it a man was polishing glasses with quick, skilful hands. Steve knew him at once for Whitey Wimble. He was a pronounced albino, unhealthy-looking, with overlarge, thin ears, small pale eyes, and teeth that looked like chalk. Steve nodded to him and spun a dollar on the bar.

"Have something," he suggested.

Wimble returned his nod, left off his polishing to shove forward a couple of the glistening glasses, and produced a bottle from behind him.

"Regards," he said apathetically, taking his whiskey with the enthusiasm and expression of a man observing his doctor's orders. "Stranger in Red Creek?"

"I haven't been here," Steve answered, "for several years. I never saw the town any quieter. Used to be a rather gay little place, didn't it?"

"It's early yet," said Whitey, going back to his interrupted task. "Bein' Saturday, the boys from the ranches will be showin' up before long. Then it ain't always so quiet."

Packard made his cigarette, lighted it, and then said casually: "How are you fixed for dollar bills in your strong-box?"

"Nary," returned Whitey Wimble without troubling himself to look into his till. "We don't see overmuch rag money in Red Creek."

"Guess that's so," admitted Steve. "They do come in handy, though, sometimes; when you want to send a dollar in a letter or something of that kind."

"That's a fac', too; never thought of that." Which, since he never wrote or received letters, was no doubt true.

"Men around here don't have much use for paper money, do they?" continued Packard carelessly, his interest seeming to centre in his cigarette smoke. "I'd bet a man the drinks nobody else has asked you for a dollar bill for the last six months."

"You'd lose," said Whitey. "I had three of 'em in the drawer for a coon's age; feller asked me for 'em jus' the other night."

"Yes?" He masked his eagerness as he thrust a quarter forward. "The drink's on me then. Let me have a cigar."

Whitey also took a cigar, indicating friendliwise the better box.

"Who was it asked you for the paper money?" Steve went on. "He might have one he doesn't need."

"It was Stumpy Collins. The bootblack across the street."

"I'll look him up; yesterday he had them, you say?"

Wimble shook his head, gave the matter his thought a moment, and said:

"It was las' Saturday night; I remember 'cause there was a right smart crowd in an' I was busy an' Stumpy kep' pesterin' me until I 'tended to him. He won't have nothin' lef by this, though; it ain't Stumpy's way to save his money long. Firs' time I ever knowed him to have three dollars all at once."

From the Old Trusty Steve went across the street, leaving his horse in front of Wimble's door where there was a big poplar and a grateful shade. Crossing the second of the two bridges he turned his eyes toward the railroad station; the red touring-car stood forth brilliantly in the sunshine, a freight train was just pulling in, Terry was not to be seen.

"She'll eat before she starts back home," he thought, hastening his stride on to Hodges's place, the Ace of Diamonds. "I'll see her at the lunch-counter."

Tucked in beside the Ace of Diamonds was a bootblack stand, a crazy, home-made affair with dusty seat. The wielder of the brush and polish was nowhere in evidence. Steve passed and turned in at the saloon door, wishing to come to Hodges, Blenham's pal. For it required little imagination to suspect that it had been Hodges at Blenham's behest, or Blenham himself, who had sent Stumpy across the street to the Old Trusty.

Here, as in Wimble's place, a few men loitered idly; here as there the proprietor stood behind his own bar. Hodges, a short, squat man with a prize-fighter's throat, chest, and shoulders and a wide, thin-lipped mouth, leaned forward in dirty shirt-sleeves, chewing at a moist cigar-stump.

"Hello, stranger," he offered offhandedly. "What's the word?"

"Know Blenham, don't you?" asked Steve quietly. "Works for old man Packard."

"Sure, I know him. What about him?"

"Seen him lately?"

"Ten minutes ago. Why? Want him?"

Packard had not counted on this, having no idea that Blenham was in town. He hesitated, then said quickly:

"Hasn't left yet, has he? Where is he now?"

"Down to the depot. Trailin' a skirt. An' some skirt, too, take it from me."

He laughed.

Steve wanted suddenly to slap the broad, ugly face. Since, however, he could formulate no logically sufficient reason for the act, he said instead:

"Maybe I'll see him before I pull out. If I don't, ask him if he lost a wad like this?"

Fleetingly he flashed the little roll of banknotes before Hodges's eyes.

"Greenbacks?" asked Hodges. "How much?"

Packard laughed.

"Not so all-fired much," he said lightly. "But enough to buy a hat!"

"If hats are sellin' ten dollars or under?" ventured Hodges.

Packard affected to look surprised.

"What do you know about how much is in this roll?" he demanded innocently.

"One-dollar bills?" said Hodges. "Ten of 'em?"

"You don't look like a mind-reader."

"Well, you're right about the wad bein' Blenham's. Leave it with me, if you want. I'll see he gets it. There ain't enough there for a man to steal," he added reassuringly.

"How do you know it's Blenham's? If he told you that he had lost it he'd have told you where. What's the answer; where did I pick this up?"

"Blenham didn't say he los' nothin'. But I know it's his because he got most of them bills from me."

"Tell me when," and Packard held the roll in a tight-shut hand, "and I'll leave them with you."

"Las' Saturday night," said Hodges, after a brief moment of reflection.

Packard tossed the little roll to the bar.

"There's the money. Tell Blenham I thought it was his!"

He turned to the door, his blood suddenly stirred with certainty: Blenham had stolen the ten thousand dollars, and the theft had been committed no longer ago than last Saturday night. Just a week—there was the chance——

"Hey, there," called Hodges. "Who'll I say lef this? What name, stranger?"

Steve turned and regarded him coolly.

"Tell him Steve Packard called. Steve Packard, boss of Ranch Number Ten."

And Dan Hodges, dull wit that he was, felt that something was wrong. The look in the stranger's eyes had altered swiftly, the eyes had grown hard. Steve went out. As he reached the sidewalk he glimpsed a red automobile racing townward from the station. Behind it, riding in its dust, came Blenham.



CHAPTER IX

"IT'S MY FIGHT AND HIS. LET HIM GO!"

Steve Packard, walking swiftly, reached the west bridge just before the front tires of Terry's car thudded on the heavy planks. He glimpsed Blenham jogging along behind her and knew that Blenham had seen him.

But his eyes were for Terry now. She, too, had recognized him with but a few yards separating them. She gave him a blast of her horn warningly, and, slowing down no more than was necessary for the sharp turn, came on across the bridge. He read it in her eye that it would be an abiding joy for Miss Terry if she could send him scampering out of her way; the horn as much as said: "You step aside or I'll run you down!"

With no intention of going under the wheels, Steve waited until the last moment and then jumped. But not to the side as Terry had anticipated. Obeying his impulse and taking his chance, he sprang up to her running-board as she whizzed over the bouncing planks of the bridge, grasping the door of her car to steady himself. The feat safely accomplished, he grinned up into Terry's startled eyes.

"We meet again," he laughed sociably. "Howdy!"

Her lips tight-pressed, she gave her attention for a moment to her wheel and the rutty road in front of her. Her cheeks were red and grew redder. Perhaps a dozen men, here and there upon the street, had seen. She had meant them to see; it would have tickled her no little to have had them note Steve Packard flying wildly to the side of the road while she shot by. She had not counted upon him doing anything else.

"Smarty!" she cried hotly.

"Smart enough to climb out from under when an automobile driven by a manslaughter artist comes along," he chuckled, sensing an advantage and drawing a deep enjoyment from it. "Don't you know, young lady, you've got to be careful sometimes? Now, if you had run over me——"

"Serve you right," sniffed Terry.

"Yes, but think! Running over a man who hasn't had time to take his spurs off yet, why you stood all kinds of chances getting a puncture! You don't want to forget things like that."

Terry bit her lip, stepped on the throttle, swung across the street, made a reckless turn, and brought up in front of the lunch-counter.

"Do you know," remarked Packard lightly, ignoring the fact that she had answered him with only the contempt of her silence, "you remind me of my grandfather. Fact! You two have the same little trick of driving. Wonder what would happen if you and he met on a narrow road?"

"At least," said Terry, eying him belligerently, "he is a man, if he is a scoundrel. Not just a hobo!"

"Oh, I didn't mean to call you a scoundrel! Nor yet to say that you struck me as mannish. Of course——"

"Oh, you make me sick!" cried Terry. And she flashed away from him, going into the lunch-room.

He followed her with speculative eyes. Then he glanced across the street. Blenham had dismounted in front of the Ace of Diamonds and was watching. As Packard turned Blenham went into Hodges's saloon.

"Wonder what he'll have to say when Hodges hands him his roll?" mused Packard.

Well, he had accomplished his purpose. He had done all that he had hoped to do in Red Creek this afternoon, had assured himself that his suspicions against Blenham were justified by the fact and that the theft was only a week old. He went back slowly to his horse in front of the Old Trusty. But his eyes were frowning thoughtfully.

What would be Blenham's next move? What would Blenham do, what would he say when Hodges gave him Packard's message? Might he, in an unguarded moment, give a hint toward the answer of that other question which now had become the only consideration: "Were the larger banknotes still hidden at Ranch Number Ten or had Blenham already removed them?"

Instead of mounting to ride away, Packard hung his spurs upon his saddlehorn and turned again into Whitey Wimble's place.

The late afternoon faded into dusk, the first stars came out, Whitey Wimble lighted his lamps. Steve, advised of the fact by the purr of a motor, knew when Terry left the lunch-room and drove to the store for a visit with the storekeeper's wife. Was she going to remain in town overnight? It began to look as though she were.

Across the street Hodges came out and lighted the big lamps at each side of his doorway. A cowboy swung down from his horse and went in, his spurs winking in the lamplight as though there were jewels upon them. A buckboard pulled up and two other men went in after him. A voice in sudden laughter boomed out. Saturday night had come. As Whitey Wimble had predicted, the boys were showing up and Red Creek stood ready to lose something of its brooding afternoon quiet.

Once again Packard crossed the bridge and made his way along the echoing wooden sidewalk to the Ace of Diamonds. A dozen saddle-horses were tied at the hitching-rail. Among them was Blenham's white-footed bay. Up and down the street glowing cigarette ends like fireflies came and went. In front of the saloon a number of men made a good-natured, tongue-free crowd, most of whom had had their first drinks and were beginning to liven up as in duty bound on a Saturday night.

A four-horse wagon came rattling into town from the east to pour out its contents, big, husky men, at Hodges's door. Among them Packard recognized one man. He was the lumber-camp cook from whom he had gotten coffee and hotcakes the other day, that morning after he had refused to accept Terry's cool invitation to breakfast.

"I'll have to look in on those fellows tomorrow," he thought as they shouldered past, boisterous and eager. "Grandy's sure had his nerve cutting my timber with never so much as a by-your-leave."

Their foreman was with them; one glance singled him out. He was of that type chosen always by old man Packard to head any one of the Packard units, a sort of confident mastery in his very stride, the biggest man of them, unkempt and heavy, with a brutal face and hard eyes. Joe Woods, his name. Packard had already heard of him, a rowdy and a rough-neck but a capable timberjack to the calloused fingers of him. He followed the men into the saloon.

At his place behind the long bar was Hodges, busy filling imperative orders, taking in the money which he counted as good as his once it left the paymaster's pocket. But it struck Packard that the bartender did not appear happy; his face was flushed and hot, his eyes looked troubled. Now and then he flashed a quick look at Blenham who stood leaning against the bar at the far end, twisting an empty whiskey-glass slowly in his big hand, staring frowningly at nothing.

"Hodges is a fool and he has just been told so!" was Steve's answer to the situation.

"Hi, Blenham!" called big Joe Woods. "Have a drink."

"No," growled Blenham, deep down in his throat. "I don't want it. I——"

His eyes, lifted to the lumber-camp boss, passed on and rested on Steve Packard. He broke off abruptly, his look changing, probing, seeming full of question.

"Get the money I gave Hodges for you?" asked Packard, coming into the room. "The ten one-dollar bills that you left behind you?"

"They wasn't mine," said Blenham quickly, his hand hard about the whiskey glass, his manner vaguely nervous. "I tol' Dan to give 'em back to you."

Steve smiled.

"Funny," he said carelessly. "Hodges said——"

"I made a mistake," called Hodges sharply. "I got Blenham mixed up with some other guy. I don't know nothin' about this here." He slammed the little roll down on the bar. "Come get it, if you want it." Packard promptly stepped forward, taking the money.

"I figured there was a chance to make ten dollars, easy money, if I just walked across the street for it," he said, looking pleasantly from Hodges to Blenham. "Sure, I want it. It's luck-money; didn't you know? You see, when a man loses anything he loses some of his luck with it; when another man gets it, he gets the luck along with it. Thanks, Blenham."

Blenham made no answer. His eyes were bright with anger and yet troubled with uncertainty. The uncertainty was there to be recognized by him who looked keenly for it. Blenham did not know just which way to jump. From that fact Steve drew a deep satisfaction. For there would have been no reason for indecision if Blenham knew that he had those other, bigger bank-notes, safe.

At the rear of the long room a man was dealing cards for seven-and-a-half. As though to demonstrate the truth of his boast about "luck-money" Steve stepped to the table, the roll of bills in his hand. He was dealt a card. Without turning it up to look at it he shoved it under the ten banknotes.

"Standing?" said the dealer.

Steve nodded.

"Playing my luck," he answered.

The dealer turned lack-lustre eyes upon Steve's card, then upon his own which he turned up. It was the four of clubs.

"I've the hunch that will beat you, pardner," he said listlessly. "But I'll come again."

He turned another card, a deuce.

"That'll about beat you," he suggested. He leaned forward for Steve's card. "Unless you've got a seven in the hole."

And a seven it was; the bright red seven of hearts. The dealer paid, ten dollars to Steve's ten.

"Come again?" he asked.

"Not to-night," returned Packard. "I took just the one flutter to show Blenham."

He turned and saw that Blenham had already slipped quietly out of the room. Dan Hodges, his face a fiery red, was just coming back from the card-room. With him was the big timber boss.

"Tin-horn!" shouted Joe Woods at Packard. "Quitter!"

A quick joy spurted up in Steve Packard's heart; he was right about Blenham. Blenham, filled with anxiety, had gone already, would be rushing back to Ranch Number Ten to make sure if the ten thousand dollars were safe or had been discovered already by the rightful owner. He had slipped away hurriedly but, after the fashion of a careful, practical man, had taken time to confer with Dan Hodges and had commissioned Joe Woods to hold Packard here. And so, though he could not remember of having ever run away from a fight before, Steve Packard was strongly of that mind right now.

"Joe Woods, I believe?" he said coolly, his mind busy with the new problem of a new situation. "Boss of the timber crew on the east side of Number Ten? I was planning on riding out to-morrow for a word with you, Woods."

"So?" cried Woods. "What's the matter with havin' that word to-night?"

"Haven't time," was the simple rejoinder. "I'm about due across the street now; at Whitey Wimble's place."

"Which is where you belong," growled Woods, his under jaw thrust forward, his whole attitude charged with quarrelsome intent. "Over at the White Rat's with the rest of the Willies!"

The ever-ready Packard temper was getting into Steve's head, beating in his temples, pounding along his pulses. He had never had a man bait him like that before. But he strove to remember Blenham only, to take stock of the fact that this was a bit of Blenham's game, and that any trouble with another than Blenham was to be avoided at this juncture. So, though the color was rising into his face and a little flicker of fire came into his eyes, he said briefly:

"Then I'd better go across, hadn't I? See you in the morning, Woods."

But there is always the word to whip the hot blood into the coolest head, to snare a man's caution out of him and inject fury in its stead, and Joe Woods, a downright man and never a subtle, put his tongue to it. On the instant Packard gave over thought of such side issues as a man named Blenham and hidden bank-notes.

He cried out inarticulately and leaped forward and struck. Joe Woods reeled under the first blow full in the face, staggered under the second, and was borne back into the tight-jammed crowd of his followers.

The men about him and Packard withdrew this way and that, leaving empty floor space to accommodate the two pairs of shuffling boots. Joe Woods wiped his lips with the back of a big, hairy hand, saw traces of blood, and charged. The sound of blows given and taken and of little grunts and of scraping feet were for a space the only sounds heard in Hodges's saloon.



Packard's attack had been swift and sure and not without a certain skill; against it Woods opposed all he had, ponderous strength, slow-moving, brutal force, broad-backed, deep-chested endurance. But from the first it was clear to all who watched and was suspected by Woods himself that he had chosen the wrong man.

Steve was taller, had the longer reach, was gifted by the gods with a supple strength no whit less than the bearish power of the timber boss. With ten blows struck, with both men rocking dizzily, it was patently Steve Packard's fight. But a dull, dogged persistence was in Joe Woods's eyes as again he shook his head and charged.

Steve struck for the stomach and landed—hard. Woods doubled up; the sweat came in drops upon his forehead; his face went suddenly a sick white. But the light in his eyes, as again he lifted his head, was unaltered.

"He can lick me—I know it! He can lick me—I know it!" he muttered and kept muttering. "But, by God, he's got to do it!"

And Steve did it and men looked on queerly, appraising him anew. He took Woods's blows when he must and felt the pain go stabbing through his body; but he stood up and struck back and forced the fight steadily, crowding his adversary relentlessly, seeming always to strike swifter and harder.

It was a bleeding fist driven into Joe Woods's throbbing throat, followed by the other fist, going piston-like, at Joe Woods's stomach, that ended the fight.

The bigger man crumpled and went down slowly like one of his own trees just toppling, and lay staring up into Packard's face with dull eyes. Steve stepped over him, going to the door.

"I'll see you in the morning, Woods," he panted.

But again boots were shuffling on the floor and already several men, Dan Hodges among them, were between him and the door. It dawned upon him that Blenham must have given emphatic orders and that Blenham had the trick of exacting obedience.

"Hold him here," shouted Hodges, and being a man of little spirit he withdrew hastily under Steve's eyes, thrusting another man in front of him. "Keep him for the sheriff. Startin' a fight in my place—it's disturbin' the peace, that's what it is! I won't stand it!"

Packard drew back two or three paces, his eyes narrowing. At that instant he was sure of what he saw in the faces of at least three of the men confronting him; they were going to rush him together.

But now Joe Woods was on his feet again. Packard drew still further back, getting the wall behind him. And then came a diversion. It was Joe Woods speaking heavily:

"I fought him fair an' he licked me. Think I'm the kind of a she-man as stands for you guys buttin' in on my fight? Stand back an' let him go!"

"Blenham said—" screamed Hodges.

"Damn Blenham an' you, too," growled Woods. "It's my fight an' his. Let him go!"

They let him go, drawing apart slowly. With watchful eyes Steve passed down the little lane they made. At the door he turned, saying briefly:

"I'll see you in the morning, Woods!"

Then he went out.



CHAPTER X

A RIDE WITH TERRY

Returning at once to the Old Trusty, on the way passing Terry's car which still stood in front of the store, Steve Packard asked for the use of a telephone. Whitey nodded toward the office, a little room thinly partitioned off from the larger. A moment later Barbee's voice was answering from Ranch Number Ten.

"He's on the way, Barbee," said Steve quickly. "Left Red Creek just a few minutes ago. I'll trail him. Give him the chance to prowl around a little; try and find what he's after. But don't let him get away with it! Understand? Shoot the legs out from under him if you have to. I'll give you a month's pay for the night's work if you nail him with the goods on."

Clicking up the receiver he went out on the street again, giving no heed to the many glances which followed him. They knew who he was; they were speculating on him. "Ol' man Packard's gran'son," he heard one man say.

In the thick darkness lying under the poplar tree it was several minutes before he was certain that his horse was gone. He had tethered the animal himself; there was no dangling bit of rope to indicate a broken tie-rope. Blenham, the practical, had simply taken thought of detail.

"Not missing a single bet, is Blenham," he thought savagely.

He swung about and reentered the saloon. A buzz of talk up and down the long room promptly died away as again the eyes of many men travelled his way. It struck him that they had all been talking of him; he knew that they must have marked those signs which Joe Woods's fists had left on his face; he stood a moment looking in on them, conscious for the first time of his rapidly swelling right eye, seeking to estimate what these men made of him.

It seemed to him that the one emotion he glimpsed on all hands and in varying degrees, was distrust. Little cause for surprise there: he was a Packard and this was not the Packard side of Red Creek.

"Somebody's put me on foot," he announced crisply. "I left my horse outside, tied. It's gone now. Know anything about it, any of you boys?"

They looked their interest. Hereabouts one man did not trifle with another man's horse. But there was no answer to his direct question.

"I've got to be riding," he went on quietly. "Who can lend me a saddle-horse for the night? I'll pay double what it's worth."

Whitey Wimble gave his bar a long swipe with his wet towel.

"If you're askin' favors, seems to me you're on the wrong side the street, ain't you, stranger?"

"Meaning I am a Packard?"

"You got me the firs' time. That's Packard's Town over yonder. Your crowd——"

"Look at my eye!" then said Steve quickly.

A big man with a thin little voice at the far end of the room giggled.

"I seen it already," said Wimble.

"Know Joe Woods? Well, he's got another just like it. Know Blenham? Blenham sicked him on me! Know old man Packard? He's sicking Blenham on me. Want to know what I want a horse for? Blenham's got a head start and I want to overhaul him! To tell him he's a crook and a thief. Now is this side of Red Creek open to me or is it shut? What's the answer, Whitey Wimble?"

Wimble appeared both impressed and yet hesitant. Here was a Packard to deal with and Whitey Wimble when taking over the destiny of the Old Trusty had been set clear in the matter that he had a ripe, old feud to maintain; and still, looking at it the other way, here was a man who carried the sign of Joe Woods's fist upon his bruised face, who announced that he was out to get Blenham, that there was open trouble between him and old man Packard.

Whitey Wimble, beginning by looking puzzled, wound up by turning a distressed face toward Steve.

"It's kind of a fine point," he suggested finally. "Now, come right down to it, it sort of looks to me——"

"Fine point!" cried Steve hotly, a sudden anger growing within him as he thought how Blenham had played the game all along the line, how Blenham might well prove too shrewd for a boy like Barbee, how a set of prejudiced fools here in the Old Trusty by denying him the loan of a horse might seriously be aiding Blenham whom none of them had any love for. "Why, damn it, man, haven't I told you that Blenham has just put a raw deal across on me, that he's coming close to getting away with it, that all I ask is a horse to run him down? Who's going to let me have one? I'm in a hurry!"

Never until now did he realize how strong a factor in the life of the community was the prejudice against his blood. On every hand he saw doubt, clouded eyes, distrust. Plainly many a man there held him for a liar; would even go so far, it was possible, as to suggest later that Steve Packard had meant to steal the horse he asked for. Steve stared about him a moment, his back stiffening. Then, with a little grunt of disgust, he strode across the room.

"At least," he flung over his shoulder at Whitey Wimble, "I am going to use your telephone again!"

Without waiting for an answer and caring not the snap of his fingers what that answer might be, he went to the telephone, jerking down the receiver, saying brusquely to the operator:

"Ranch Number Ten, please. In a hurry."

He waited impatiently and, it seemed to him, an inexcusably long time. Finally the operator said after the aloof manner of telephone girls:

"I am ringing them."

And again——

"I am ringing them."

And then——

"They do not answer."

And at last, and then only when Steve made emphatic that there must be some one at the Number Ten bunk-house at this hour, the girl said:

"Wait a minute."

And after that:

"There seems to be something the matter with the line. I can't raise any of the ranch-houses out that way. We'll send a man out in the morning."

So he couldn't even warn Barbee that Blenham had made good his head-start; that Blenham was plainly of one mind to-night; that it was up to young Barbee to keep his eyes open and his gun cocked. He began to understand why his grandfather had made Blenham one of his right-hand men; he had the cool mind and the way of acting quickly which makes for success.

"I got a horse for you, pardner," said a slow voice as Packard came out of the office. "A cayuse as can't be beat for legs an' lungs. Come ahead."

Steve looked at him eagerly. He was a little fellow, leather-cheeked, keen-eyed, leisurely; a stranger, obviously a cowboy.

"I work for Brocky Lane," offered the stranger as they went out together. "Know him, don't you?"

"I did a dozen years ago," answered Steve absently. "Where's your horse?"

"You're Steve Packard, ain't you? You done Brocky a favor when you was a kid, didn't you? Brocky told me. Brocky's done me a favor. I'm doin' you a favor. That squares us up all 'round. Like a circle, all in a ring, sort of; get me?"

"Yes," agreed Steve, feeling vaguely that the cowman had unknowingly touched upon a problem in higher mathematics. He slipped a hand into his pocket.

But the friend whom an old, long-forgotten kindness raised now for him at his need, shook his head, would have none of Packard's money, and led the way to a shed behind the saloon. Out of the darkness he brought a tall, wall-eyed roan, quickly saddled and bridled and handed over to Steve.

"Heeled?" came solicitously from the little man as Steve swung up into the saddle.

"No."

"Well, Blenham is. He goes that way all the time. An' he's a right good shot, the boys say. If there's some real sour blood stirred up between him an' you there's no use bein' a plumb fool, is there? The store's apt to be open yet; there's a firs'-class double-barrel shot-gun, secon'-hand but as good as new, in the window. Only seven dollars an' a half."

"I'll send the horse over to Brocky's to-morrow," called Steve. "And as for being square—call on me at any time for the next favor. So long."

"So long," responded the slow-voiced man.

Steve swung out toward the east, curbing his mount's eagerness, settling himself in the saddle for a couple of hours of hard riding. Slowly he would warm up the big roan, letting him out gradually, steadily. Already he sensed that in truth here was "a cayuse hard to beat for legs an' lungs." And Blenham's head-start was but a matter of minutes, half an hour at most.

But before he had ridden fifty yards Steve whirled his horse and rode back, going straight to the store. After all, since Blenham was playing a game in which the stakes were no less than ten thousand dollars, since Blenham was without doubt the man who had sought to kill Bill Royce six months ago for the very same money, since Blenham always "went heeled and was a right good shot," why then, as Brocky Lane's cowboy put it, "there was no use bein' a plumb fool." And to ride a hundred yards or so and buy a Colt .45 and a box of cartridges required but a moment.

In the store the long shelves upon one side held dry-goods, while upon the opposite shelves a miscellany of groceries was displayed; toward the rear was the storekeeper's assortment of hardware near a counter piled high with sweaters, boots, chaparejos, all jumbled hopelessly. At the flank of this confusion was a show-case containing a rather fair line of side-arms. Steve, his eye finding what it sought, went straight to the back of the house. And then, looking through an open door which gave entrance to the living-room of the storekeeper's family, his glance met Terry's. She was rising to her feet, drawing on her gauntlets.

"That's your train now," a woman's voice was saying.

Packard heard the whistling of a distant engine. He lifted his hat, she promptly whirled about, giving him her back to look at.

"Here's what I want," said Steve as the storekeeper came to his side. "That .45, and a box of cartridges."

Terry turned again quickly and he surprised a little look of interest in her slightly widened eyes. A man doesn't buy a gun and a box of cartridges at this time of night unless he has a use for them. Packard took up his new purchases, went out, swung again into the saddle, and clattered down the street.

The night was bright with stars, clear and sweet. Presently, with only a handful of miles behind him, the moon rose above the distant ridge, at the full, glorious and generous of light. He loosened his reins a little, gave the big roan his head, and swept on through the ghostly-lighted country.

Now and then, remarking some old remembered landmark, he glanced from it to his watch; more than once, having slipped his watch again into his pocket, he leaned forward and patted the horse's neck.

Then—he had done a little more than half the distance and was riding through the thick shadows of Laurel Canon, which marks the beginning of the long grade—the unforeseen occurred; the unlooked-for which, he knew now, he would have fully expected, had he not counted always upon Blenham playing a lone hand.

In the middle of the inky blotch made by the laurels standing up against the moon there was a spot through which the moon-rays found their way, making a pool of light. As Packard rode into this bright area he heard a rifle-shot, startlingly loud; saw the spit of flame from just yonder, perhaps ten feet, certainly not more than twenty feet away; felt the big roan plunge under him, race on unsteadily, and sink.

He slipped out of the saddle as the horse crashed down in the bushes at the side of the road, and as he did so emptied his revolver into the shadows whence had come the rifle-shot. But he knew that he was a fool to hope to hit; the man had had time to select his spot, to screen his own body with a boulder or fallen log, to leave open behind him a way to safety and darkness.

"Not Blenham himself but one of his crowd did that," muttered Packard as he turned back to the fallen horse. "Just to set me on foot again. He isn't up to murder when he sees another way. And for ten dollars he could hire one of his hangers-on to kill a horse."

Well, it was just another trick for Blenham. On foot now he must make what time he could to the Pinchot farm, some three or four miles further on, demand a horse there, and pray that Barbee was equal to his task. But first he must not leave the big roan to suffer needlessly and hopelessly.

He struck a match and made a flaring torch of a little wisp of dry grass. Loving a good horse as he did, he felt a sudden and utterly new sort of hatred of Blenham go rushing along his blood.

It was with a deep sigh of relief that he straightened up when he saw that either chance or a remarkable skill with a rifle had saved Brocky Lane's roan from any protracted pain.

Packard pushed on, seeking to make what time he could, breaking into a jog-trot time and again upon a down-slope, conserving wind and strength for the up-hill climbs, keeping in the shadows for the most part but taking his chance over and over in the moonlit open.

Yet it was being borne in upon him that it was useless to hurry now; that Blenham had made of his advantage a safe lead; that he might as well slow down, make a cigarette, take his time. And still, being the sort of man he was, he kept doggedly on, telling himself that a race is anybody's race until the tape is broken; that Blenham might be having his own troubles somewhere ahead; that quitting did no good and that it is not good to be a "quitter." But he had little enough hope of coming up again with Blenham that night.

And then, when he had been on foot not more than twenty minutes, a faint, even, drumming sound swelling steadily through the night somewhere behind him put a new, quick stir in his blood. He stopped, stood almost breathless a moment, listening.

The smooth drumming grew louder; suddenly topping a rise the two headlights of an automobile flashed into his eyes. Terry Temple, her errand done in Red Creek, was racing homeward.

"And I'll beat Blenham to it yet!" cried Steve.

Where the moonlight streamed brightest and whitest across the road he sprang out so that she could not fail to see him, tossing up both arms in signal to her to stop. Her headlights blinded him one moment; he heard the warning blast of her horn; he entertained briefly the suspicion that she was going to refuse to stop.

Incredible—and yet he had not thought of her own likely emotions. To have a man leap out into the road in front of her, all unexpectedly, waving his arms and calling on her to stop— Why, she'd think herself fallen into the hands of a highwayman!

She was coming on, straight on, her horn emitting one long, sustained shriek of menace. Packard ground his teeth; either she did not recognize him and was bound upon getting by him, or she did recognize him and was accepting her opportunity to emphasize her attitude toward him.

In any case she was going by, she in whom lay his sole hope to come to grips with Blenham. If he let her evade he might as well quit, quit in utter disgust with the world.

With the world? Disgust with himself, that he had let Blenham beat him, that he wasn't much of a man, that his old grandfather was right about him. Her car was rushing down upon him; if he let it pass, why, he'd be letting, not only a girl laugh at him, but he'd be letting his chance rush by him. His chance that loomed up bigger than the oncoming machine and more real; his chance not for to-night alone but for ever after.

For if Blenham beat him to-night and his grandfather beat him again later on, he knew that he would pass away from the country about Ranch Number Ten, that he would give over all sustained effort to make something of his life, that he would go back to drifting, rounding out his days after the fashion of the last twelve years. It was while Terry's car was speeding toward him that all of this ran through his mind.

There was the possibility that, knowing who he was, Terry would try to bluff him out of the road, counting confidently upon his leaping to safety at the last moment; there was the other possibility that she mistook his motives and would run him down in a sort of panic of self-defense.

Packard, with his rather clear-cut conception of the girl's character to steer by, saw the one way to master the situation. Whirling about, his back to her now, he broke into a run, speeding along the road in front of her. As he ran the hard lines about his mouth softened into a rare grin: he'd have her guessing for a minute, anyway. And by the time she got through guessing——

He had duplicated his feat of the afternoon at the bridge in Red Creek. Terry, in her first astonishment that the man should turn and run straight on in front of her, slowed down, hesitation in her mind. What was he up to? Then there came sudden shadows in a narrow part of the road, a sharp turn, the absolute necessity of slowing down just a trifle more, and then——

"It's all right; go ahead!" called Packard lightly. He was standing on her running-board.

She had thrown off her hat to the cool of the evening. As they passed out from the shadows he could see her eyes. He pushed back his own hat and Terry saw his eyes. For a moment, while the car sped on, neither spoke.

Looking at her he had glimpsed wonder, an annoyance that was swiftly growing into anger, and a certain assurance that Miss Terry Temple fully intended to remember this day and to square accounts with Stephen Packard.

Returning his look, Terry had seen but one emotion in his eyes: pure triumph. She could not know how the man of him, having but just now succeeded in this first task he had set himself, felt a sudden confidence of the future.

"If I had let you go by," said Packard quietly, "I should have felt that I had let my destiny pass me!"

"Don't you start in getting fresh just because it's moonlight!"

Steve looked puzzled, understood, put back his head and laughed joyously. Then, his face suddenly serious again, he considered her speculatively. Now for the first time he became aware that Terry was already carrying a passenger. A small man, Japanese, immaculate, and frightened so that his teeth were chattering.

He was Iki, who had come into Red Creek this evening by train and due to cook for the Temple ranch. Just now he was screwed up in his place, ready to jump if Steve moved his way, his purse clutched in his plump hand, half offered already. Steve beamed upon him, then turned his eyes, still speculative, upon Terry.

"Do you care to tell me," said Terry tartly, "why you're always getting in my way? Think you're smart, climbing aboard like a monkey? You've done the trick twice; do I have to look out for you every time I take the car out?"

"I just happen to be in a hurry," said Packard. "And going your way. Somebody shot my horse back there for me."

Her eyes grew actually round; Iki shivered audibly. But in the girl's case the emotion aroused by Packard's words was short-lived. Why should a man shoot the horse under Steve Packard? Disbelief reshaped her eyes; she cried out at him as her foot went down on the accelerator:

"Think I'm the kind to believe all the yarns you can tell? If you want to know what I think, Steve Packard—you're a liar!"

He laughed, well content with the moment and the situation, well content with his unwilling companion just as she was.

"And do you know that what I told you this afternoon was true?" he countered cheerfully. "You're just like my blazing old Grandy! Instead of being my grandfather he ought to be yours. By golly, Miss Terry Pert," teasing the blood higher into her cheeks with his laughter, "that might be arranged, too! Mightn't it? You and I——"

"Oh!" cried Terry, and he had no doubts about her meaning what she said. "Oh, I hate you! Yes, worse than I hate old Hell-Fire: he keeps out of my trail, anyway. And you, you big bully, you woman-fighter, you—you——"

Just in time he guessed her purpose and threw out his hand across her steering-wheel and grasped her right hand. The car swerved dangerously a moment, then came back to its steady course as Steve's other hand closed over Terry's left. Slowly, putting his greater strength gently against hers, he took her automatic from her.

"Thirty-eight calibre?" he said coolly. "There's nothing little about your way of doing things, is there? And you meant to drill a hole through me, I'm bound!"

Terry's face gleamed white in the pale light; and he knew from the look in her eyes as they seemed fairly to clash with his, that it was the white of sheer rage.

"I'd just as lief blow your head off as shoot a rattlesnake," she announced crisply.

"I believe you," he grunted. "Just the same, if you'd only——"

"Oh, shut up!" she cried, shaking his hand free from hers on the wheel and driving on recklessly.

"I would like to mention," came an uncertain voice from a very pale Japanese, "that I must walk on my feet. I am most regretful——"

"Oh, shut up!" cried Terry. "Shut up!"

And for the rest of the ride both Iki and Steve Packard were silent.



CHAPTER XI

THE TEMPTING OF YELLOW BARBEE

"Here's where I get down," said Steve after a very long silence during which he watched Terry's pretty, puckered face while Terry, gripping her wheel, recklessly assumed the responsibilities of their three lives, hurling the car on through the moonlit night.

Iki, breathing every now and then a long quivering sigh and forgetting to breathe betweenwhiles, held on tightly with both hands.

"Here's where I get down," said Steve again. Here the road followed the line of his north fence; less than a mile to the southward he could see a light like a fallen star, gleaming cheerfully through the trees.

He sensed rather than saw a quick stiffening of Terry's already tense little body; fancied that the car was steadily taking on greater speed, read Terry's purpose in a flash. If he forced her to carry him, why then she would take him as far out of his way as possible.

"Terry Temple!" he cried sharply, leaning in a little toward her. "What's the matter with you anyway? What if we're not friends exactly? I never did you any harm, did I? Why, good Lord, girl, when a man tells you his horse has been shot under him; when he is trying to overhaul the crook at the bottom of the whole mess whom you hate as well as I do— Oh, I mean Blenham and you know it——"

"Liar!" cried Terry, flashing her eyes at him, and back to the road alternately white with the moon and black with shadows. "Liar on two counts! Didn't I see your horse this afternoon? Tied in front of Wimble's whiskey joint? Oh, it's where I'd expect him! Well—and you needn't think I looked to see or cared, either—when I came by just now, leaving town, I saw your horse standing there yet. So you needn't——"

"That couldn't be," muttered Steve. "And yet— Anyhow, I've got to get off here. Will you stop, please?"

"No, I won't stop please! Nobody asked you to ride that I know of. Get off the same way you got on!"

Packard realized two things very clearly then:

If he jumped with the car going at its present speed he would probably break his neck; if he gave any considerable time to arguing the matter with her he would be carried as far in five minutes as he could walk in an hour.

"I mean business to-night," he told her bluntly. "If you don't slow down before I count ten I am going to lean out a little—like this—and shoot a hole in your tire. Then, if you keep on, I'll shoot a hole in the other tire. Understand?"

Terry laughed mockingly.

"You wouldn't dare!" she told him serenely. "That would be some kind of a crime; they could put you in jail for it. You'd be scared to."

"One, two, three, four, five," he counted briskly.

"I would seek to interrupt to advise, oh, Miss Lady!" chattered Iki. "His voice has the sound of bloodthirstiness."

"Six, seven, eight, nine—ten," counted Packard.

Terry sniffed. He leaned out, she saw the glint of the moon upon his revolver.

She threw out her clutch and jammed down both brakes, hard. Steve swung out and down to the ground. The car, as though it had gained fresh power from the fact of being freed of his weight, shot forward, stopped again.

"Not exactly friends?" cried Terry, and he marked a new trembling in her voice. "I should say not. You—you darned snake, you!"

And she was gone, spinning along into the night, hidden from him by the first hill around whose base the road curved. He stared after her a moment, shrugged, turned his back, and strode rapidly toward the Ranch Number Ten corrals.

He had planned correctly; he had correctly measured Blenham's impulses and desires. Further, he had come in time, just in time.

The light was in the ranch-house. Though but little after eleven o'clock it was dark within the bunk-house, the men long ago asleep. But Barbee was awake, his wits about him; his voice and Blenham's, both quiet, met Steve's ears as he slipped about the corner of the house, coming under the window where the light was.

Blenham was talking now. He sat loosely in a chair, his hands one upon the other, idle in his lap. Barbee, his eyes narrowed and watchful, stood at the far side of the room. On the floor, near his feet, was a revolver; from its position Steve guessed that Barbee had just kicked it safely out of Blenham's reach. Barbee's own gun was in the boy's hand.

"You're a pretty foxy kid, Barbee," Blenham was saying tonelessly. "You got the drop on me; you're the firs' man as ever did that little trick. Yes; you're a pretty foxy kid!"

Barbee shrugged and spat and answered Blenham with a curse and a grunted:

"Nobody's askin' your opinion, Blenham."

But Steve saw and Blenham must have seen the gleam of triumph in Barbee's eye.

"What are you goin' to do with me?" asked Blenham presently.

"Nothin'," replied Barbee. "Jus' keep you where I got you until Steve Packard comes back. Which ought to be mos' any time now."

"He'll be late," said Blenham. "He won't be here for two or three hours. Suppose while we wait, let's me an' you talk!" he said sharply, sitting forward in his chair.

"Well?" said Barbee. "Talk an' be damned to you, Blenham. Only you don't talk yourself out'n the hole you're in right now. An', I promise you, you make a quick jump for a get-away, an' I'll shoot you dead."

"I know," Blenham nodded. "You'd do it. But I ain't goin' to try any fool thing like that. I'm jus' goin'— Like I said to you, let's talk. What's Packard payin' you for this night's work?"

"He's no tightwad, if that's what you're drivin' at. I'd of done to-night's job an' glad of the chance an' you know it, Blenham, an' never asked pay for it. But I'm drawin' down a whole month's pay extra, if I've got you like you are when he comes in."

Blenham laughed softly. Then he moved the hands resting in his lap. Packard saw that they were folded loosely about an old leather wallet.

"He's sure payin' you generous, Barbee," jeered Blenham. "You know it! Why, look here: This is yours an' more to trail it if you jus' pocket your gun an' let me go! I ain't askin' much an' I'm payin' my way. Look it over, kid!"

Packard saw how he stripped a bank-note from a thin sheaf of its fellows; how he tossed it toward Barbee. It fell to the floor; a little draft set it drifting; Blenham set his foot upon it.

"Look at it!" he snapped, for the first time giving sign of the strain he was laboring under. "It's yours—if you ain't a fool."

Barbee, not to be tricked were this some ruse to snare his attention, said crisply:

"Put you' han's up while I get it!"

Blenham obeyed; Barbee stooped swiftly, all the while with eyes riveted on his prisoner. Then, the muzzle of his gun raised another inch, he looked at what he held. When he looked back at Blenham his eyes were round, his mouth stood a little open.

"My God!" he gasped. "It's a thousan' dollars!"

"Yes," said Blenham quietly. "It's a thousan' dollars. That's quite a little wad, Barbee; it's more, anyhow, than an extra month's wages, ain't it? An' it's yours if you want it! Think of the times you can go on, think of the way you could make Red Creek open its eyes! An' there's more to come if you take that an' let me go an' jus' watch my play an' take a chance with me when I say so. What's the word, Barbee?"

Packard, having held back thus long, remained motionless, glimpsing unexpectedly something of Barbee's soul; watching a little human drama, become spectator to the battle royal of the two contending factions which made up a man's self.

It seemed to him that young Barbee was pale and grew paler; that a shiver ran through him; that he was, for the moment, like one drugged. And, side by side, two emotions, both primal and unmistakable, peered out of his eyes: a savage hatred of Blenham, a leaping greed of gold.

Thus for a little forgetting his own interest in this scene, Packard watched, wondering what the outcome would be. Blenham tempted. Barbee hesitated.

"Right here in my hand," Blenham was saying coldly, "are nine more like that, Barbee. Ten thousan' dollars in all. One thousan' to go to you for jus' keepin' out of my way. I said once you're a foxy kid. Now let's see if you are. Tie to a man like me that's out to make a pile, a damn big pile, Barbee—or hang to a fool like Steve Packard an' take his pay in dribbles an' let him be the one that gathers in all the big kale. Him an' me when I get things goin' right; him an' me with you jus' gettin' the scraps. Which is it? Eh, kid? Which way're you goin'?"

Barbee held the bank-note in his left hand; slowly his calloused fingers closed tightly about it, crumpling it, clutching it as though they would never release it. And then slowly the fingers opened so that the wrinkled bit of paper lay in his palm under his eyes. Barbee ran his tongue back and forth between his dry lips. Steve, staring in at him through the window, saw in his eyes the two lights, that of hate, that of covetousness; they burned side by side as a yellow candle and a red might have done.

Which way would Barbee go? Did Barbee know? Blenham did not; Steve did not. Suddenly, seeing how the two fires flickered in Barbee's eyes, Steve cried out within himself:

"It's unfair! It's asking too much of Barbee!"

And aloud, shoving the nose of a Colt .45 through the window-pane which splintered noisily:

"Hands up there, Blenham! Good boy, Barbee. You've got him, all right! Watch him while I slip in."

Blenham jumped to his feet, threw out his arms, and cursed savagely. Then, grown abruptly quiet, he dropped back into his chair, his two big hands loose about the wallet hidden under them. Steve threw a leg over the window-sill and came in, his gun ready, his eyes taking stock of Barbee while they appeared to be for Blenham only. And Barbee, white now as he had never been until now, shivered, filled his lungs with a long sigh, and fell back a couple of paces, staring at Steve, at Blenham, but most of all at the thing in his hand.

"You put it across, Barbee!" cried Steve heartily.

He reached forward and snatched the wallet from Blenham's knee. Blenham's big hands, clenching slowly, fell to his sides; Blenham's eyes, sullen and evil, clung steadily to Packard's.

"You've saved me my inheritance to-night; you've helped save me my ranch. You've helped me square the game with a dirty dog named Blenham!"

Like a dog Blenham showed his teeth. His drawn face was stamped in the image of fury.

"You're a sweet picture of a dead game sport," he growled, shifting nervously in his chair. "I ain't got a gun; you an' Barbee have; go ahead an' call me all the names you like!"

Steve counted the bank-notes in the wallet. Blenham had spoken truly; there were nine one-thousand-dollar bills. He put out his hand to Barbee for the tenth. Barbee, staring strangely like one rudely awakened from sleep and not yet certain of his surroundings, let the bank-note go. His eyes, leaving it at last to rest steadily on Blenham, looked red and ugly. Packard slipped the wallet into his shirt.

"Barbee," he said quietly, while he busied his eyes with Blenham's slightest movement, "this money was left to me by my father. He gave it to Bill Royce to keep for me. You know all that Bill has stood from Blenham; now you know why. There's quite a load of scoundrelism dumped off at Blenham's door. And, thanks to you, we've got the dead wood on him at last!"

"What are you goin' to do with him?" Barbee, speaking for the first time since Steve's entrance, was husky-voiced. Blenham shifted again in his chair; now there was only cold hatred in the boy's look. "We'd ought to be able to put him in the pen for a good long time."

Blenham laughed jeeringly.

"Try it!" he blustered. "See what you can prove, actually prove to a jury an' a judge! Try it! You go to the law an' see——"

"To hell with the law!" cut in Steve, and though his voice was not lifted for the imprecation Blenham shot a quick, startled look at him.

And both Blenham and Barbee, listening wonderingly, understood that here was a Packard talking; that in the shoes of the grandson, even now, there might be standing the big bulk of the uncompromising grandfather.

"What do I want with the law now? Blenham would wriggle out, I suppose; or he would get a light sentence and trim that down to nothing with good behavior. No, Blenham, if you ever go to jail it will be somebody's else doing; not mine. Is it just jail for the man who shot down my old pardner in cold blood, just for the sake of a handful of money? Is it to be just jail for the man who has made Bill Royce's life a hell for six months? Just jail for the brute who had a horse shot under me to-night? Why, damn you—" and at last his voice broke through the ice of restraint and rang out angrily, full of menace—"do you think I'm going to let you go out of my hands into the hands of judge and jury after all you've done?"

Blenham sprang up, drawing back. The muzzle of Steve's .45 followed him threateningly.

"Barbee," said Packard, his voice once more under control, "go to the bunk-house and send Bill Royce here. Don't wake the other boys. Then you come back here with him. And bring a whip with you."

"A whip?" repeated Barbee.

"Yes; a whip. Any kind you can lay your hands to in a hurry; quirt or buggy-whip or bull-whip!"

Blenham watched Barbee go. Then, drawn back into a corner of the room, sullen and vigilant, he stood biting nervously at a big, clenched, hairy fist.



CHAPTER XII

IN A DARK ROOM

Bill Royce, hastily and but half dressed, came promptly to the house, stumbling along at Barbee's heels. Blenham, his silence and watchfulness unbroken, still chewed at his fist. Barbee brought a heavy blacksnake in his hand.

"Barbee says you want me, Steve?" said Royce from the threshold. "An' that Blenham's here?"

"Yes, Bill," Steve answered. And to Barbee, "Close the door behind you. Lock it. Give me the key. Now fasten the shutters across both windows."

Barbee obeyed silently. Blenham's eyes followed him, seeming fascinated by the whip in Barbee's hand.

"Listen a minute, Bill," said Steve when Barbee had done. "I want to tell you something."

And, as briefly as might be, he told Royce of the ten dollar bills substituted for the real legacy, of the results of his evening in Red Creek, of Barbee's trapping Blenham, of the recovery of the ten thousand dollars, of a horse shot dead on the Red Creek road.

"Then," said Royce at the end of it, his mind catching eagerly one outstanding fact, "I was right, Steve? An' it was Blenham as gave me both barrels of Johnny Mills's shot-gun? It was Blenham for sure, wasn't it, Steve?"

"Yes, Bill. It was Blenham."

"An'—an' Blenham's right across there now? It's him I can hear breathin', Steve?"

"Yes, Bill."

"An'—an' what for did you sen' for me, Steve? What are you goin' to do to him?"

Packard beckoned to Barbee. The boy came quickly to his side, giving him the blacksnake. Steve laid it across Bill Royce's hand.

"I'm going to give him a taste of that, Bill," he said. "And I wanted you here. You can't see it; but before I am through with him, you can hear it!"

"Goin' to tie him up an' whip him, Steve? That it?"

"Pack of low-bred mongrel pups!" cried Blenham wrathfully, for the first time breaking his silence. "Sneakin', low-lived curs an' cowards!"

"That it, Steve?" persisted Royce. "Goin' to tie him up an' give him a whippin' with a blacksnake?"

"I am going to whip him—for your sake, Bill," answered Steve sternly.

He threw off his coat, tossing it behind him.

"Get the chairs and table out of the way, Barbee! No, I am not going to tie him up; that isn't necessary, Bill. I can handle him with my hands without tying him; I am going to do it. And then I am going to take the whip and lay it across him until his hide is in strips—or until he begs to be let go. Ready, Blenham?"

"Mean that?" snarled Blenham, a new look in his eye. "Mean you're goin' to give me an even break?"

But Bill Royce, fairly trembling with an eagerness strange to him, had clutched at Steve's arm, had found it, was holding him back, crying out excitedly:

"You're a good pal, Stevie; you're the best pal as ever was an' I know it! Didn't I always know you'd be like this? But can't you see, Stevie, can't you see it ain't enough another man should lick him, even when that man's my pardner, even when it's Stevie himself doin' it! Ain't I been waitin' an' waitin' to get my hands on him!"

Blenham, a little comforted by Steve's words, jeered openly now.

"Come on, Blind Billy," he taunted. "An' when I've throwed you into the junk pile I'll take on your friends! One at the time—you know how the sayin' goes!"

Steve was shaking Royce's hand from his arm.

"Let me do this for you, Bill," he said firmly. "It's only fair. If you could see, it would be different."

But Royce clung on desperately, crying out insistently:

"Blind as I am I can lick him! I know I can lick him! Ain't I done it in my sleep a dozen times, a dozen ways? Ain't I always promised myself sometime I'd get him in my two hands, I'd feel him wriggle an' squirm? This is my fight, Steve, an'—Blenham, where are you?"

"Here!" cried Blenham. "An' gettin' tired of waitin'!"

Royce plunged toward him. But Steve Packard caught his old friend about the body, holding him back a moment.

"Easy, Bill," he said gently. "Easy. I was wrong, you are right. It's your fight. But take your time. Get your coat off. Barbee, stand by that window there; if Blenham tries to get out stop him. I'll stand here. All ready, Bill?"

"Ready!" cried Royce, his voice a roar of eagerness.

"All ready, Blenham?"

"Ain't I said it?" jeered Blenham.

"Then—" and suddenly Steve had snatched up the lamp, blowing down the chimney and plunging the room into thick darkness—"go to it! The light is out, Bill! The room is pitch-black. You're as well off as he is. And now, old pardner. Now!"

It was suddenly very still in the room; the thick, impenetrable darkness seemed almost a palpable curtain screening what went forward; the silence was for a little literally breathless.

Then there came the first faint, tell-tale sound, the slow, tortured creaking of a board as a man put his weight upon it. Through the darkness, across the room, Bill Royce was going slowly, questing the man who, surprised by the action of Steve's which had reduced his advantage over a blind man, held to his corner. And then, stranger sound still through that tense silence, came Bill Royce's low laugh.

"Good boy, Steve," he said softly. "I'd never thought of that! In the dark Blenham's as blind as me! How do you like it, Blenham? How'd you like to have it this way all the time?"

Blenham's only answer lay in his leaping forward, out from his corner, and striking; Royce's answer to that was another quiet laugh. He had slipped aside; Blenham had flailed at the thin air; Royce, grown still again, knew one of the moments of sheer joy which had been his during these last weary months.

Packard and Barbee, frowning unavailingly toward each little noise, could only guess at what went forward so few inches from them. A scraping foot might be either Royce's or Blenham's; a long, deep sigh or quick breathing now here, now there, might emanate from either man. The strange thing, thought both Barbee and Packard, was that even ten seconds could pass without these two men at each other's throats.

But, a supreme moment his at last, Bill Royce found himself grown miserly in its expenditure; he would dribble the golden seconds through his fingers, he would draw out the experience, tasting its joy fully.

For the moment his blindness was no greater than Blenham's; for a little Blenham would grope and wonder and hesitate and grow tense after the fashion the blind man knew so well. And then at the end, when an end could no longer be delayed, Bill Royce would mete out the long-delayed punishment.

But, since the natures of both men were downright, since their hatreds were outright, since there was little of finesse in either and a great impatience stirring both, Royce's playing with Blenham was short.

There came a sudden shuffling of feet—and Royce's laugh; a blow landing heavily—and Royce's laugh; another blow, a grunt, and a panted curse from Blenham—and Royce's laugh.

And then only a scraping of feet up and down, back and forth along the bare floor, the thudding of heavy shoulders into an unexpected wall, the impact of fist against body. In the utter darkness the two men gripped each other, struck, swayed together, staggered apart, only to come together again to strike harder, more merciless blows.

Packard and Barbee now held their breaths while the others panted freely; both Packard and Barbee, stepping quickly now this way and now that as the battling forms swayed up and down, sought to gauge what was happening by the sounds which came to their ears.

Muttered imprecations, scuffling feet in a rude dance of rage, another heavy, thudding blow, a coughing curse. Whose? Blenham's, since after it came Bill Royce's laugh. Another blow, fresh pounding and scraping of boots—blow on top of blow, curse on top of curse—a man falling heavily——

Who was down? Royce of Blenham?

"Bill!" called Packard. "Bill!"

No answer save that of two big bodies rolling together on the floor. Both were down, Royce and Blenham. Both were fighting, wordless and infuriated. Who was on top?

No man on top long, no man under the other more than a second. The rolling bodies struck against Packard's leg and he drew back, giving them room. The dust puffing up from the floor filled his nostrils. The room was becoming unendurably close, sickeningly close. The sweat must be streaming from both men by now. Packard sniffed, fancying the acrid smell of fresh blood. The big bulks rolled and threshed and whipped here and there——

"Hell!"

It was a cry of mingled rage and pain; it came bursting explosively from Blenham's lips. Royce's laugh followed it; Packard shivered.

"Bill!" he cried. "Bill!"

Royce did not answer; perhaps for the very good reason that he did not hear. There were other matters now engaging his attention solely and exclusively. The fighting fury, the hate frenzy was riding him and he in turn was riding his enemy. Cool sanity and hot blood-lust do not find places side by side in the same brain. A second time came the horrible cry from Blenham. Packard struck a match hastily and lighted the lamp.

Packard and Barbee together dragged Royce away, letting Blenham lie there. Both men were naked to their waists, their shirts and undershirts in rags and strips hanging grotesquely about their hips; Royce looked like some hideously painted burlesque of a ballet-dancer in a comic skirt. Only there was nothing of burlesque or comedy in his face.

Packard, glancing from him down to the tortured body of Blenham that breathed jerkily, noisily, turned with a sudden revulsion of feeling and hurled the heavy blacksnake away from him. He had not fancied the sharp smell of fresh blood.

"I got him!" said Royce shakily. "With my two hands, I got him! Didn't I, Stevie?"

"Better than you know, Bill!" muttered Packard. "Better than you know."

The thing had been an accident, at least in so far as Bill Royce's intent was concerned. Packard knew that; he knew that his old pardner fought hard, fought mercilessly, but fought fair. But in a larger sense was it an accident? Or rather a mere retributive punishment decreed by an eternal justice? There in the pitch dark, for no man to see the how of it, this is perhaps what had happened:

There had been the old, long-rowelled Mexican spur hanging on the wall; Royce's shoulder or Blenham's had knocked it down; their feet had pushed it out to the middle of the floor. They had fallen, together, heavily; they had rolled. Blenham had gone over on his face, Royce's hands worrying him. The spur——

But it mattered little how it had come about. The result was the thing. Blenham would never see with his right eye again.



CHAPTER XIII

AT THE LUMBER CAMP

They did what they could for Blenham—which was but little—and let him go when he was ready. Before daylight he had ridden away, dead white, sick-looking, and wordless save for his parting words in a strangely quiet voice—

"I'll get all three of you for this, s'elp me!"

They had bound his head up in a strip torn from an old sheet; the last they saw of him in the uncertain light was this bandage, rising and falling slowly as his horse bore him away.

Blenham gone, Barbee and Bill Royce went down to the bunk-house again, slipping in quietly. Steve Packard, alone in the ranch-house, sat smoking his pipe for half an hour. Then he went to bed, the bank-notes still in his shirt, his gun under his pillow.

Twice last night he had said to Joe Woods, the lumber-camp boss, "I'll see you in the morning."

Morning come, Steve breakfasted early, saddled his horse, and turned out across the fields to meet the rising sun. And it seemed to his fancies, set a-tingle in the early dawn freshness, that the rising sun, ancient symbol of youth and vigor and hope with triumph's wings, was coming to meet him.

At this period of the day, especially when he rides and is alone and the forests thicken all about him, man is prone to confidence. It had been a simple matter, so he looked upon it now, to have discovered the truth of the substituted bills last night; as simple a matter had been his winning at seven-and-a-half or his whipping big Joe Woods or his recovery of the lost legacy.

Blenham, or rather an agent of Blenham, had killed his horse; what then? His destiny had stepped forward; Terry had come; he had whizzed back to the ranch in her car and on time.

What if the ranch were mortgaged and to the hardest man in seven counties? What though his grandfather had obviously fallen supine before the old man's tempting sin, which is avarice, and was bound to break him? Was fate not playing him for her favorite?

To Steve Packard, riding to meet the sun and to keep his promise to the lumber boss, the world just now was an exceedingly bright and lovely place; in this hour of a leaping optimism he could even picture Terry Temple in a companionably laughing mood.

So early did he take to saddle that the fag end of the dawn was still sweet in the air when he passed under the great limbs of the stragglers of the forests clothing his eastern hill-slopes. He noted how between the widely separated boles the grass was thick and rich and untrampled; reserved against the time of need. There was no stock here yet.

He passed on, swung into the little-used trail which brought him first to the McKittrick cabin where a double-barrelled shot-gun six months ago had brought Bill Royce his blindness; then to the lumber-camp a mile further on. Both were on the bank of Packard's Creek; the flume constructed by Joe Woods's men followed the line of the stream.

The new sun in his eyes, Steve drew his hat low down on his forehead and looked curiously about him. The timberjacks had come only recently; so much was obvious. They had come to stay; that was as plainly to be seen. Rough slabs of green timber, still drying and twisting and splitting as it did so, had been knocked together rudely to make a long, low building where cook and cookstove and a two-plank table indicated both kitchen and dining-room.

A half-dozen other shacks and lean-tos, seen here and there through the trees, completed the camp. Great fallen trees—they were taking only the full-grown timber—looking helpless and hopeless, lay this way and that like broken giants, majestically resigned to the conqueror's axe.

Here in the peace and quiet of the pinking day this inroad of commercialism struck Steve suddenly both as slaughter and sacrilege; among the stalwart standing patriarchs and their bowed brethren he sat his horse staring frowningly at the little ugly clutter of buildings housing the invaders.

"My beloved old granddad had his nerve with him," he grunted as he rode on into the tiny settlement. "As usual!"

The cook, yawning, bleary-eyed, unthinkably tousled, was just bestirring himself. Steve saw his back and a trailing suspender as he went into the cook-shed carrying some kindling-wood in one hand and a bucket of water in the other. It was only when Packard, having ridden to his door and looked in, startled the cook into swinging about, that the dull-eyed signs of a night of dissipation showed in the other's face.

"Up late last night, I'll bet," laughed Steve, easing himself in the saddle. The cook made a face unmistakably eloquent of a bad taste in his mouth and went down on his knees before his stove, settling slowly like a man with stiff, rheumatic joints or else a head which he did not intend to jar.

"Drunk las' night," he growled, settling back on his haunches as his fire caught. "A man that'll get drunk is a damn' fool. I'm t'rough wid it."

"Where's Woods?" asked Steve. "Up yet?"

"Yes, rot him, he's up. He's always up. He's—holy smoke, I got a head!"

"Where is he?" demanded Packard.

The cook rose gently and for a moment clasped his head with both hands. Then he immersed it gradually in his bucket of icy water. After which, drying himself with a dirty towel and setting the bucket of water on his stove, he turned red-rimmed eyes upon Steve.

"You're the guy I fed the other mornin', ain't you?" he asked.

Steve nodded.

"More'n which," continued the cook, "you're the guy as licked Woodsy las' night in Red Crick?"

Again Steve nodded.

"An' again you're claimin' to run the ranch here? An' to own it? An' to be ol' Hell-Fire's gran'son?"

"I asked you where Woods was," Packard reminded him sharply. The cook threw up his hand as though to ward off a blow.

"Whatcha yellin' in my ear for?" he moaned dismally. "Want to split my head off? Woodsy's over yonder; talkin' with a man name of Blenham. Ever hear of him?"

"Over yonder" plainly meant just across the creek where there was a little flat open space among the trees in which stood one of the larger shanties. Steve saw a stove-pipe sticking out crookedly through the shed roof; noted a thin spear of smoke. He spurred across the stream and to the timber boss's quarters.

Woods heard him and came out into the brightening morning, drawing the door closed behind him. His eyes, like the cook's though to a lesser degree, showed indications of a wild night in town. Steve guessed that he hadn't undressed all night; that he was not entirely sober just now though he carried himself steadily and spoke well enough.

"I thought you'd show," said Woods quietly, his big hands down in his pockets, his shoulders against the wall.

"What is Blenham doing here?" Steve asked.

Woods narrowed his eyes in a speculative frown.

"He's damn' near dead. He's waitin' for me to get one of the boys to hitch up an' haul him to a doctor. He says you an' two other guys gouged his eye out for him."

"He's a liar," announced Packard angrily. "The thing was an accident. It was a fair fight between him and Bill Royce. Blenham fell on an old spur. I promised you I'd be here this morning, Woods."

"Yes," said Woods. "I expected you."

"You were square with me last night," went on Packard quietly. "I appreciate the fact. If ever I can do you a favor, just say so. So much for that part of it. Next: Maybe you've heard I'm the owner of Ranch Number Ten? And that I'm running it myself? I've come over to tell you this morning that we're knocking off work here. I don't want any more timber down."

There came a little twitching at the corner of Woods's broad mouth. He made no answer.

"Hear me?" snapped Steve.

"Sure I hear you," said Woods insolently. "So does Blenham; he's right inside where he can hear. I guess it's him you want to talk with. I'm takin' my orders off'n Blenham an' nobody else."

"I've talked already with Blenham. I've told him not to set his hoofs on my ranch again after to-day. Since he's pretty badly hurt I'll let you haul him to the doctor but I don't want him hauled back. Further, I want work stopped here right now. The men will be having breakfast in a few minutes. After breakfast you can explain to them and let them go."

Woods shrugged.

"My orders, hot out'n Blenham's mouth, is to stick on the job here an' saw wood," he said colorlessly. "I'm takin' my pay off'n him an' I'm doin' what he says."

There seemed only a careless indifference in his gesture as he partly turned his back, staring up-stream; but the slight movement served to show Packard that Woods carried a gun on his hip, in plain sight. Well, Woods himself had said—"I expected you!"

Last night and for a definite purpose Steve had armed himself; this morning, setting out on this errand, he had tossed the revolver into a table drawer at the ranch-house. He had never been a gunman; if circumstance dictated that he must go armed, well and good. But his brows contracted angrily at the display of Woods's readiness for gun-play.

"Look here, you Joe Woods!" he cried out. "And listen, too, you Blenham! I'm no trouble-seeker; I know it's a dead easy thing to start a row that will see more than one man dead before it's ended, and what's the use? But I mean to have what is mine in spite of you and Hell-Fire Packard and the devil! The right of the whole deal is as plain as one and one: This is my outfit, if it is mortgaged; nobody excepting me has any business ordering my timber cut. And I say that it's not going to be cut. If there is any trouble it's up to you fellows."

From Blenham in the cabin came no sound; Woods, having glanced swiftly at Packard's angry face, again stared up-stream.

For a little Steve Packard gnawed at his lip, caught in an eddy of helpless rage. Never an answer from Blenham, never an answer from Woods; angry already, their silences maddened him. Across the creek he saw the cook standing in his kitchen door, listening and smiling in sickly fashion; two or three of the men, coming out for their breakfasts, were watching him.

They were an ugly, red-eyed bunch, he thought as he swept them with his flashing eyes; they'd fight like dogs for the joy of fighting; soon or late, if Blenham persisted, he'd have the job on his hands of throwing them off his land. Of course he could go "higher up"; he could appeal to his grandfather.

He could, but in his present mood he had no intention of doing any such thing. His grandfather, before now, should have withdrawn these men.

"Don't ask me to hold my hand!" the old man had shouted at him. "I'm goin' after you tooth an' big toe-nail!"