So this was the Ramblin' Kid, Carolyn June thought. Someway she had pictured him a blue-eyed, yellow-haired sort of composite Skinny Rawlins, Chuck, Bert Lilly, Charley Saunders all in one and with the face of a boy in the teens!

He was different. She wondered, and almost laughed at the absurd thought, if he was bow-legged. A glance at the straight limbs stretched in repose on the ground dispelled the doubt.

The suddenness with which the Ramblin' Kid had spoken and the tone he used, Carolyn June thought, was utterly unfair. She felt as if she had been ambushed. How could she know he was sleeping under the shed? Why wasn't he in the bunk-house where he belonged? Her own embarrassment made her cross. She wanted to say "damn!" and stamp her foot or throw something at him, lying there so completely self-possessed! Instead, she looked steadily into the eyes of the Ramblin' Kid. Someway as she looked they seemed not so unkind, more sorrowful they were, on closer scrutiny, than cruel. She started to speak, her cheeks began to burn—

Without a word she turned and walked rapidly toward the house.

As she moved away Carolyn June felt something snap at her knee. She did not stop. Reaching down she gathered the soft folds of the loose gown about her and hurried away from the corral.

"God!" the Ramblin' Kid whispered as he straightened up, "she's built like th' Gold Dust maverick—an' just as game! They was made for each other."

He went to the corral and leaned against the fence, studying the filly thoughtfully, while Captain Jack with a friendly whinny came and nosed at the fingers thrust through the bars. After a time the mare cautiously moved up beside the roan stallion and stretched her own velvety muzzle toward the hand the Ramblin' Kid held out.

"You want to be loved, too, you little devil!" the Ramblin' Kid laughed gently, "—you thought I was mean last night, didn't you?"

For a while he fooled with the horses, then started toward the kitchen. A few steps from where Carolyn June had been standing he glanced down at a broad pink satin elastic band lying on the ground. It had been fastened with a silver butterfly clasp. The clasp was broken. The Ramblin' Kid stooped and picked it up.

"I'll be—!" he chuckled as he fingered, almost reverently, the dainty thing, "it's a—a—darned pretty little jigger!"

Smiling whimsically the Ramblin' Kid slipped his find in his pocket and sought Sing Pete to tease him for a bite of breakfast.



CHAPTER VI

YOU'RE A BRUTE

Carolyn June went directly to her room when she reached the house. She wished to investigate the feeling of looseness at her knee. The satin band that belonged there was gone. She felt her cheeks grow hot. Doubtless she had lost it at the corral—the Ramblin' Kid would pick it up! The thought tormented her. Once more she wanted to swear vigorously and with extreme earnestness. Instead she—laughed! It was all so absurd. The strange interest this rough cowboy inspired in her; the confusion she felt when he had spoken to her—no man among all the clever, carefully groomed, ultra-sophisticated suitors she had left in Hartville ever stirred her emotions as had the Ramblin' Kid with a few drawling words and one long look from his black, inscrutable eyes. That look! She had the feeling, someway, that her whole soul was naked before it. She was almost afraid of him. It was silly! She detested him—or—anyway, he needed punishment! No, he wasn't worth it! He was only an ignorant rider of the range—why trouble at all about him?

Quickly changing her dress for a riding suit of khaki—the skirt sensibly divided—and the morning slippers for stout, tan, laced boots, she stepped into the front room. Ophelia was in her own room dressing to go to town. Carolyn June heard voices in the kitchen. Sing Pete's shrill chatter mingled with an occasional slow word from the Ramblin' Kid. Thought of the garter she had lost flashed into her mind. Perhaps the cowboy had not found it. She would run out to the corral and see. Passing quickly out the front way Carolyn June hastened again toward the circular corral. Old Heck and Parker were at the garage getting the car ready for the drive to Eagle Butte; Pedro and Chuck were riding across the valley toward the upper pasture. The other cowboys saddled their horses near the barn.

As she walked, Carolyn June scanned the ground. At the corral she looked carefully where she had been standing. Her search was fruitless. She smiled queerly. Again she glanced at the Gold Dust maverick.

"You darling," she whispered, "I am going to have you—I am—I absolutely am!"

Turning, her eyes rested on the saddle, chaps and riding gear lying in the shed where the Ramblin' Kid had slept. Carolyn June stepped close to the outfit.

"I have a notion to—to spit on you!" she said vehemently, "or kick—" but she didn't finish the sentence. One tan shoe had been drawn back as if to be swung viciously at the inoffensive pile of riding gear; it paused, suspended, then gently, almost caressingly, pushed the leather chaps which suddenly seemed to Carolyn June to look limp and worn and pathetically tired.

As Carolyn June returned to the house Parker drove the car around to the front; Old Heck joined the cowboys, already mounting their bronchos, and with them rode down the lane in the direction of the lower field. Skinny came out of the barn, leading Pie Face and Old Blue. He left the horses standing and at the back-yard gate overtook Carolyn June. As they stepped inside the yard the Ramblin' Kid appeared at the kitchen door.

"There's the Ramblin' Kid now," Skinny said as they approached. "Hello, Kid," he continued, "I see you got the filly—Excuse me, I guess you folks ain't acquainted."

Haltingly he introduced them.

Without the flicker of an eyelid the Ramblin' Kid looked into the eyes of Carolyn June. He had seen her coming from the corral and guessed correctly the reason for her second visit to the enclosure. Indeed at that moment his hand was in his pocket toying with the delicate souvenir for which she had gone to search. Yet his face was utterly without emotion as he lifted his hat and stood aside, acknowledging with formal words the introduction. "It's sure a surprisin' day an' pleasant—" he finished, emphasizing "surprisin'" and "pleasant" till Carolyn June could have sworn there was a veiled taunt in the words he spoke.

She was equally calm. Smiling sweetly and with not a hint of a previous meeting she said: "I think I have heard of the Ramblin' Kid." Pausing a moment: "It's always peaceful after a storm!" she added enigmatically. And the Ramblin' Kid, as Skinny and the girl passed around to the front of the house, knew that Carolyn June had hurled a lance!

"A natural born heart-breaker," he said to himself as he went toward the bunk-house, "a genuine, full-grown vampire, part intentional an' part because it's in her—but she's a pure-bred—" He grew pensive and silent, a look of gentleness came to his face, followed quickly by an expression of extreme humility. "Oh, hell," he exclaimed aloud, "what's th' use!" Entering the building the Ramblin' Kid seated himself at the table at the end of the room. He pulled the pink satin elastic from his pocket and gazed at it, rubbing the soft fabric tenderly with the end of his thumb. His eyes lighted suddenly with anger and contempt. He threw the band violently across the room into a corner. "I wasn't raised to associate with luxuries like that!" he exclaimed with mingled bitterness and scorn, "—a damned ign'rant cow-puncher dreamin' dreams about an angel!" he finished with a harsh laugh. For a while he sat silent, gazing down at the table. Then he got up, went over and lifted the garter from where it had fallen and replaced it in his pocket. "Oh, well," he chuckled less bitterly and whimsically added, "—any idiot can smile at th' mornin' star even if th' darned thing is beyond his reach! Besides, she don't need to ever know—" Leaving the bunk-house he went toward the circular corral.

Parker climbed from the car and entered the house, asking if Ophelia was ready.

"In just a moment!" the widow called from her room.

"What are you and me going to do?" Skinny asked Carolyn June as they stepped on to the porch, "take a ride?"

"On 'Old Blue'?" Carolyn June questioned scornfully, then, with resignation, as they went inside the house: "Oh, well—I suppose, after a while. I have some letters to write now," and she entered her room leaving Skinny standing perplexed by her varying moods. He looked foolishly at Parker a moment. Going to the graphophone he put on a record—

"I'm forever blowing bubbles, pretty bubbles in the air!"

wailed disconsolately through the house.

"Good heavens," Carolyn June called, "do you blow bubbles this early in the morning?"

"Don't you like it?" Skinny asked soberly. "I thought that was a pretty good tune."

"I'm crazy about it!" Carolyn June answered sarcastically. "There and then, but not here and now—"

"Where and when?" Skinny queried innocently.

"In the valley of the moon at the end of a perfect day!" she laughed back. "—Forgive me, I couldn't help it!"

"What does she mean?" Skinny asked Parker in a whisper. "Is she making fun of me?"

"No, you blamed fool," Parker replied, "she feels good and is just joking—"

Skinny brightened up immediately.

"That's a good one," he called to Carolyn June with a snicker; "I never thought of it before!"

A ripple of laughter came from Carolyn June's room.

"Really, I don't mind," she said; "play Bubbles as much as you like—I think it's rather soothing, but truly I must write my letters now so Ophelia can take them to town."

Half an hour later Ophelia appeared dressed for the drive to Eagle Butte. Carolyn June and Skinny went out on the front porch and watched the widow and Parker climb into the Clagstone "Six." As Parker started the engine Skinny suddenly called to him. Parker sat with his foot on the clutch while Skinny hurried out to the car.

"What do you want?" he asked impatiently, "We've got to be going!"

"Lean over here," Skinny said, his face flushing scarlet, "I want to tell you something."

"Well?"

"Stop at the Golden Rule and get me a white shirt size number fifteen and—a purple necktie if they've got any!" Skinny whispered.

Ophelia heard and choked back a laugh.

"Thunderation, he's plumb locoed!" Parker exclaimed, as he jammed the clutch into gear and the car sprang forward.

"Don't forget it, Parker," Skinny called earnestly, "I actually need it!"

Carolyn June and Skinny stood on the porch and watched the car climb the grade and out on to the bench. The storm of the night before had washed the earth clean and cooled the air. A faint after-breeze fanned the tree-tops. The Costejo peaks stood out, with stereoscopical clearness, against a cloudless sky. The day was a challenge to one who loved the open.

"You may saddle 'Old Blue,'" Carolyn June said to Skinny. "—I'll see if I can 'stick on him' long enough to ride as far as the river!"

"He's already saddled," Skinny replied, "him and Old Pie Face both."

"Man, dear," she cried in mock misunderstanding, "you surely are not expecting me to ride the two of them at once!"

"No," he answered meekly, "Old Pie Face is my horse, I'm going to ride him and go with you."

"Indeed!" she exclaimed, then laughing mischievously. "Oh, certainly—that's a good one—I hadn't thought of it before!"

"Don't you want me to go?" Skinny asked doubtfully.

"Surely. I should be utterly unhappy if you didn't—I'll get my hat."

"Blamed if I can figure her out," Skinny said to himself as Carolyn June ran lightly into the house. "She keeps a feller freezing to death and burning up all at once—sort of in heaven and hell both mixed together."

A white, medium-brimmed felt hat was set jauntily on the fluffy brown hair when she reappeared. Skinny's heart leaped hungrily. Carolyn June was a picture of perfect physical fitness. The cowboy silently wondered how long he could keep from making "a complete, triple-expansion, darned fool of himself!"

"I'm glad you want me to go," he said, renewing the conversation as they started around the house, "because I wanted to and, well, anyhow it's my job—"

"What do you mean 'your job'?" Carblyn June asked quickly.

Skinny was stricken silent. He realized he was on dangerous ground. He wasn't sure it would be wise to tell her what he meant. Someway he felt Carolyn June would resent it if she knew he was drawing wages for acting the lover to her. It seemed wholly impossible for him, just at that moment, to explain that, although Old Heck was paying him ten dollars a month extra salary to court, temporarily, his attractive niece, he, Skinny Rawlins, would personally be overjoyed to reverse the order and give his entire income, adding a bonus as well, for the privilege of continuing indefinitely and of his own choice the more than pleasant employment. Yet this was the literal truth, so quickly had his susceptible heart yielded to the charms of the girl. But he dared not try to tell her. He knew the words would not come and if they did he would probably choke on them and she, not believing the truth, would detest him. Skinny had heard of men who courted girls of wealth to win their money and with sincere contempt he despised these degenerates of his sex. Now, suddenly, he felt that he himself was in their class. The thought made him sick, actually caused his stomach to quiver with a sort of nausea.

"Skinny Rawlins," Carolyn June said sternly, stopping and looking straight at the confused and mentally tortured cowboy, "tell me—and don't lie—what you meant when you said to go with me was 'your job!'"

Skinny raised his eyes; in them was piteous appeal.

"I meant—I—" he hesitated.

"Tell me the truth," she ordered relentlessly, "or I'll—I'll—do something awful!"

"I meant it was my job—" suddenly inspired, he blurted out, "to ride Old Pie Face. He's—he's dangerous and has to be rode every so often to keep him from getting worse and to-day's the day to ride him!"

"Skinny," Carolyn June spoke gently, "I feel sorry for you. I want to like you and I'm disappointed. It breaks my heart to say it but you are a liar—you're just a common double dashed liar—like Uncle Josiah was when he sent that telegram saying there was smallpox at the Quarter Circle KT—"

"Am I?" Skinny asked humbly.

"You are," she retorted impatiently, "and you know it—"

"Do I?" as if dazed.

"You do, and did all the time—"

"Did I?" he felt like a parrot.

"You did!" Carolyn June snapped. "Good heavens," she continued, "why do men think they have to lie to women? Common sense and experience ought to teach them they can never fool them long—I hoped out here in the big West I would find one man who wouldn't lie—"

"Th' Ramblin' Kid won't," Skinny said as if suddenly struck by a bright thought, "—he wouldn't lie to you!"

Carolyn June laughed scornfully.

"Oh, yes he would," she declared, "all of them do—every last one of the poor frail"—contemptuously—"turtles!"

"But th' Ramblin' Kid wouldn't," Skinny persisted; "he won't lie to anybody."

"Not even to a woman?" she questioned incredulously.

"No," he answered positively, "I'm sure he wouldn't."

"And why wouldn't he?" she asked.

"Well," Skinny replied, "for one thing he don't give a darn. Th' Ramblin' Kid don't care what anybody, man, woman or anything else thinks about him or whether they like what he says or not so there ain't any use of him lying. Maybe he wouldn't tell what was in his mind unless you asked him, but if you did ask him he'd say what it was whether he thought it satisfied you or not. He's funny that way. He just naturally don't seem to be built for telling lies and he wouldn't do it—"

"Oh, Skinny, poor simple Skinny!" Carolyn June laughed. "You don't know men—men when they're dealing with women! Through all the unnamed years of my life I've never found one man who was absolutely truthful when talking with a 'female.' They think they have to lie to women. They do it either to keep from hurting them—or else they do it intentionally for the purpose of hurting them, one or the other! And they are so stupid! No man can hide anything long from a woman—"

Reaching over she jerked a spray of tiny roses from the rambler at the window near which they were standing; tapping the blossoms against her lips, beginning to smile whimsically, she continued: "Why, I can almost read your own thoughts right now! If I wanted to I could tell you more about what is in your mind than you yourself could tell—"

"Could you?" Skinny said, a guilty look coming in his eyes.

"For one thing," Carolyn June went on, ignoring the inane question, "you are in love—"

"I ain't!" the over-hasty denial slipped from his lips unintentionally.

"Lie!" she laughed, "you can't help telling 'em, can you? And you are thinking—" She paused while her eyes rested demurely on the roses in her hand.

"What am I thinking?" Skinny asked breathlessly.

Before she could reply an agonized spitting, yowling and hissing, accompanied by the rattle of tin, came from behind the kitchen. "What's that?" Carolyn June cried half frightened at the instant a yellow house cat, his head fastened in an old tomato can, came bouncing backward, clawing and scratching, from around the corner.

"Gee whiz!" Skinny exclaimed, "it's that darned cat again—Sing Pete goes and dabs butter in the bottoms of the cans and the fool cat sticks his head in trying to lick it out and gets fastened. It looks like the blamed idiot would learn sometime. It's what I call a rotten joke anyhow!"

Sing Pete appeared at the kitchen door cackling with fiendish joy at the success of his ruse.

Carolyn June stared, apparently stricken dumb by the antics of the struggling animal.

"Sun-fish! Go to it—you poor deluded son-of-sorrow!" The Ramblin' Kid, who, unnoticed by Carolyn June and Skinny, at that moment had come from the corral and stood leaning against the fence, chuckled half pityingly, yet making no move toward the creature.

"Catch him and take it off," Carolyn June cried, "it's hurting him!"

Skinny started toward the rapidly gyrating jumble of claws, can and cat.

"I will if the darn' thing'll hold still a minute!" he said.

Carolyn June looked at the Ramblin' Kid, still leaning against the fence watching the cat's contortions.

"Why don't you help him?" she asked impatiently. "Skinny can't do it alone—can't you see it's choking?"

"No, he's not choking," the Ramblin' Kid replied without moving from where he stood, "—he's sufferin' some, but he ain't chokin'. He's got quite a lot of wind yet an' is gettin' some valuable experience. That cat's what I call a genuine acrobat!" he mused as the terrified creature leaped frantically in the air and somersaulted backward, striking and clawing desperately to free itself of the can tightly wedged on its head.

Carolyn June was accustomed to obedience from men creatures. The Ramblin' Kid's indifference to her request, together with his apparent cruelty in refusing to aid in relieving the cat from its torturing dilemma, angered and piqued the girl.

"Help Skinny take it off, I tell you!" she repeated, "haven't you a spark of sympathy—"

The Ramblin' Kid resented her tone and detected as well the note of wounded pride. Instinctively he felt that at that instant the cat, with Carolyn June, had become a secondary consideration.

"Well, some, I reckon," he answered, speaking deliberately, "generally a little, but right now darned little for that old yaller cat. I figure he's a plumb free moral agent," he continued as if speaking to himself; "he got his head in that can on his own hook an' it's up to him to get it out or let it stay in this time, just as he pleases—"

"But Sing Pete put butter in the can!" Carolyn June said, arguing.

"He's done it before," the Ramblin' Kid answered with a glance at the Chinese cook still gleefully enjoying the results of his cruel joke. "He won't no more. But that don't make no difference," he laughed, "th' darn' cat hadn't ought to have yielded to temptation!"

"You're a brute!" she exclaimed passionately, "—an ignorant, savage, stupid brute—" The harsh words sprang from the lips of Carolyn June before she thought. The Ramblin' Kid flinched involuntarily as if he had been struck full in the face. A look came in his eyes that almost made her regret what she had said.

"I reckon I am," he replied, gazing steadily at her without feeling or resentment and speaking slowly, "yes, I'm an 'ign'rant, savage, stupid brute,'" deliberately accenting each word as he repeated the stinging phrase, "—but—what's the use?" he finished with a mirthless laugh. "Anyhow," he added, glancing again at the cat and Skinny's futile efforts to catch it, "I ain't interferin' this time, at least, with that damned cat!"

Carolyn June knew she had hurt with her unintentionally cruel words. For an instant there was a humane impulse to temper their severity.

"I—I—didn't—" she started to say, but the Ramblin' Kid had turned and, ignoring the cat, Skinny and herself, was leaning on the fence with his back to her, looking off across the valley, apparently lost in thought. She did not finish the sentence.

The cat bucked its way to the fence. As it went under the wire the can caught on a barb of the lower strand. Jerking furiously, the animal freed itself from the can, leaving splotches of hair and hide on the ragged edges of tin. Still spitting and clawing, with its tail standing out like an enormous yellow plume, it dashed toward the barn, eager to put distance between itself and the thing that had been torturing it.

"Gosh a'mighty," Skinny said, sweating with the exertion and the excitement of trying to catch the cat, "it'll be noon before we get started for that ride!"

"We'll go now," Carolyn June answered, "—before some other horrible thing occurs."

"We're going over to the river and maybe out on the sand-hills a ways," Skinny casually remarked to the Ramblin' Kid as Carolyn June and he passed through the gate. "Oh, yes," he added, "Chuck said tell you he took your rope—there was a weak spot in his and he didn't get it fixed yesterday!"

The Ramblin' Kid did not answer.

Skinny had been wrong about the Ramblin' Kid not caring what any one thought of him. He was supersensitive of his roughness, his lack of education and conscious crudeness, and the words of Carolyn June were still in his mind. When Skinny and the girl were going toward their horses the Ramblin' Kid turned and entered the gate. Sing Pete was still at the kitchen door.

The Ramblin' Kid stepped up to him.

"You damned yellow heathen," he said in a level voice, "if you ever play that trick on that cat again th' Quarter Circle KT will be shy a cook an' your ghost'll be headin' pronto for China!"

Without waiting for a reply he went back to the gate and watched Skinny and Carolyn June ride down the lane. The deftness and skill with which the girl handled the horse she rode forced a smile of admiration to the lips of the Ramblin' Kid. She sat close in the saddle and a glance showed she was a born master of horses. "She's a wonder," he said to himself, "a teetotal wonder—" A shade of melancholy passed over his face. "An ign'rant, savage, stupid brute!" he murmured bitterly, "well, I reckon she was right—Hell!" he exclaimed aloud, "I wonder if Skinny'll remember about that upper crossin' bein' dang'rous with quicksand after the rain—Guess he did," he finished as the two riders turned to the right toward the lower and more distant river ford and disappeared among the willows and cottonwood trees that fringed the Cimarron.



CHAPTER VII

THE GREEDY SANDS

When the Ramblin' Kid, working the rope-conquered and leg-weary Gold Dust maverick from the North Springs back to the Quarter Circle KT, crossed the Cimarron at dawn Captain Jack and the filly swam a raging, drift-burdened river. Less than twelve hours later Carolyn June and Skinny, at the lower ford, rode into a stream that again was normal. Old Blue and Pie Face splashed through water barely reaching the stirrup leathers. Only the fresh rubbish flung out on the meadows by the flood's quick anger or lodged in the willows, still bent by the pressure of the torrent that had rushed over them and slimy with yellow sediment left on their branches and leaves, told the story of the swift rise and fall of the Cimarron the night before.

On the bluff north of the river Carolyn June and Skinny checked their horses while the girl gazed down on the panorama of green fields, narrow lanes, corrals and low buildings of the Quarter Circle KT. The sight thrilled her. On all the Kiowa range there was no more entrancing view.

"It's kind of pretty, ain't it?" Skinny ventured.

"Beautiful!" she breathed.

"I'd—I'd like to stand here and look at it always—if you—if you'd enjoy it!" he said and was instantly appalled by his own audacity.

Carolyn June flashed a quick look at him.

"We had better go on," she said, then added lightly: "Does it always affect you so when you get this view of the valley?"

"No. But, well, somehow it's different this morning—maybe it's because you are here!" he blurted out hurriedly.

"Please," she said, starting Old Blue toward the west along the crest of the ridge, "don't be sentimental. I'm afraid—" she added, intending to say it would spoil their ride.

"You needn't be, with me along!" Skinny interrupted hastily, misinterpreting her meaning.

She laughed and without explaining urged her horse forward.

Skinny followed pensively on Old Pie Face.

The Ramblin' Kid, while going from barn to corral, glanced across the valley and saw Carolyn June and Skinny as they rode along the ridge. It was two miles from the ranch to the bluff on which they were riding, but so clear was the rain-washed air that the horses and riders were easily recognized. He watched them until they reached the corner of the upland pasture. There the roads from the lower and upper fords came together. The couple turned north along the fence and disappeared beyond the ridge.

For a mile Carolyn June and Skinny rode without speaking. He felt already a reaction from his over-boldness of a while ago and silently swore at himself for his rashness. She was not eager to resume a conversation that had threatened a painfully emotional turn. She was quite content to enjoy the fresh air of the morning, the changing scenes through which they passed and the easy motion of the horse on which she was mounted.

The bronchos pricked forward their ears at the sound of galloping hoofs.

"Somebody's coming," Skinny spoke as Pedro, riding rapidly toward them, rounded the point of a low hill a little distance ahead.

"What's wrong?" Skinny questioned, when the three met and stopped their horses.

"The pasture fence is bu'sted," Pedro answered; "at the northeast corner it is broke. The cattle are out. Ten—fifteen maybe—are dead—the lightning strike them perhaps. The others all of them are gone. They go pronto, stampede I think, toward the Purgatory. Chuck and me can not get them alone—I go to tell Old Heck so the boys will come and help!"

It was plain to Skinny what had occurred. The cattle had drifted before the storm until stopped by the wire. While crowded against it a bolt of lightning had struck the fence, followed the metal strands, and killed the animals touching or nearest to it. In the fright the others plunged madly forward and had broken their way to freedom. Five hundred Diamond Bar steers, recently bought by Old Heck and brought from the Purgatory forty-five miles north of the Quarter Circle KT were out and rushing back to their former range.

"You go help Chuck," Skinny said to Pedro. "Carolyn June and me will turn around and take the news to Old Heck and send some of the boys to help you. If them cattle ain't bunched before they hit the Purgatory and get scattered over their old range it will take a month to gather them and get them back again!"

"Why don't you yourself go with Pedro and Chuck?" Carolyn June asked Skinny. "I can ride to the ranch alone and tell the others about it."

"I'm supposed to stay with—" he begun.

"With me, I presume," she interrupted. "Well, this is one time you don't. Go on with the boys. You are needed after those steers a lot more than you are to 'herd' me back to the ranch!"

Without waiting to argue she wheeled Old Blue toward the Quarter Circle KT. Skinny watched her a moment, then started with Pedro in the other direction. Suddenly checking his horse he swung around in the saddle.

"Go back the way we came!" he called after the girl. "Don't try the upper ford!"

Carolyn June looked around and threw up her hand, motioning toward the north. Thinking that she understood, Skinny touched Old Pie Face with the spurs and soon overtook the Mexican.

He was mistaken. Carolyn June had not understood the warning. The distance was too great for his words to reach her distinctly. She thought he was merely protesting against her going alone. At the fork of the road she saw that the trail that led to the upper ford was much the nearer way to the ranch. Reining Old Blue into it she rode swiftly along the ridge and down the slope toward the dangerous crossing.

* * * * *

The Ramblin' Kid spent the morning at the circular corral. He was studying the moods and working to win the confidence of the Gold Dust maverick. He was watching her and thinking always a little ahead of the thought that was in the mind of the mare. His love for a horse and understanding of the wonderfully intelligent animals was as natural as were the brown eyes, the soft low voice, the gentle but strong touch, by which it was expressed. He wooed the outlaw filly thoughtfully, carefully, as a lover courts a sweetheart. The beautiful creature reminded him of Carolyn June. "They was made for each other!" he repeated softly as he worked with the mare. From the corral he could see the road across the river where Skinny and the girl had gone. Often he turned his eyes in that direction.

He was fingering the garter in his pocket and looking toward the river when Carolyn June appeared on the ridge as she returned alone to the ranch. He stood and watched her. The ugly words she had spoken at the gate came into his mind and a bitter smile curled his lips. Still he watched the girl, expecting Skinny would ride into view. She turned down the ridge toward the upper ford.

"That's funny," he thought, "wonder where Skinny's at?" Then it flashed through his mind that something must be wrong for the girl was riding alone. "Hell!" he exclaimed aloud, "she's by herself an' headin' straight for th' upper ford!" Only an instant he paused. "Jack!" he cried sharply, running to the corral gate and swinging it partly open. "Come—quick!"

The roan stallion started at a trot toward the gate, then, trained to obey instantly the word of the master he loved better than life, leaped nimbly through the opening. Slamming and fastening the gate the Ramblin' Kid ran to the shed, the broncho at his side. He threw the blanket and saddle on the little roan, cinched quickly but carefully the double gear, slipped the bit into the waiting mouth of the horse and without stopping to put on his chaps sprang on Captain Jack's back and whirled him in a dead run around the corner of the shed and down the lane toward the north. At the pasture corral below the barn he guided the broncho close to the fence and scarcely checking him leaned over and lifted a rope, coiled and hung on a post near the gate, from its place—the one Chuck that morning had left because of the flaw.

"God!" he groaned, "—an' a bad rope!"

He glanced toward the ridge across the river. Carolyn June had disappeared down the trail that led to the upper ford.

"Go, Little Man, go—for th' love of God, go!" the Ramblin' Kid whispered as he leaned forward over the neck of the horse. Captain Jack answered the agonized appeal as he would never have responded to the cruel cut of spurs and leaped ahead in a desperate race to beat Old Blue and his precious burden to the greedy sands of the Cimarron.

As he rode, the Ramblin' Kid slipped his hand around the coils of the rope till his fingers found the broken strands that told of the weakness that caused Chuck to leave it behind that morning. Bending over it, while his horse ran, he worked frantically to weave a rawhide saddle string into the fiber and so strengthen the dangerous spot.

* * * * *

Thinking only to reach the ranch as quickly as possible Carolyn June guided Old Blue down the trail and through the thin patches of willows and cottonwood trees that grew along the river. The stream looked innocent enough and the crossing perfectly safe. Swift but apparently shallow water flowed close to the northern bank. Beyond that was a clean, pebble strewn bar and then a smaller, narrower prong of the river. On the south side stretched a white, unbroken expanse of sand a hundred feet or more wide and ending against the low slope of the meadow land.

At the brink of the stream Old Blue stopped short and refused to go on.

"What's the matter," Carolyn June laughed lightly, "—afraid of getting your 'little tootsies' wet?"

The horse reared backward when she tried to urge him ahead and wheeled half around in an effort to get away from the water.

"Look here, Old Fellow," she spoke sharply, tightening the reins as she touched his flank with her spur, "we haven't time for foolishness! Generally, in fact always," accenting the last word, "horses—and men—go in the direction I want them to go! Why, you're as stubborn—as—as the Ramblin' Kid!" she finished with another laugh as Old Blue, with a snort of fear, yet not daring to resist further the firm hand and firmer will of his rider, stepped into the water.

"Gee, when you do start you go in a hurry, don't you?" Carolyn June said as the broncho went rapidly forward as if eager to negotiate the crossing, seeming to know that safety lay in the quickness and lightness of his tread. As he lunged ahead the girl had the sensation that the saddle was sinking from under her. Reaching the firmer footing of the gravel bar in the center of the stream Old Blue tried again to turn about.

"Go on!" Carolyn June cried impatiently yet with a feeling somehow of impending danger she could not wholly define, "—you've got to do it, so you had as well quit your nonsense and go ahead!" at the same time raking the horse's sides sharply again with the spurs.

Crossing the shallow branch of the river the broncho reached the smooth, firm appearing beach of sand.

With his head down, his muzzle almost touching the ground, as if scenting, feeling, his way, he went forward stepping rapidly, easily, as possible. At each step his foot slipped lower into the yielding, quivering mass. Carolyn June felt him tremble and the sensation that the horse was being pulled from under her grew more and more pronounced. She noticed how he sank into the sand and observed also the sweat beginning to darken the hair on the neck of her mount.

"Pretty soft, isn't it?" she said, speaking to the broncho kindly as though to encourage him and perhaps at the same time to allay a bit the queer sense of uneasiness she felt, for even yet she did not realize the danger into which she had unknowingly ridden.

Half-way to the firm black soil of the southern bank of the stream Old Blue's front feet seemed suddenly to give way beneath him. He began to plunge desperately. Then it was the truth came to Carolyn June. Her cheeks grew white.

"The quicksand!" she exclaimed aloud, at the same time trying to help the horse with a lift of the reins. It was too late to turn back. Her only salvation lay in reaching the solid ground such a few yards ahead—and yet so fearfully far away. Old Blue struggled madly to go forward, gaining a little but at each effort sinking deeper into the sand. Carolyn June tried to encourage him with words:

"Come on, come on! Good Little Horse—you can make it! Keep trying—that's it—now!—you're doing it! Brave Old Blue—don't give up—don't give up, Boy!" she pleaded, pity for the horse causing her almost to forget her own terrible peril.

It was useless.

Twenty-five feet from safety Old Blue's front quarters went down until his breast was against the sand. The hind legs were buried to the stifles. He wallowed and floundered helplessly. His hoofs touched nothing solid on which to stand. He stretched his head forward, straining-to lift himself away from that horrible, clinging suction. His efforts only forced him down—down—always down!

Carolyn June's own feet were in the sand. She threw herself from the saddle—as far to one side and ahead of the horse as she could. With her weight removed perhaps Old Blue could get out. Anyway it was death to stay on the horse. Perhaps alone she could escape—she was lighter—the sand might hold her up—by moving rapidly surely she could go that short twenty-five feet to the firm ground ahead of her. At the first step she sank half-way to her thigh. She fell forward thinking to crawl on her hands and knees. Her arms went into the mass to the shoulder. Silently—without a word—but with horrible fear gripping her heart she fought the sand. She sank deeper—slowly—steadily—surely. The hellish stuff closed about her body to the waist. If she only had something—anything—solid to hold to! She took off her hat, grasped the edges of the brim, reached her arms out and tried to use the frail disk of felt for a buoy. It held a moment then gradually settled below the surface of the shifting, elusive substance. Again and again she lifted the hat free from the sand and sought to place it so it would bear a part at least of her weight. Her efforts were vain. The insidious mass crept higher and higher on her body. She remembered reading that one caught in the quicksand by his struggles only hastened his own destruction. She tried to be perfectly still. In spite of all she was sinking—sinking—the sand was engulfing her.

During all her struggles Carolyn June remained silent. She had not thought to cry out. Somehow she could not realize that she was to die. The sun was bright, the sky cloudless, the trees along the river-bank barely swayed in a little breeze! How beautiful the world! How queer that such a little distance away was the green grass of the meadow and the firm black earth in which it was rooted and she—she was held fast and helpless in the embrace of the deadly sand! Strange thoughts rushed through her mind. She wondered what they would think at the ranch when night came and she did not return. Would they know? Would they guess the thing that had happened? Would the sand draw her down—down—until it covered her so none would ever know where or how she died? She looked at Old Blue. "Poor old fellow!" she whispered, "I am sorry—I didn't know—it looked so white and firm and safe!" The sand was half-way up the sides of the horse and he swayed his body in pathetic, futile efforts to free himself.

A strange calm came over Carolyn June. So this was the end? She was to die alone, horribly, in the treacherous sands of the Cimarron? Surely it could not be—God would not let her die! She was so young! She had just begun to live—She thought of Hartville, her father, the old friends. How far away they seemed! How queer it was—she could not image in her mind any of the familiar scenes, the face of her father or any of the friends she had known so well! She tried to think of her Uncle Josiah, Ophelia, Skinny Rawlins—poor fellow, how susceptible was his big, innocent, boyish heart! She called each one up in a mental effort to remember how they had looked, the sound of their voices—they were only names—dim shadowy names! There was nothing in the whole world but Old Blue—herself—and the sand—the sand—an eternity of sand pulling, dragging, sucking her down! She closed her eyes tightly, thinking to shut out the impression of utter loneliness. The face of the Ramblin' Kid flashed into her mind! She could see him! She saw him lying under the shed, as he had looked that morning, his head resting on the saddle, his eyes gazing steadily into her own; she saw him again as he had looked when she stung him with her harsh words at the gate. She seemed to see the agonized humility in his expression and hear the low tenseness of his voice as he repeated aloud the words she had used—"An ign'rant, savage, stupid brute!" She laughed almost hysterically. "Why can I see him—just him—and not the others? Has he come to—to—haunt me?" she finished with a gasp.

The sand had reached her breast. How long before it clutched at her throat? Her mouth? Her eyes? Ah, would she hold up her arm as she went down—down—and reach out her hand as if to wave the world a last, long farewell? "I will—I will!" she cried, the pressure around her body almost stopping her breath, "I—I—will—and—wiggle my fingers to the end!" she added with a choking half-hysterical laugh, so tightly did she cling to life. Her mood changed. "I—guess—I ought to pray!" she said, "but—I—God—God knows anyhow!" her voice trailing away to a whisper as if she had grown suddenly, utterly, tired. She stretched out her hands once more with the hat, trying to use it to buoy her up. Under the weight of her arms it sank in the sand. She tossed it to one side. "It will—stay—on top by itself," she choked. "I—I—will leave it—maybe they will find it—and know—" She felt her senses were leaving her. Even yet she had not called for help. It had not occurred to her that rescue was possible. As if it were an echo to her thoughts there came the throbbing tattoo of hoofs pounding the earth. She listened intently. Some one was riding down the lane toward the river from the ranch! The horse was evidently running—running madly, desperately. Would he cross at the upper or lower ford? Her heart pulsed with heavy dull throbs. The sand was crushing her chest. A wave of weakness swept over her. She almost fainted. At that instant Captain Jack, carrying the Ramblin' Kid, leaped through an opening in the willows and stopped—his front feet plowing the firm ground at the edge of the quivering beach of sand.

"Pure luck!" the Ramblin' Kid breathed fervently, his eye quickly measuring the distance to the nearly exhausted girl; "she's close enough I can reach her with th' rope! God, if it'll only hold!" Already the coils were in his hand. With a single backward fling of the noose and forward toss he dropped the loop over the head of Carolyn June.

"Pull it up—close—under your arms!" he commanded shortly, "an' hang on with your hands to take th' strain off your body!"

The girt obeyed without a word.

He double half-hitched the rope to the horn of the saddle, swung Captain Jack around. "Look out!" he called to the girl as he started away from the brink of the sand. "Steady, Boy, be careful—" to the broncho. The slack gradually tightened. The strain drew on Carolyn June's arms till it seemed they would be pulled from the sockets. The rope cut cruelly into her body under her shoulders. She wanted to cry—to scream—to laugh. She did neither. She threw back her head and clung with all her strength to the rough lariat, stretched taut as a cable of steel.

The Ramblin' Kid leaned forward in the saddle, his body half turned, eyes looking back along the straight line of the severely tested rope. He swore softly, steadily, under his breath. "God—if it will only hold—if it only don't break!"

Slowly, surely, the little stallion leaned his weight against the tensely drawn riata and Carolyn June felt herself lifted, inch by inch, out of the sand that engulfed her. At last she fell forward—her body free. Without stopping the horse the Ramblin' Kid continued away from the river-bank and dragged the girl across the yielding surface to the solid earth and safety. The instant she was where he could reach her he whirled Captain Jack and rode quickly back. Carolyn June was trying to get to her feet when he sprang from the broncho and helped her to the firm ground on which he stood. She was panting and exhausted.

"Get—get—Old Blue out!" she gasped and dropped limply down on the grass, fingering at the rope to remove it from around her body.

"Danged if she ain't got more heart than I thought she had!" the Ramblin' Kid said to himself as he lifted the loop from over her head. "I'm goin' to," he said aloud, "if I can—but—I'm afraid he's gone. I'll try anyhow—you lay there an' rest—" at the same time remounting his horse.

The sand covered the rump of Old Blue. The saddle, Parker's it was, was nearly submerged, only the horn and cantle showing above the slimy mass. His head, neck and the top of his withers were yet exposed. He still struggled, wallowing feebly, vainly resisting the downward pull of the sand. Crouching, as if fascinated by the terrible scene, Carolyn June watched as the Ramblin' Kid, waiting his opportunity, at the instant the horse in the sand lifted his head deftly flung the rope over his neck. With a short jerk of the wrist he tightened the noose till it closed snugly about the throat of the broncho. Again turning Captain Jack away from the bank he urged him slowly forward. The rope stiffened. The little stallion bunched himself and desperately strained against the dead weight of Old Blue, multiplied many times by the suction of the sand. The Ramblin' Kid leaned far over the neck of Captain Jack to give the horse the advantage of his own weight and looked back, watching the supreme efforts of the mired broncho as he fought to climb out of the sand. A moment it looked as if the little roan would drag him out. Slowly he seemed to be raising and moving forward. There was a sharp snap. Half-way down its length the lariat parted. At the weak spot the strain was too great. Captain Jack plunged forward to his knees, his nose rooting the earth, and the Ramblin' Kid barely saved himself from pitching over the horse's head.

"That's what I was dreadin'—" he said as he turned and rode back to the edge of the sand.

Carolyn June gazed, wide-eyed, speechless with horror, at the horse in the sand. When the rope broke, Old Blue, with a groan almost human, sank back and quickly settled down until only his head and part of his neck were exposed to view. The Ramblin' Kid looked at the broken rope—the end fastened around the throat of Old Blue had whipped back and was lying far beyond the cowboy's reach. The piece half-hitched to the saddle horn was too short for another throw. Old Blue was doomed. Carolyn June saw him sinking gradually, surely, into the sand. It seemed ages. His eyes appealed with dumb pathos to the group on the bank. They could hear his breath coming in harsh, terrible gasps. The sand seemed to be deliberately torturing him as though it were some hellish thing, alive and of fiendish cunning, that grasped its victim and then paused in his destruction to gloat over his hopeless agony.

The Ramblin' Kid sat Captain Jack and watched.

"Why did God ever want to make that stuff anyhow!" sprang hoarsely from his lips. He was torn between blind unreasoning anger at the quicksand and pity for the struggling horse. Suddenly he jerked the forty-four, always on his saddle, from its holster. As the gun swung back and then forward there was a crashing report and Old Blue's head dropped, with a convulsive shudder, limp on the sand.

Carolyn June screamed and buried her face in her hands.

At the sound of the shot Captain Jack stiffened and stood rigid. The Ramblin' Kid, his face white and drawn, sat and looked dry-eyed at the red stream oozing from the round hole just below the brow-band of the bridle on the head of the horse he had killed.

"I—I—would have wanted somebody to do it to me!" he said softly and rode to the side of the girl huddled on the ground. He dismounted and stood, without speaking, looking down at her shaking form. After a time she looked up, through eyes drenched with tears, into his face. Then as if drawn by an irresistible impulse—one she could not deny—she turned her head and looked at the spot where Old Blue had fought his last battle with the quicksands of the Cimarron. A crimson stain, already darkening, on the white surface; a few square feet of disturbed and broken sand, even now settling into the smooth, innocent-looking tranquillity that hid the death lurking in its depths; a short length of rope, one end drawn beneath the sand, the other lying in a sprawling coil; her hat resting a little distance to one side, were all that remained to tell the story of the grim tragedy of the morning. She shuddered and looked once more into the pain-filled eyes of the Ramblin' Kid.

"We'd better be goin'," he said quietly, "you're wet an' them clothes must be uncomfortable. You can ride Captain Jack!"

She stood up weak and trembling.

"I—I—thought Captain Jack was an outlaw," she said with a faint smile. "He won't let me ride him, will he?"

"He'll let you," the Ramblin' Kid answered dully, "no woman ever has rode him—or any other man only me—but he'll let you!"

As she approached the stallion he raised his head and looked at her with a queer mixture of curiosity and antagonism, curving his neck in a challenging way.

"Jack!" the Ramblin' Kid spoke sharply but kindly to the horse, "be careful! It's all right, Boy—you're goin' to carry double this one time!"

The broncho stood passive while the Ramblin' Kid helped Carolyn June to his back.

"You set behind," he said, "it'll be easier to hold on an' I can handle th' horse better!"

She slipped back of the saddle and he swung up on to the little roan. With one hand Carolyn June grasped the cantle of the saddle, the other she reached up and laid on the arm of the Ramblin' Kid—the touch sent a thrill through her body and the cowboy felt a response that made his heart quiver as they turned and rode toward the Quarter Circle KT.

For a mile neither spoke.

"I—I—am sorry for what—I said this morning," Carolyn June whispered at last haltingly, feeling intuitively that the cruel words—"an ignorant, savage, stupid brute"—were repeating themselves in her companion's mind.

"It's all right," he answered without looking around and in a voice without emotion, "it was th' truth—" with a hopeless laugh. "I'm a damn' fool besides!"



CHAPTER VIII

QUICK WITH A VENGEANCE

Old Heck rode in advance of Charley and Bert as the trio returned from repairing the fences wrecked by the flood that had swept over the east bottom-lands of the Quarter Circle KT. All morning he had been silent and morose. Only when necessary had he spoken while he directed the cowboys at their labor, helped them reset posts, or untangle twisted wires and build up again that which the rush of water had torn down. The damage had not been great and by noon the fence was as good as new. As soon as the breaks were mended the moody owner of the Quarter Circle KT mounted his horse and started for the house.

"Them women coming or something has got Old Heck's goat," Bert remarked to Charley as they climbed on their horses and followed a moment later.

"Something's got it," Charley answered, "he ain't acted natural all day—do you reckon he's sore because Parker took the widow to town?"

"Darned if I know," Bert said doubtfully, "that might be it."

"Well, he's feverish and disagreeable for some reason or other and that's the way people generally get when they're jealous," Charley observed sagely.

"He hadn't ought to be," Bert argued, "it's Parker's day to keep company with Ophelia, and Old Heck and him agreed to split."

"If he's in love he won't split," Charley retorted with conviction, "I never saw two men take turn about loving the same woman yet. It can't be done!"

"The woman wouldn't object, would she?" Bert queried.

"Probably not," Charley replied, "at least not as long as double doses of affection was coming her way. From what I've heard most of 'em sort of enjoy having as many men make love to 'em as possible, but—" he paused.

"But what?"

"They kick if a man loves several women at once!" was the sophisticated reply. "But as far as that's concerned," he continued, speaking as a man wise in the ways of the world, "men and women ain't much different in that respect. When it comes to loving, both sides are plumb willing to divide up 'a-going' but want it to be clean exclusive when it comes to 'coming!'"

"It's funny, ain't it?" Bert commented.

"No, it ain't funny," Charley declared. "It's just natural—"

"Maybe Parker and Old Heck will have a fight about Ophelia," Bert suggested hopefully. "Which do you suppose would lick?"

"It's hard telling," Charley said thoughtfully. "Old Heck's the heaviest, but Parker's pretty active."

"Well, it sure does seem like wherever women are trouble is, don't it?" Bert observed meditatively.

"Blamed if it don't," Charley agreed; "there's something about them that's plum agitating!"

Old Heck, riding a short distance ahead of the cowboys, was troubled with similar thoughts. He was trying to analyze his own feelings. Years without association with womankind had made him come to regard them with a measure of indifference and suspicion. He had developed the idea that women existed chiefly for the purpose of disorganizing the morale of the masculine members of the race. He was very sincere in this belief. Yet he was forced, now, to confess that he found something interesting in having a couple of attractive females at the Quarter Circle KT. The situation was not so disagreeable as he had expected. Already he was proud of his kinship to Carolyn June. She was a niece worth while. Ophelia also had proved herself a pleasant surprise. He had pictured her as a strong-minded, assertive, modernized creature who would probably discourse continuously and raspingly about the evils of smoking, profanity, poker, drinking and other natural masculine impulses. Instead, she had proved herself, so far, a perfect lady. Without doubt she was the most sensible widow he had ever met. The thought of Parker's long, intimate ride with her to Eagle Butte made him uncomfortable. It was a darned fool arrangement—that agreement that he and his foreman were to divide time in the entertainment of Ophelia. He could have done it alone just as well as not. Anyway the dual plan was liable to cause confusion. Oh, well, Parker would be out on the beef hunt next week. By rights it ought not start for ten days yet, but—well, it wouldn't hurt to move it up a little. He would do that. Then he remembered the frank admiration the cowboys had shown toward Carolyn June. This suggested complications in that direction.

"Thunderation!" he said aloud, "it's a good thing we fixed it up for just Skinny to make love to her—if we hadn't there'd have been a regular epidemic of bu'sted hearts on this blamed ranch! There wouldn't have been a buckaroo on the place that could have kept from mooning around sentimental—unless it was th' Ramblin' Kid," he added; "that blamed cuss is too independent and indifferent to fall in love with any female!"

At the barn Charley and Bert overtook Old Heck. The three unsaddled and fed their horses and started toward the house for dinner. Sing Pete had seen them coming and immediately pounded the triangle.

"Th' Ramblin' Kid's gone somewhere again," Bert observed as he noticed the Gold Dust maverick alone in the circular corral. "Captain Jack's not with the filly—"

"Yonder th' Ramblin' Kid comes now," Charley said, looking toward the north; "he's been over to the river—what the devil kind of a combination is that?" he exclaimed as he got a better view of the horse coming up the lane. "Him and that girl both are riding Captain Jack."

"Blamed if they ain't," Bert said curiously; "it's a wonder Captain Jack'll let them. But how does that come, anyhow? Where's Skinny? I thought it was his job to ride herd on Carolyn June—"

"It is his job," Old Heck interrupted, "I don't understand—something must have gone wrong," he added excitedly as the stallion with his double burden drew near. "Carolyn June's all wet and she's lost her hat."

Turning his horse toward the house, when he reached the end of the lane and with but a glance at the trio standing at the barn, the Ramblin' Kid rode straight to the back-yard gate. Old Heck and the cowboys hurried across the open space and reached the gate just as Carolyn June rather stiffly dismounted from the little roan. Her hair was disarranged, her riding suit soiled and wet from the sand and water, but her eyes were bright, cheeks flushed, and she showed only a trace of nervousness.

"What's the matter?" Old Heck asked uneasily, "what's happened? Where's Skinny?"

In a few words, while the Ramblin' Kid sat silently on the back of Captain Jack, Carolyn June told of the ride across the river; the meeting with Pedro and the message he brought that the cattle were out and some had been killed by lightning; of sending Skinny with the Mexican to help with the steers; of her return alone toward the ranch, the struggle in the quicksand and the death of the horse she had been riding.

"Poor Old Blue—poor old fellow!" she finished with a little catch in her voice.

Old Heck's cheeks whitened as he listened.

"Good lord," he half-groaned, "you had a close call! It's lucky th' Ramblin' Kid saw you coming toward the upper ford—if he hadn't—you'd never got out! But go on into the house and get some dry clothes on. Boys, we'll have to hurry up and eat dinner and then go help get them steers back. I wish Parker was here—we'll need all the help we can get. You'd better catch up another horse," he continued, speaking to the Ramblin' Kid, "Captain Jack is probably worn out from chasing that Gold Dust maverick last night, and if you ain't too tired yourself, go with us—"

"I ain't too tired," the Ramblin' Kid replied quietly, "I'll go—an' ride Captain Jack—he ain't done up." He took the broncho to the corral, removed the saddle and turned him in with the outlaw mare. After giving the horses fresh hay—there was water in the corral, supplied by a small ditch that was fed from the larger irrigation canal and which ran under one side of the fence—he joined the others at dinner.

An hour later Old Heck, Bert, Charley and the Ramblin' Kid rode away from the ranch to help Chuck, Skinny and Pedro round up and return to the big pasture the cattle that had broken out and were rushing toward their old range on the Purgatory.

Carolyn June was left alone with Sing Pete, the Chinese cook at the Quarter Circle KT. She still felt somewhat shaken from her experience of the morning, although a bath, clean dry clothing and the meal had refreshed her considerably. She carried a chair to the front porch, thinking to spend the afternoon resting. The events of the day raced in review through her mind. It did not seem possible so much could have happened in so short a time. Only yesterday had Ophelia and she arrived at the ranch. Already she had the feeling that they both were fixtures, and had been indefinitely, at the Quarter Circle KT. The elemental atmosphere of the range country had completely enveloped her, seemed to have absorbed her, and made her a part of it. Some way she rather delighted in this sensation of permanency. Her rescue by the Ramblin' Kid and the close view she had been able to get of his impulses made her thrill with a queer mixture of admiration and pity for him even while his brutal answer when she had apologized for her harsh words still echoed in her mind.

"Gracious," she thought with a whimsical smile, "things move fast in this western country!"

She had seen, already, that both her Uncle Josiah and Parker were yielding to the charms of Ophelia. The fancy made her chuckle. She remembered Skinny's too rapidly developing tenderness toward herself. "Poor fellow," she murmured, slowly shaking her head, "I wish he wouldn't! But I suppose he can't help it—I wonder why men are always falling in love with me, anyhow? I'm sure I don't try to make them! I never saw one yet I really wanted to care—" she stopped suddenly while a warm flush spread over her body as the Ramblin' Kid was imaged rather vividly in her mind. "Nonsense!" she said aloud with a soft, throaty laugh. "Carolyn June, you are getting silly!"

She sprang up and went into the house.

"Sing Pete," she said, stepping into the kitchen, "may I have some sugar—I'd like the lumpy kind if you have it?"

"Sure! You have him sugal—how muchee you want?" as he held out to her a tin containing squares of the desired article.

"Oh, enough to win a heart!" Carolyn June answered laughing, at the same time taking a handful from the can.

"You eat him?" Sing Pete asked with a grin.

"No," she replied, "I feed it to broncho—to Gold Dust maverick. Some folks sprinkle salt on bird's tail to catch him—I put sugar on horse's tongue to make him love me—"

"Lamblin' Kid, he do that. Allee time him gettee sugal for Clap'n Jack!"

"Feeds 'Clap'n Jack' sugar, does he?" Carolyn June said pensively. "Captain Jack's a nice little broncho," she added, "he deserves sugar." She paused a moment. "'Lamblin' Kid's' a funny fellow, don't you think so, Sing Pete?" she finished idly.

"Not funny—him dangelous!" the Chinaman replied earnestly. "He gettee velly mad 'cause I puttee butter in can so cat catchee his head in an' go lound an' lound—buckee like a bloncho—havee lots a good time! He not talkee much, Lamblin' Kid don't—just dangelous—that's all!"

Carolyn June felt sudden interest.

"When did he get mad about the cat?" she asked quietly.

"Allee same to-day—when you an' Skinny go 'way. Lamblin' Kid cussee me lot—tellee me not do him any more. Him dangelous! I not do him next time!" Sing Pete explained seriously.

"You are wise, Sing Pete," Carolyn June laughed as she left the kitchen by the back door and started toward the corral where the Gold Dust maverick was restlessly pacing about. "Don't do it any more! 'Lamblin' Kid' is 'dangelous'—dangerous in ways that you don't understand!" she finished softly, her eyes lit with a strange light and her heart elated and beating quickly because of what the Chinese cook had told her.

The outlaw filly leaped to the far side of the corral and stood trembling, her head up and breath coming in whistling snorts of defiance and fear, as Carolyn June opened the gate and stepped boldly inside. Apparently paying no attention to the frightened horse, the girl walked to the center of the corral and facing the mare leaned her back against the snubbing post. Both stood perfectly still while the eyes of each appraised the other.

After a time the filly seemed to relax and she slowly lowered her head, yet watching, alertly, the motionless figure of Carolyn June. The girl talked to the horse, her words gentle, her voice soothing and low. The Gold Dust maverick became quieter still. Presently she circled the corral, trotting swiftly and crowding closely against the fence. Carolyn June turned, keeping her eyes always on the broncho, and continued the quiet pleading of her voice. It was an hour before the filly shyly and cautiously came up to the girl—before curiosity mastered her fear. Carolyn June held out her hand and the outlaw nosed it timidly, ready instantly to spring away. A lump of sugar was pressed into the Gold Dust maverick's mouth—she drew back, working the morsel about with her tongue and lips and finally spitting it out. Several times this was repeated. At last the beautiful creature tasted the sugar and greedily ate the lumps, permitting Carolyn June gently to stroke the velvety muzzle. Then the girl's hand crept higher and higher on the horse's neck and after a little an arm was slipped over the filly's neck.

"You darling!" Carolyn June breathed softly, "I love you! I wonder what the Ramblin' Kid would say if he knew I was stealing your heart?" she added demurely as she laid her face against the silky mane of the mare.

She remained at the corral until the afternoon was nearly gone. The poplars along the front-yard fence were beginning to throw their shadows across the corral. When at last Carolyn June started to return to the house the filly followed her to the gate of the corral and whinnied a little protest against her going.

"I don't believe you are a bit mean," the girl said as she looked back affectionately at the nervous, high-strung animal; "you are just lonely and want to be loved—and understood—that is all, and I doubt if you'd buck a single buck if I rode you right this minute!"

As she reached the gate the Clagstone "Six" glided quietly down the grade from the bench and a moment later Ophelia and Parker joined Carolyn June on the porch. The widow's cheeks were glowing and Parker looked embarrassed and rather upset. His arms were full of bundles.

"Have a good time?" Carolyn June greeted them.

"Fine," Ophelia replied, "spent oodles of money shopping, saw the minister's wife, talked with the editor of the paper and we are going to organize a Chapter—I think we shall call it 'The Amazons of Eagle Butte.'"

"Great," Carolyn June laughed, "you are a hustler, Ophelia! Uncle Josiah will have a fit. Does Parker know?"

"Yes," the widow answered, her eyes twinkling, as she looked at the sweating foreman of the Quarter Circle KT. "I told him all about it and he is going to give us his moral support."

"Where is Skinny?" Parker interrupted hastily, looking more uneasy and foolish than ever; "why ain't he here?"

Carolyn June told of the happenings of the morning.

"My dear, my dear!" Ophelia cried, shuddering when she heard of Carolyn June's narrow escape from the quicksand. "You must never cross that terrible river again! It's too horrible to think about!"

"It was just 'experience,'" Carolyn June said lightly. "I don't mind it a bit now that it is over. Of course," she added seriously, "I feel badly about Old Blue—and losing Parker's saddle."

"Don't worry about the saddle, I can get new riding gear lots easier than Old Heck could have got another niece!"

"Carolyn June needs a saddle of her own," Ophelia suggested.

"I am going to get one; and then I'll ride the Gold Dust maverick!"

"I doubt if th' Ramblin' Kid will let you ride the filly," Parker said, "he's funny that way—"

"I think he will," Carolyn June interposed. "I'll steal her if no other way!"

"Maybe he will, but it's doubtful," Parker continued, "but Old Heck is aiming to get you a saddle. He spoke about it this morning when we were getting the car out to go to town—"

"Dear old uncle," Carolyn June said warmly, "I love him already—don't you, Ophelia?"

Parker colored and looked quickly, with a worried expression on his face, at the widow. She flushed also.

"That's personal, my dear," she answered, "and rather abrupt!"

Parker went out to put the Clagstone "Six" in the garage.

"Carolyn June," Ophelia said when they were alone, "I have made a discovery—"

"It is?" questioningly.

"That western Texas is the 'quickest' country in the world!" the widow answered.

"Please explain," Carolyn June said, "although," demurely, with certain memories fresh in her mind, "I fancy I can almost guess—"

"Yesterday," Ophelia continued rather breathlessly, "we arrived at the Quarter Circle KT; last night at the supper table I met Mr. Parker for the first time; ten minutes later he kicked me—accidentally, I think—on the shins; I saw him again at breakfast this morning; to-day we drove to Eagle Butte and this afternoon"—she paused and then with a quick, nervous laugh finished—"he asked me to marry him!"

"Good lord," Carolyn June gasped, "that is—'pronto'—as these cowboys say! 'Quick' with a vengeance! There must be something in this western air that makes them do it!"

"It was all I could do this morning to keep Skinny from—" she started to say, then shifted again to the subject of Parker. "Did he know that you are—"

"National Organizer for the 'Movement,'" Ophelia filled in. "Yes, I had already confessed. I told him as we were driving to town—and the other—the shock—came just after we crossed the bridge when we were returning home!"

"He is a bold, dangerous man!" Carolyn June exclaimed, in mock seriousness, "trying to get ahead of Uncle Josiah!"

"I inferred as much," the widow explained; "he told me that to-morrow would be your uncle's 'day'—whatever he meant by that; the next he, Mr. Parker himself, would be 'around' again. 'Unless Old Heck took some fool notion or other;' before long he would be away on the beef hunt and one can never tell what might happen while one is gone and, well, that's the way he felt about it, so he just said it—"

"And you?"

"Naturally was completely surprised, entirely non-committal, and made no definite agreement!" Ophelia laughed softly.



CHAPTER IX

OLD HECK'S STRATEGY

It was late when Old Heck and the cowboys returned to the ranch. The runaway cattle had been overtaken on the sand-hills beyond the North Springs and it took the entire afternoon to bunch them and work the restless animals back to the Quarter Circle KT, into the big pasture, and repair the fence so it was safe to leave them for the night.

Ophelia, Carolyn June and Parker were in the front room when Old Heck and the hungry cowboys clattered, long after dark, into the kitchen for the supper Sing Pete had kept warm for them.

After the meal Skinny went into the room where Parker and the women were. Old Heck followed and talked for a few moments with Parker about the affairs of the ranch, then joined the cowboys at the bunk-house where they had gone directly after leaving the table. On Skinny's bed Parker had tossed a bundle.

"What in thunder do you reckon Skinny's been buying, now?" Chuck questioned as he picked up the package and examined it curiously. "Blamed if it don't feel like a shirt."

"I'll bet that's what it is," Bert said with a laugh as Old Heck stepped inside the door, "the darn fool has gone and got him a white shirt—"

"Who has?" Old Heck asked, hearing only the latter part of Bert's remark.

"Skinny," Charley answered for Bert, "he's fixing up to make love in style—"

"Aw, the blamed idiot," Old Heck grunted, then glancing over toward Parker's bed: "—Did you notice whether Parker got him one, too, or not?"

Before the question was answered Parker and Skinny appeared at the bunk-house door.

"What's the matter?" Chuck said, still holding the bundle in his hand, "—ain't it too early for lovers to bu'st up for the night? Or did the widow and Carolyn June blow out the lights on you—"

"Forget it, you danged fool!" Skinny said crossly. "Can't you ever get over your dog-goned craziness? They was just tired and went to bed. Give me that package, it's mine and private!" reaching for the bundle.

Chuck, with a laugh, threw it at him. It landed on the Ramblin' Kid's bunk where the latter was lying, his clothing still on, his eyes staring straight up while he smoked a cigarette.

"When are you going to ride the Gold Dust maverick?" Skinny asked as he picked up the package.

For a moment the Ramblin' Kid did not answer. Then, without changing his position, replied:

"I don't know as I'll ever ride her. Maybe I'll turn her loose again on th' range."

"What did you catch her for?" Bert queried. "Don't you want her?"

"I caught her, 'cause I wanted to," the Ramblin' Kid answered, "but that ain't no sign I intend to keep her. Hell, what's the use?" he finished indifferently.

"If you want to sell her," Old Heck said, "I'll buy her."

"She ain't for sale," the Ramblin' Kid answered shortly, "not to anybody."

"She would be a thunderin' sight better off if she was used."

"Would she?" the Ramblin' Kid questioned dully. "I ain't so sure about that."

"Of course she would," Old Heck insisted, "she'd be fed regular and—"

"An' be mauled around by some darned human!" the Ramblin' Kid interrupted with sudden vehemence. "If I was a horse," he continued, speaking passionately while his black eyes burned with the spirit of rebellion, "I'd rather be a short-grass cay-use nippin' th' scatterin' feed on th' north hills an' be free to snort an' raise hell when I blamed please than have my belly stuffed with alfalfa hay three times a day an' have to gnaw th' iron of some damned man's bit in my mouth or carry his saddle on my back!"

Silence followed the outburst.

Old Heck and the cowboys knew the Ramblin' Kid was in one of his "moods," and experience had taught them that at such times argument was neither discreet nor safe. The thing they did not know was that his heart was torn by memory of the agony of Old Blue in the quicksand and his mind tortured by the picture of dumb suffering a bullet from his own gun had, that morning, mercifully ended.

After a time he spoke again, more quietly and with a note of weariness in his voice:

"Oh, well, I reckon I'll keep th' filly. In a day of two, when she gets rested up a little, I'll ride her,"

"You ought to break her for Carolyn June," Skinny suggested.

"Had I?" the Ramblin' Kid said with a queer laugh—it was just the thought that was in his mind and against which he was struggling. "That's a bright idea! Maybe I'll study about it an' take a notion to do it. If I do she can ride th' maverick When you an' her go on your honeymoon—"

"What's a honeymoon?" Skinny queried innocently.

"It's what two people take when they first get married; go off somewhere by themselves—like they was locoed—to find out how bad they got stung!" the Ramblin' Kid laughingly answered.

"We'd better all go to bed," Old Heck said; "it's late and we have to get up early in the morning. Parker, you and some of the boys will have to go skin them dead steers—we've got to save the hides at least."

"Old Heck wants to go to sleep so he can dream about the widow," Chuck snickered, "it's his turn again to-morrow to love her—"

"How did she act to-day, Parker?" Bert broke in; "was she pretty affectionate?"

"Aw, shut up! Ain't you got any respect for anything—"

"I'll bet he proposed to her and she throwed him down," Chuck hazarded, not realizing how nearly he had come to guessing the truth.

Parker looked angrily at Chuck, then his cheeks grew red, he bent over and began tugging at his boots in an effort to hide the tell-tale confusion in his eyes.

Old Heck furtively studied the face of his foreman.

"Or else she confessed to being a Bolshevik or local-optionist or something and the news broke his heart," Charley volunteered, joining in the baiting of the range-boss.

"She didn't neither confess," Parker denied hastily, aggravated into a reply, "she ain't either one of them! She's an 'Organizer—'"

Dead silence greeted this sudden announcement. Every eye was turned in astonishment on Parker while Old Heck and the boys awaited further explanation. Parker offered no additional information.

"She's a what?" Old Heck finally managed to whisper, leaning toward Parker, while a look of fear and incredulity spread over his face.

Parker noticed the anguish in Old Heck's eyes and a sudden new look of cunning came into his own.

"An 'Organizer' I said," he repeated impressively, "she's an 'Organizer' for some kind of 'Movement' or other—"

"A dis-organizer, you'd better say!" Chuck laughed uncertainly, "judging from the way she's got you and Old Heck stampeding already!"

"Great guns!" Old Heck half groaned, "what—what sort of a—a—'Movement' did she say it was, anyhow?"

"Swiss, probably!" came in a chuckling undertone from the direction of the Ramblin' Kid's bed. "Hell, what's the difference?"

"She said it was connected someway with 'feminine obligations and woman's opportunity,'" Parker answered, ignoring the frivolous interruptions.

"I know what she is!" Charley exclaimed, "—it's just what I expected! She's one of these self-starting female suffragettes! That's what she is. I knowed she was too gentle acting to be harmless!"

"She just had to break loose sooner or later," Bert said in an awed voice.

"My Gawd!" Old Heck murmured hopelessly. "Holy gosh a'mighty!"

The owner of the Quarter Circle KT was really shocked and worried. He had surrendered quickly to his first impression concerning the widow. The original meeting at Eagle Butte, when she and Carolyn June appeared as visions of feminine loveliness, as contrasted with the homely cook and her daughter whom he and Skinny had mistaken for, and feared were, the Quarter Circle KT's prospective guests, had caused a psychic effect on his feelings toward Ophelia. The sense of relief that came when he found that the cook was not Ophelia, together with the widow's unexpected graciousness, had instantly disarmed his suspicions and, metaphorically speaking, hurled his heart into her lap. He had found the widow charming, interesting, very feminine, and already dreams had shaped themselves in his mind. The sudden revelation that Parker had made brought tremendous disappointment. Ophelia had not shown the least indication of obnoxious strong-mindedness or that disagreeable intellectuality which Old Heck firmly believed was a necessary attribute of all women who participated in politics or "movements."

Ophelia was an "Organizer"! It was unbelievable! The thought gave him a sickening feeling at the pit of his stomach and actually made his head ache.

Old Heck's first impulse, when Parker made the startling announcement, was to assert his authority as boss of the outfit and annul the every-other-day arrangement whereby he and his foreman were to share and share alike in the widow's society. He would let Parker do it all—have her all of the time! He wouldn't take any chances! On second thought he decided to wait at least another day. Besides, it was against his principles, contrary to the ethics of the range, to back up on a bargain and he never asked an employee to do a thing he hadn't the courage to do himself. He would stick it out, come what may, and see the thing through to a finish. However, there was still a means of escape. If Ophelia developed any really serious suffragette tendencies during the next day or two he would go on the beef hunt himself and let Parker remain at the ranch!

When finally he went to sleep Ophelia was still on his mind. The first thought that came to him when he awakened the next morning was the sickening news Parker had brought.

Old Heck and the cowboys were silent and had about them an air of depression when they filed into the kitchen for breakfast.

Each cast furtive, curious glances at Ophelia. The information that she was an "Organizer"—presumably for a "Movement" involving woman's political rights—caused them to view her with a kind of reverential awe and fear. The widow and Carolyn June, apparently, were wholly unconscious of the thoughts in the minds of the men. Both women were as innocent-looking and attractive as ever—matching with their early morning freshness the bowl of roses Carolyn June, before the call to breakfast, had gathered and placed on the table.

The Ramblin' Kid sat at the right of Carolyn June. It was the first time they had met at the table. He said nothing and seemingly was lost in thought. When they had entered the kitchen Carolyn June and he had spoken and for a moment he looked into her eyes with an expression that caused her own to drop and the warm blood to rush over her throat and face. She had felt that same sensation of "soul-nakedness" she experienced when she looked into his eyes that first time when she was at the circular corral and he was lying under the shed. Neither spoke of the incidents of the previous day.

The other cowboys and Old Heck studied Ophelia with a sort of fascination, casting shy upward glances at her from over their plates.

Parker and the Ramblin' Kid only, were at ease and undisturbed.

"You wouldn't think she was one by looking at her, would you?" Chuck said in an undertone to Charley.

"Some of them's so blamed slick they can't hide it."

"I reckon that's right," Chuck whispered back, "it's an awful jolt to Old Heck, ain't it?"

"Yes, he's taking it pretty hard," Charley mumbled.

"Her forehead does bulge out a good deal in front, when you come to look at it, don't it?" Chuck observed under his breath.

"Quite a lot," Charley answered in the same tone; "that's one indication!"

Parker gazed at the widow with an expression undeniably adoring. Old Heck saw it and straightened up with a look of sudden resolution on his face. If Parker wasn't afraid of Ophelia, by golly, he wouldn't be! The widow had returned the foreman's look with understanding, while more than a trace of tenderness and sympathy was registered in her eyes.

"To-morrow is Sunday," Old Heck announced suddenly with startling distinctness, "and we'll get things in shape to begin the beef round-up on Monday!"

There was immediate interest.

"I'll be darned," the Ramblin' Kid murmured half audibly, "Old Heck is goin' to 'Uriah' Parker!"

"Huh?" Skinny queried across the table.

"Nothin'," the Ramblin' Kid answered with a laugh, "I was just reminded of somethin' I read in a book one time—"

Carolyn June caught the subtle reference to the Bible story of King David's unfortunate romance with another man's "woman" and chuckled.

"Ain't you starting the beef hunt too early?" Charley asked.

"I don't know as I am," Old Heck answered doggedly.

"Aw, that'll put us right in the middle of it on the Fourth of July when the Rodeo is going on in Eagle Butte—" Bert began.

"And I ain't going to miss that, either," Chuck interrupted, "that Y-Bar outfit over on the Vermejo took everything in the two-mile sweepstakes last year and they've been bragging about it ever since. They think that Thunderbolt horse of theirs can't be beat. I was going to put Silver Tip in this year. He can put that black in second place—"

"No, he can't," the Ramblin' Kid remarked quietly, "—you'd lose your money. There's only one animal on th' Kiowa range that can outrun that Vermejo horse."

"What animal is that?" Charley asked.

"She's in th' circular corral," the Ramblin' Kid answered laconically.

"The Gold Dust maverick?" Bert questioned.

"That's the one I mean," the Ramblin' Kid replied in a low voice, "for two miles—or five—there ain't nothin' in western Texas, or Mexico either, that can catch her."

"Why don't you take her in when the Rodeo is on and run her in the sweepstakes then?" Chuck asked eagerly. "I ain't caring what Kiowa horse gets the money just so that Y-Bar outfit is taken down a notch or two. Ever since they got that Thunderbolt horse and beat Old Heck's Quicksilver with him they've been crowing over the Quarter Circle KT and I'm getting plumb sick of it—"

"Old Heck lost three thousand dollars on that race!" Bert interrupted rather triumphantly.

"I didn't neither," Old Heck corrected sullenly, "it was only twenty-five hundred!"

"Well, that Vermejo crowd has got a hundred of mine," Chuck said vindictively, "but I don't give a darn for that—I'd be willing to lose twice that much again just to set that Thunderbolt horse of theirs back in second place!"

"Why don't you run the outlaw filly?" Charley asked coaxingly of the Ramblin' Kid.

"Yes, go on and put her in," Skinny urged, "—you ought to!"

The Ramblin' Kid remained silent, seemingly indifferent to the teasing of the others.

Carolyn June leaned over and said, in a voice audible only to him, while her eyes grew mellow with a look that tested his composure to the uttermost but which wrung no sign from him:

"Please, race the maverick—I—want you to—Ramblin' Kid!"

It was the first time she had used his name in speaking directly to him and the tone in which it was spoken made him tremble in spite of himself. For a moment he returned her gaze. Her words and manner were so different that by their very difference they reminded him of what she had called him yesterday—"an ignorant, savage, stupid brute"—when he had refused to interfere with the cat when its head was caught in the can. He started to make a cynical reply. Then he remembered her sympathy for Old Blue, her apology later for the harsh words—anyhow he knew or felt in his heart they were true—and suddenly he seemed to see the pink satin garter he still carried in his pocket. The look that came into his eyes made Carolyn June lower her own. He smiled a whimsical but hopeless smile, as, replying apparently to the pleading of Charley and Skinny, he said, softly, the single word:

"Maybe!"

Old Heck had forgotten the annual Rodeo held in Eagle Butte, for some days each summer, around the Fourth of July. His sudden determination and eagerness to have the beef round-up begin earlier than usual in order to get Parker away from the widow had driven all else but that one idea from his mind. The protests reminded him of his oversight. He had not intended to deprive the cowboys of the opportunity to enjoy the one big event happening yearly in the Kiowa country and which temporarily turned Eagle Butte, for a few days each summer, into a seething metropolis of care-free humanity.

"I think it's a darned shame to spring the beef hunt so it will interfere with the Rodeo," Bert grumbled, "—and us have to be out on the hills wrangling steers while the celebration is going on!"

"I'm not-goin! to be out on th' hills then," the Ramblin' Kid said quietly but with unchangeable finality.

"You can all go to the Rodeo," Old Heck interposed, not feeling just right in his conscience about sending Parker away in advance of the time expected, and wishing to make amends,"—Parker and all of you. You can 'break' the round-up for a few days during the Rodeo and what cattle you've got gathered by then can be turned into the big pasture and held there till it's over. That'll let you all get into Eagle Butte for the Fourth—I'd like to see that blamed Thunderbolt horse beat myself! But we'll start the beef hunt Monday the way I said in the first place—"

"Who's going to cook, this year, on the round-up?" Charley queried. "You can't take the Chink from here this time, can you?"

"I reckon Sing Pete'll have to go along as usual," Old Heck answered; "it'll make it a little unhandy at the ranch, but—"

"Ophelia and I can 'batch' while you are gone," Carolyn June suggested. "We won't mind being alone and it will be fun to cook our own meals."

"We will enjoy it," Ophelia added agreeably.

"You ain't going to be alone," Old Heck said; "Skinny and me will be here. When it comes to the cooking maybe between the four of us we can get along some way!"

"Well, if the round-up's got to start Monday," Parker declared sullenly as they left the table, "I'll have to go down to town again to-day and get me a new saddle. Mine was on Old Blue."

"I'll go with you," Old Heck said in a conciliatory way. "Charley and the other boys can be working on them dead steers till we get back. We'll go in the car and ought to make the round-trip by noon."



CHAPTER X

FIXING FIXERS

The widow and Carolyn June were alone at the house. Old Heck and Parker went immediately from the breakfast table to the garage to get the car out to go to Eagle Butte. The cowboys were at the barn preparing to begin the day's work. Skinny had excused himself, ostensibly to attend to some ranch chores, but in reality to get away to the bunk-house and "fix up" for the day's courtship of Carolyn June. He planned, when the cowboys were gone, to put on the white shirt Parker brought, yesterday, from Eagle Butte.

"Ophelia," Carolyn June said mysteriously as they stepped out on the front porch and filled their lungs with the clean air of the morning, "you made a 'discovery' yesterday, I believe?" pausing questioningly.

"Yes," the widow smiled, recalling their conversation relative to Parker's abrupt proposal of marriage.

"To-day," Carolyn June continued impressively, "it is my turn—I have made one!"

"And it is?"

"You and I have been 'framed!'" was the answer spoken solemnly yet scarcely louder than a whisper, while the brown eyes of Carolyn June sparkled with a mixture of suppressed anger, merriment and indignation.

"Framed?" the widow repeated inquiringly, "just what does 'framed' mean, my dear?"

"Framed means," Carolyn June replied wisely, "'tricked,' 'jobbed,' 'jinxed,' 'fixed,' or whatever it is people do to people when they scheme to do something to them without the ones to whom they are doing it knowing how it is done!"

"Exceedingly lucid, my love," the widow laughed, "but you are so agonizingly fond of suspense—"

"Come inside," Carolyn June said as she led the way into the house, "and in a dark corner—no, that would be too near to the walls and their proverbial 'ears,' in the center of the room is better—I will expose the whole diabolical plot!"

At the end of the reading table they stopped and faced each other.

"And now?" Ophelia said, expectantly.

"And now," Carolyn June repeated, her voice low and carefully guarded. "Listen: Before Ophelia Cobb and Carolyn June Dixon ever arrived at this Quarter Circle KT their 'lovers' were already picked out for them—officially chosen, delegated, appointed, foreordained and everything! The 'arrangements' had all been made—"

"I don't understand," the widow said, bewildered by the rapid flow of legal-sounding words.

"Nor did I at first," Carolyn June went on, "but I have figured it all out! I have 'discovered' what all this mysterious hinting about 'arrangements,' 'the agreement,' 'Old Heck's day,' 'Parker's time,' 'Skinny's job,' and so forth means! I have studied it out. Why is Skinny Rawlins thrown into my lap as my 'regular' lover? It's his 'job'—that is why! And why the day-and-day-about courting of yourself by Uncle Josiah and Parker? It is the 'agreement'—the one is to have you one day and the other the next! Before we came some such arrangement was fixed up. I am sure of it—"

"Impossible," Ophelia protested, "preposterous!"

"Outrageous!" Carolyn June added vehemently, "but truth just the same! To start with they didn't want us to come. That telegram lying about them all having the smallpox proved as much. We were, for some reason or other, considered 'afflictions,' Why, I don't know. I guess they thought we were a pair of female vampires or something and had to be disposed of in advance to prevent our stirring things up and causing a lot of murders or suicides or duels on the Quarter Circle KT!"

"I can't believe it," Ophelia muttered as if stunned. "Why, that would be 'dealing' with us just as though we were cattle!"

"That's it!" Carolyn June exclaimed vindictively, her anger for the moment getting the better of her sense of the ridiculous, "they 'dealt' in us! More than likely they played poker to decide how to divide us up—to see who should love you and which should love me! As if the heart of a woman can be made to run in a groove cut to order by the hand of any masculine—insect!" she finished, thoughtless of the incongruous metaphor.

"Then Skinny and your Uncle Josiah," the widow murmured, "and Parker—are—are—pretending?"

"No," Carolyn June answered, "they started out 'pretending,' but they've stepped into their own trap! They are painfully serious now—they are 'intending!'"

"What shall we do about it?" Ophelia asked helplessly.

"We ought to assassinate them!" Carolyn June snapped, then laughed as the absurdity of the situation dawned upon her and her sense of humor overcame the moment of anger and indignation. "I have it—I've got it! We will Vamp' them in dead earnest! We'll fix the 'fixers,' we'll frame the 'framers'!"

"But how?" doubtfully.

"From now on," Carolyn June replied decisively, "I am going to flirt, individually and collectively—desperately and wickedly—with the whole male population of this ranch! We'll show them what premeditated love-making really is! When it comes to Uncle Josiah and, well, possibly Parker, you will have to take care of that giddy pair yourself and, incidentally, you might work some on Charley Saunders," mentioning the oldest of the cowboys. "I'll just flicker an eyelid occasionally at Parker, unless you object?"

"Not in the least," Ophelia answered, blushing a trifle.

"Well, then, we will make it a free-for-all," Carolyn June said, "and—"

"How about the Ramblin' Kid?" the widow interrupted, "do you think he is one of the conspirators—is in on the—the—'frame-up?' Is he also to be a 'Victim'?"