"I had a little accident th' other day," he explained, "an' hurt my hand powerful bad. It ain't goin' to be much use fer handlin' a rope fer quite a spell. Had to let the round-up move away without me." His voice grew plaintive.

She spoke quickly, with great compassion. "I am sorry! It seems too bad to see a great big fellow like you disabled. How did it happen?"

"Well, it was like this: I come over here th' other night an' got to settin' 'round here doin' nothin', so I thought I'd improve th' time an' clean this here gun o' mine. It's been a-needin' it powerful bad fer awhile back. I didn't know there was nary load in it until the blame thing went off an' I felt somethin' kind o' sudden an' hot piercin' my left hand. It was a fool trick to do, but it's the gospel truth, Miss."

"I heard—that is, the boys said something about a shooting affair up the road." She pointed toward the sheep-man's ranch. "I thought for a moment that perhaps you had been mixed up in that. I'm very glad to know that you were not, because you know it wasn't a very nice, manly thing to do to a defenseless stranger." Her cool eyes watched his nervous shifting. "You see I can't very well help hearing a lot of things around here. The girls hear things and they tell me, and then I am often forced to overhear the men and boys talking among themselves. It's none of my business, but yet I am glad to know that you were not one to set upon an innocent white man. I scarcely know this Mr. Livingston by sight, but he is a friend of Sydney's, my cousin, and they say,"—here she drew out her words slowly and impressively,—"that over in his country he has been in the army and is well versed in firearms; also that he has a small Gatling gun with him over here that shoots hundreds of shots a minute. So he really isn't so defenseless as he seems." This startled the man into open-mouth astonishment.

"I thought there was something!—I mean I thought, when I heard tell about the fracas over there, that there was somethin' like that in the wind," stammered the man.

Apparently Hope had told a deliberate untruth to force a confession from Long Bill, but yet it was a fact that she had heard something very similar. On the day before, Sunday, Jim McCullen had come to visit her. From his camp the noise of the shooting had been plainly heard, and through curiosity he and Carter had ridden to Livingston's ranch to inquire into it, but the sheep-man had been very reticent about the matter. Had told them only that there had been trouble with some breeds, and his herder had been killed. This old Jim repeated to Hope, adding that Livingston must have a Gatling gun concealed on his place, judging from the sound of the firing. So Hope in her effort to impress the tall cow-puncher had not used her imagination wholly.

"I am glad you had nothing to do with it," she concluded, walking slowly away toward the kitchen end of the house. "And I hope your hand will soon be well."

"That's right," said Long Bill. "I didn't have nothin' to do with it. No Gatlin' guns in mine, Miss!"

CHAPTER X

Dave grunted. "He's all right 'nough, only he'll bust the bridle if you tie him, an' he won't stand without bein' tied. He'll buck if he's cinched too tight or gets too much to eat, an' he ain't fit for a lady to ride, nohow. He's an Indian pinto to boot, a regular fool calico pony! Now my horse is an all 'round good one, an' so gentle any lady can ride him, just like any sensible horse ought to be."

"Yes, that's all he's good for, is to stand 'round an' look pretty, like some o' these here bloods—an' them pretty soldiers over to the post. I notice when there's any real work to be done, Mr. Dude ain't in it. Oh, he can stand 'round an' look pretty all right, but the pinto's the best all 'round, an's got the most sense!"

Their discussion seemed at an end, for the soft-voiced twin having fastened the rope securely, walked around to the other side of his pinto and had just turned the stirrup toward him, preliminary to mounting, when the other boy grasped him roughly by the collar, throwing him backward to the ground.

"That's my lariat; you hand it over here!" he exclaimed gruffly; thereupon the soft-voiced twin picked himself up, very carefully brushed the dust from his sleeve, and answered slowly, in a particularly sweet tone:

"I ain't a-goin' to fight you here in front of the teacher. That's my rope. Go an' get it if you want it! But she's got yourn. I saw her pick it up by mistake this mornin'. You've tied up your dude cayuse twice with her'n to-day. Must have somethin' the matter with your eyes. I ain't a-goin' to lick you er fight with you, but I'm goin' to get even with you for this!"

"Here's your rope," said Hope, taking it from her saddle and handing it to the boy. Dave took it shamefacedly, throwing her rope on the ground, then hid himself on the opposite side of his pony. In an instant the soft-voiced twin picked up the teacher's stake-rope, coiled it, and tied it on to her saddle.

The girl stood to one side watching him. She wondered at his quickness. He must have inherited something of his grandmother's acuteness. But her sympathy turned to the other boy—big, clumsy, rough Dave. He was standing out of sight behind his horse, embarrassed by his own error. Hope felt sorry for him. She had already found it very difficult to keep peace between these boys and herself. Each day brought some new ruffle that required all her wit to smooth over.

The soft-voiced twin handed the bridle reins to her, then turned to his own horse, which had wandered away toward more tempting pasture. The girl thanked him, and walked over to Dave. He looked at her sullenly, a certain dogged obstinacy in his eyes. She had intended to say something kind to him, instead she spoke indifferently, yet to the point.

"Go home with Dan the same as usual. Say nothing about it, but get my rifle and meet me here at the school in two hours—six o'clock. There is a big flock of chickens that fly over that point every evening."

The boy made no reply, but his face changed noticeably, and he jumped on his horse, calling his twin to hurry up; but the soft-voiced boy had no notion of leaving his teacher, so Dave, with a savage whoop, ran his pony to the top of the hill, leaving the school-house and his uncomfortable feelings far in the background.

"Why don't you go with him?" asked the girl.

"I'm waitin' for you," replied the boy.

"But I'm not going just now. You'd better run along with Dave."

"I ain't in no hurry."

"Aren't you? Well, that is good, for I just happened to think of something. I want you to go down to Pete La Due's place where they are branding, and hang around awhile and keep your ears open. There will be a lot of breeds there, and some of those men over on Crow Creek, and maybe something will be said that we ought to know about. You understand. You are my faithful scout, you know. And another thing—don't try to pay Dave back for what he did. He's sorry enough about it."

The boy's face took on a shrewd, determined expression, causing him at once to look years older. For an instant Hope imagined that he resembled his aged grandmother, old White Blanket, the "witch."

"I'll go over there," he replied, "an' I'll see what I can find out, but about Dave—I'll get even with him if it takes me ten years. He needs teachin'."

"We all do," said the girl thoughtfully. "I have begun a series of lessons myself—on humanity. No, on sympathy, on what is expected of a womanly woman. We're lucky when we have a good teacher, aren't we? But it's pretty hard to learn what doesn't come natural. Remember Dave isn't like you. He wasn't made like you, and never will be like you. Think of this, and don't be hard on him, that's a good boy."

The soft-voiced twin smiled sweetly, and mounting his horse, remarked:

"I expect I'd better be movin' over there if I'm goin' to find out anything to-day."

"Yes," said Hope, pleased that he should leave her at last. "I think you're right. Be sure to come home before bedtime and report."

The boy dug his heels into the pinto's sides, starting off on a bound. She watched him, absent-mindedly, until he disappeared over the hill-top, then she rode away at a lively canter toward the sheep-man's ranch.

A horseman came rapidly toward her before she reached Livingston's gate. It was a slender, boyish figure, who sat his horse with remarkable ease and grace. The girl frowned savagely when she saw him, but only for an instant. He waved his hat above his dark head and called to her from the distance. His voice possessed a rich musical ring which might have stood for honesty and youthful buoyancy.

When Hope met him she was smiling. In fun she passed rapidly, seeing which he wheeled his horse about, caught up with her, and leaning far over, grasped the bridle, bringing her horse to a stand-still beside him. It was an old trick of his boyhood. The girl's ringing laughter reached a small group of men at work with shovels upon the rise of a green knoll not far away. They stopped work and listened, but the notes died away and nothing more could be heard.

"That wasn't fair, Syd!" she cried. "I thought you'd forgotten it. I was going to run you a race."

"Rowdy's thin, he couldn't run. A stake-rope don't agree with him, and I'll bet he hasn't seen an oat since you've been here," he answered, growing sober. "Hopie, dear, leave these breeds and go home, that's a good girl! I can't bear to have you stay there. You've been up here a week and you look thin already. I'll bet you're starving right now! Come, own up, aren't you hungry?"

"I hadn't thought of it," replied Hope. "But now that you remind me, I believe I am—the least bit. A steady diet of eggs—boiled in their own shells, is apt to make one hungry at times for a good dinner. But what's the difference? I feel fine. It certainly agrees."

"But that's terrible! Eggs! Eggs only—eggs in the shell. Haven't you brought yourself to meat, bread, and potatoes yet? Eggs only! It's a joke, Hope, but somehow I can't feel amused. I've eaten eggs for a meal or two, around those places, but a week of it! Hope, your father wants you. Go home to him!"

"No; you see it's this way, Sydney, I couldn't if I would, and I wouldn't if I could. I couldn't because father told me to stay until the school term ended, and I wouldn't because—I like it here. It's new and exciting. I feel just like a boy does in going out into the world for the first time. You know how that is, Syd, how you roamed about for months and months. You had your fling and then you were satisfied."

"I know," said Carter softly, stroking her horse's neck. "But you had such a free 'fling' there at the ranch, what else could you want? You had your choice between the ranch and New York. You could travel if you wished. Surely there was nothing left to be desired. You can't make me believe that you really like it up here among these breeds, teaching a handful of stupid children their A B C's! I can't see the attraction. Clarice Van Rensselaer with the Cresmonds and that little jay Englishman, Rosehill, are due at the ranch this week. You like Clarice; go home, Hope, and look after things there. You're needed, and you know it. Do go, that's a good girlie!"

"Don't say anything more about it to me, Sydney. I can't go, I'm not going, and I want to forget for this one summer about the ranch and everyone on it."

"I am wasting my breath, but yet," he looked at her searchingly, "I don't understand you in this. I see no attraction here for you. Why, even the hunting isn't good! I'll not admit that there is any attraction for you in this Englishman over here. You've known dozens of them, and you've always expressed an aversion to every one. I'm not going to be scared of one lone Englishman!" He grasped her hand and his face darkened. "Hope, if I thought you would ever care for him I'd——"

She interrupted:

"You need not finish that! Show a little manhood! Oh, Syd, a moment ago you were my dear old companion—my brother, and now——If you knew how I detest you in this! It is not yourself—your dear self, at all, but the very devil that has taken possession of you. Sydney, are you sure there isn't something the matter with your brain? Do you realize how awful it seems? Doesn't it make you feel ashamed of yourself when you think of all the sweetness of our past life? It makes me, Syd. Sometimes at night before I go to sleep I think of the way you've acted lately, and I can feel a hot flush creep all over my face. It makes me so ashamed! I've grown up with you for my brother, I think of you always as my brother, and this makes a new person out of you—a person whom I neither love nor respect. Syd, dear Syd, forget it and I will never think of it again, for I will have my brother back. I loved you, Sydney, you and father, better than anyone else in this world. And now——" She turned her head away from him and began to cry quietly. In an instant he was filled with commiseration and tenderness.

"Don't, Hope!" he exclaimed, bending close to her. "I can't stand anything like that! Don't cry. I'm sorry, girlie. I've been a fool, a brute, a low-lived beggar, but I can't stand tears from you! Here you're hungry, starving, living among a lot of breeds, and I've added more to your misery. It's all a mistake. I know now when I see you crying—don't do it, dear! You've never cried since you were a baby, and now you're such a great big girl. The other feeling's all gone. I guess it must have been because you were the only girl out here and I let myself think of you that way until it grew on me. But you are my sister—my dear little pard!"

He had dismounted and stood beside her. Now he reached up and took her hands away from her face. She was ashamed of her tears, as people are who seldom cry, and hastily mopped her face with her handkerchief.

"I'm so glad, Syd, dear!" she exclaimed in a moment, then reached down and kissed him. "What a baby you must think I am!"

"Your tears woke me up, dear; don't be sorry. Maybe some time they'll make a man out of me."

"Nonsense! you were a man all the time, only you didn't know it. You don't know how happy I was all at once when you called me 'pard' again. I knew then I had my brother back."

The young fellow mounted his horse again. His own eyes were suspiciously moist.

"And I have my sister, which seems better than anything to me," he said. Then they both laughed.

"I was going to the Englishman's," said Hope, "to see if I could help any about the poor herder who was shot."

"They're burying him now," announced her cousin, "right around the bend of this hill just inside the fence. Do you want to go over there?"

"Yes, I think I do," she replied. "I want to ask Mr. Livingston when the little German girl is expected to arrive and what is going to be done about her."

"The herder's sister?" asked Sydney.

"No, his sweetheart. Just think, Sydney, his little sweetheart, who is on her way to marry him! Isn't it sad? Who will meet her and who will tell her, I wonder, and what will she do? How are such things managed, I wonder. Isn't it terrible, Syd?"

"Some beggars around here shot the poor fellow, Livingston told me. The whole bunch ought to be hanged for it."

"It was a cowardly thing to do!" exclaimed the girl.

"Sheep in a cattle country, the same old story. I imagine old Harris is a pretty strong element here. They've driven out a couple of bands already. Someone ought to put Livingston next. But he probably scents the situation now from this occurrence. He is one of the kind who trusts everyone. I met him last fall in town when he first came out here. He has put a lot of money into this business, and I'd like to see him make it a go. He'll have something to learn by experience."

"Isn't it too bad he didn't invest in cattle?" deplored Hope.

"Yes, though they say there's bigger returns in sheep." He pointed ahead. "You can't see the men, but they're just around that point of rocks, though they must be about through with the job by now."

"You'll go along, won't you? Then you can ride back to the school-house with me. I'm going to meet one of the twins there at six o'clock, and we're going to see if we can get some chickens."

"If you will promise to bring the chickens over to the camp and let the cook get you up a good, square meal," he replied. "Jim will be back before dark."

"If I shouldn't happen to get any birds," she asked, "does the invitation still hold good?"

"Pard!" he reproved.

CHAPTER XI

"Syd," she said softly, wonderingly, "he's praying!" She had an impulse to flee before he should see her, and with a look communicated the thought to Sydney, but Livingston turned around and came quickly down the grassy slope toward them. He greeted them cordially, heartily shaking hands with each.

"Is this not a beautiful day? I am glad you have come, Miss Hathaway. I wanted you to see this spot. Could any place be prettier? See this green slope and the gigantic ridge of rocks beside it."

"It's magnificent!" she exclaimed. "What a monument!"

"I had an idea he would like it if he could know," he continued. "Day after day he has stood up there on that point of rocks and watched his sheep."

Hope pointed across the valley to where the grassy slope terminated in a deep cut-bank, exclaiming:

"There is the corral!" It came involuntarily. She shot a quick glance at her cousin, but he was gazing thoughtfully at the magnificence of the scene before him, and had not noticed the words, or her confusion which followed them, which was fortunate, she thought.

If asked she could not have explained why she felt in this manner about it, and it is certain that she did ask herself. She had probably saved Livingston's sheep. Well, what of it? She only knew that she wanted no one to find it out, least of all Livingston himself. She had a half fear that if Sydney ever got an inkling of it he might sometime tell him, and Sydney was very quick; so she adroitly eased her involuntary exclamation by remarking:

"That is a queer place to put a corral! Aren't you afraid of a pile up so near the bank?"

"I am not using it now," he replied. "I put it there because Fritz ran his band on that side and it was more convenient not to drive them so far. I am using this shed below here, at present."

Sydney looked at Hope and began to laugh, then leaned over toward Livingston and placed his hand upon his shoulder.

"She'll be telling you how to run your sheep next. You mustn't mind her, though, for she's been teaching school a whole week, and dictating is getting to be sort of second nature with her, isn't it, Hopie? And besides that she isn't responsible. A steady diet of hard-boiled eggs isn't conducive——"

She stopped him with a gesture, laughing.

"That's awfully true, only I haven't eaten even hard-boiled eggs since breakfast, and I'm famished! It was cruel of you to remind me, Syd!"

"You poor youngster!" he exclaimed in real commiseration. "Is it as bad as that? I'm going over and start supper at once. The camp is just over the hill there, up that next draw." He pointed ahead, then looked at his watch. "It's after five now. You keep your appointment with the half-breed, but never mind the chickens till you've had a square meal."

She nodded in answer, smiling at him.

"They're starving her over there," he explained to Livingston, who looked at them in some wonderment. "They don't feed her anything but boiled eggs. Tell him why you don't eat anything but eggs, Hope, boiled,—hard and soft,—in their own shells. Maybe you can get them to bake you a potato or two in their own jackets!"

"What an idea! I never thought of that," she exclaimed. "You're a genius, Syd. But go home or I shall famish! I'll meet Dave and come right over there. I think the chickens will fly that way to-night, anyway, don't you?"

"Of course they will," replied her cousin, "they fly right over the top of my tent every evening!" Then he started away, but turned about quickly as though he had forgotten something, and asked Livingston if he would not come over to camp for supper, too.

Livingston looked up into the dark eyes of the girl beside him, then accepted.

"Good!" said Sydney. "Come along with Hope."

"Be sure and see that there's enough cooked," called the girl as he rode away.

"Don't worry about that, pard," he answered, then, lifting his hat, waved it high above his head as he disappeared around the reef of rocks.

Hope looked after him and was still smiling when she turned to Livingston. It may have been something in his face that caused her own to settle instantly into its natural quiet.

"I'd like to go up there for a moment," she said, then dismounted, and leaving her horse walked quickly up the grassy hill until she stood beside the grave. Some sod had been roughly placed upon the dirt, and scattered over that was a handful of freshly picked wild flowers.

"You picked them!" exclaimed the girl softly, turning toward him as he came and stood near her. "And I never even thought of it! How could you think of it! I had supposed only women thought of those things—were expected to think of them, I mean," she added hastily. "You make me wonder what——"

He looked at her curiously.

"Make you wonder what?" he asked in his quiet, well modulated voice.

A flush came over her face. Her eyes shifted from his until they rested upon the grave at her feet. The breeze threw a loose strand of dark hair across one eye. She rapidly drew her hand over her forehead, putting it away from her vision, then looked full and straight at the man beside her.

"I beg your pardon; I cannot finish what was in my mind to say. I forgot, Mr. Livingston, that we are comparative strangers."

"I am sorry, then, that you remember it," he replied. "It never seemed to me that we were strangers, Miss Hathaway. I do not think so now. There is something, I know not what, that draws people to each other in this country. It does not take weeks or months or years to form a friendship here. Two people meet, they speak, look into one another's eyes, then they are friends, comrades—or nothing, as it sometimes happens. They decide quickly here, not hampered by stiff conventionalities. It is instinct guides. Are you different from your countrymen?"

"No," she replied quickly. "Not in that one thing, at least. To be honest, I have never felt that you were a stranger to me; but a girl, even a rough Western girl, must sometimes remember and be restricted by conventionalities. I know what you are thinking, that conventionalities include politeness, and I have been rude to you. Perhaps that is the reason I wouldn't let you go back to Harris' with me the other night—I had not known you long enough."

He answered her simply: "I am not thinking of that night, but that you have just told me you are my friend—that you think kindly of me." She flashed him a look of surprise.

"But I never told you that!" she exclaimed.

"Not in just those words, true," he said. "But it is so. Didn't you say that you had never felt me to be a stranger to you? If you had not approved of me—thought kindly of me in the start, could you have felt so? No. When two people meet, they are friends, or they are still strangers—and you have never felt me to be a stranger. Is that not so?"

"I cannot deny what I have just said," she replied. "And I will not deny that I believed what I was saying, but your argument, though good, doesn't down me, because I honestly think that a person may see another person just once, feel that he never could be a stranger, and yet have no earthly regard or respect for that person."

"Have you ever experienced that?" he inquired.

"N—no. You are trying to corner me; but that isn't what I came to talk about, and it is time to go," she said, turning away from the grave. He walked with her down the hill toward her horse.

"I wanted to ask you, Mr. Livingston, about the little German girl," she said, standing with her back against the side of her horse, one arm around the pommel loosely holding the reins, and the other stretched upon the glossy back of the gentle animal. "When are you expecting her, and what are you going to do about her?"

"She should be here the last of the week. Poor girl! My heart bleeds for her. There is nothing to do except to tell her the sad story, and see that she gets started safely back to her country and her friends," he answered.

Hope stood upright, taking a step toward him.

"You would not—oh, it would be inhuman to send her back over the long, terrible journey with that cruel pain in her heart! Think how tired she will be, the thousands of miles of travel through strange lands, and the multitude of foreigners she will have passed! Think of the way she has traveled, those close, packed emigrant cars, and everything. It is terrible!"

"I never thought of that. She will be tired. You are right, it would never do to send her over that long journey so soon, though she is not coming through as an emigrant, but first class, for she is of good family over there. So was Fritz—a sort of cousin, I believe, but the poor boy got into some trouble with his family and came over here penniless. He was to have met her in town and they expected to get married at once. He was going to bring her out here to the ranch to live until he had hunted up a location for a home. If I am not mistaken she has some money of her own with which they were going to buy sheep. She has been well educated, and has had some instruction in English, as had Fritz.

"I thought only of getting her back among her friends again and I never gave a thought about the long, weary trip and the poor, tired girl. She must rest for a time. You have shown me the right way, Miss Hathaway—and yet, what am I to do? I could bring her out here to the ranch, but there is no woman on the place. Perhaps I may be able to secure a man and his wife who need a situation, but it is not likely. There may be some good family about who would keep her for awhile. Do you know of one?"

"There are several families around here who might welcome a boarder, but none with whom a girl of that kind could be contented, or even comfortable. If only I were at home, and could take her there! I might send her over there. But, no, that would be worse than anything! There is no other way," she said suddenly, placing her hand upon his sleeve with a quick unconscious motion. "You must let me take care of her, up here, as I am, at Harris'!" Excitement had flushed her cheeks scarlet. Her eyes were filled with the light of inspiration and more than earthly beauty. She waited, intense, for him to speak, but he could not. He felt her hand upon his arm, saw the wonderful light in her face—and was dumb.

"Tell me that I may take care of her. I must—there is no other way," she insisted. "And it will give me the privilege of doing one little act of kindness. Say it will be all right!"

"If she cannot find comfort and strength in you, she cannot find it upon earth," he said softly. "I have no words with which to thank you!"

She took her hand from his arm with a little sigh of content, turned around and stood at her horse's head a moment, then mounted as lightly and quickly as a boy.

"Where's your horse?" she asked, whirling the animal about until it faced him. The wonderful light in her face had given place to a careless, light-hearted look.

"Up at the stable. Have you the time and patience to wait for me?" said Livingston.

"Plenty of patience, but no time," she replied. "I promised to meet one of the twins at six o'clock, so I've got to hurry up. I'll meet you over at Syd's camp in a little while."

Before he had time to either speak or bow she was gone. As she disappeared behind the ledge of rocks a clear boyish whistle of some popular air floated back to him.

Walking quickly through the pasture toward the ranch buildings Edward Livingston thought of many things—and wondered.

CHAPTER XII

The soft-voiced twin was all smiles, but Dave with his back against the front of the building was scowling sullenly, giving vent to his ugliness by kicking small stones with the toe of his boot and watching them as they went sailing high into the air, then down the sloping stretch of young green below. At one of those stones Hope's horse shied, but the girl smiled, knowing full well the young savage's mood. She rode rapidly, and stopped beside the boys, but did not dismount.

"Am I late?" she inquired of the scowling twin. "I see you are on time with the gun like a good boy, Dave, and you've brought your own along, too. We won't do a thing to those chickens if we get sight of them to-night!" She smiled at the boy, who became a trifle more amiable; then she turned to his soft-voiced twin. "How is it you're back so soon?"

He brushed a speck of dust from his overalls before replying, and his voice was particularly sweet.

"Had to come to report. You see when I got there they was just quittin', so I came along back with some o' the fellers. Didn't you meet Long Bill and Shorty Smith up the road there a piece when you come along?" The girl nodded. "Well, I come back with them's far as home; then I saw Dave getting the guns, so I thought I'd get mine an' come along, too. Say, what's a gating gun?" Hope looked perplexed for an instant, then laughed outright.

"Oh, you mean a Gatling gun!" She laughed, then very soberly: "It's a terrible weapon of war—a wicked thing. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, I just wanted to know," replied the boy evasively. "I heard some o' the men talkin' about one, so I thought I'd ask you. Must shoot pretty fast, don't they? Long Bill was tellin' about one that fired two thousand shots a second."

"That must have been a terror of one!" exclaimed the girl. "But they don't shoot quite as many as that, not even in a minute, but they are bad enough. A few of them would simply perforate an army of men. They're a machine gun," she went on to explain. "Just a lot of barrels fastened in a bunch together and turned by a crank which feeds in the cartridges and fires them, too. They shoot over a thousand shots a minute."

"I wish we'd 'a' had one the other night," exclaimed Dave, waking at last to a new interest in life. "And I'd 'a' had hold of the crank!"

"Wasn't it bad enough!" remonstrated the girl. "Didn't you do enough damage to satisfy your savage soul for awhile?"

"Shorty Smith's got a game leg," returned the boy gleefully, "an' so's old Peter. Long Bill, he's got his hand all done up in a sling, too, an' couldn't go back on the round-up!"

"I wonder how Bill done that," mused the other twin with a sweet, indrawn breath. Hope flushed scarlet, which faded instantly, leaving her face its rich, dark olive.

"Come on," she cried severely, "if we are to get any birds to-day!"

"I know where there's a coyote's den," said the soft-voiced twin. Dave was all attention immediately.

"Where?" he exclaimed eagerly. Hope, interested, too, leaned forward resting her arm upon the pommel of the saddle.

"Well," said the boy, deliberately, sweetly—too sweetly, thought the girl, who watched him keenly—"I was goin' to keep it to myself, an' get 'em all on the quiet, but it's in a kind of a bad place to get at, so mebbe I can't do it alone. It's 'bout a half mile back there, between here an' home, up on that ridge behind old Peter's shack. There's a hole under the side of the rocks, but it's hard diggin', kind of sandstone, I reckon. I left a pickax an' shovel up there."

"Let's go up there now," cried Dave, "an' get the whole bloomin' nest of 'em! We can get the chickens later."

"Now, look here," said the other quietly. "The find's mine. If you're in on this here deal, you'll have to work for your share. If you'll do the diggin' you can have half of the bounty on 'em. How's that?"

Dave grunted. "Supposin' there ain't any there," he demurred.

The soft-voiced twin shrugged his shoulders contemptuously.

"What'd you suppose I'd be diggin' there for if there wasn't none? There's a whole litter o' pups."

"Come on, then!" exclaimed Dave, convinced of his good fortune, for the bounty on coyotes was four dollars for each and every one.

Hope looked dubiously at the soft-voiced twin, she thought of the supper at Sydney's camp, then fired with the fun of the thing rode gayly away with the boys.

The hounds leaped after them, clearing the ground with long, easy bounds. The girl watched them glide along, yelping, barking, filling the air with their voices. Her horse loped neck to neck with the soft-voiced twin's. She pointed at the dogs, drawing the boy's attention to them.

"Why did you bring them?" she asked. "They'll warn your old ones and they'll be far away by the time we get there. You're usually so quick-witted, Dan, I wonder you did not think of it!"

The boy made no reply, but gave her a look filled with cunning, cool intent.

So this was his revenge—his twin was to dig into a rocky ledge for an empty coyote's den! She marveled at the boy's deliberate scheming, and rode gayly along to see the outcome. To this sort of revenge she had no actual objection.

They rode up over the top of a high divide, then followed down a narrow draw until it widened into a tiny basin, and there, in the center of vivid green, like a smooth, well-kept lawn, nestled old Peter's cabin. Surrounding this pretty basin were steep, high ridges and hills, smooth-carpeted, too, except the ever narrow terraced "buffalo trails," and here and there a broken line where sharp crags of sandstone jutted out. To the base of one of these ridges of rock, back of the old hermit's one-roomed log shack, the soft-voiced twin led the way, followed closely by his eager brother.

The twins left their horses at the foot of the hill and climbed up about thirty feet to a narrow ledge, where a shovel and pickax marked the small entrance of a coyote's den.

Dave set immediately at work plying the pickax with vigor, and shoveling out the stones and the hardened sand about the opening, while his twin superintended the job and occasionally offered words of encouragement.

Hope watched them from below. Evidently the soft-voiced boy was enjoying himself immensely. He sat on one end of the ledge, his blue-overalled legs dangling over the side, while Dave worked industriously, hopefully on.

The hounds evidently had found a trail of some kind, for after sniffing about busily for a moment they made a straight line along the hill, disappearing over the high ridge. Hope watched them out of sight, feeling an impulse to follow, but changed her mind and rode over to old Peter's cabin instead. The old man limped to the door and peered out cautiously.

He was a squat-figured, broad-shouldered, grizzled little man, with unkempt beard and a shaggy sheaf of iron-gray hair, beneath which peered bright, shifting blue eyes. He added to his natural stoop-shouldered posture by a rude crutch of hasty manufacture much too short for him, which he leaned heavily upon. He opened the door only wide enough to put out his head, which he did cautiously, holding his hand upon the wooden latch.

"How d'!" he said in a deep, gruff voice that seemed to come from somewhere between his shoulders.

She nodded brightly, remembering to have seen the old fellow around Harris'.

"You have no objection to our digging out a den of coyotes back here, have you?" she asked.

"Umph! There ain't no den 'round here that I know about," he replied, still retaining his position in the door.

"But see here," pointing toward the side hill, "the boys have found one and are at work up there right now."

"More fools they, then," declared old Peter, limping cautiously outside the door. "I cleaned out that den three year ago, an' I never knowed a coyote to come an' live in a place that'd been monkeyed with. Too much sense fer that. I always said a coyote had more sense 'n them boys! Better go tell 'em they'd as well dig fer water on the top o' that peak, Miss!" He shook his tousled head dubiously, watched the boys on the hill for a moment, then limped back again, taking up his first position, half in, half out the door. His attitude invited her to be gone, but she held in her uneasy horse and proceeded in a friendly manner to encourage some more deep-seated, guttural tones from the old man.

"Do you live here all alone?"

"Humph! I reckon I do."

"Have you lived here long?"

"Reckon I have."

"Are those your cattle up on the divide?"

"I reckon they be."

"It must be awful lonesome for you here all by yourself. Do coyotes or wolves trouble you much? Whoa, Rowdy!"

"They're a plumb nuisance, Miss. Better kill off a few of 'em while you're here. I reckon you kin use yer gun."

"I reckon I can, a little," she replied.

"When I was in the war," he continued, "they had some sharpshooters along, but they wan't no wimmen among 'em. I reckon you're right handy with a gun."

"Who told you?" she asked suddenly.

"I reckon I know from the way you hold that 'ere gun."

Just then the soft-voiced twin rode up to the cabin. Hope accosted him.

"Did you get the coyotes already?"

"Nope, Dave's still diggin'. I'm goin' home er the old man'll be huntin' me with the end of his rope."

"Oh, you'd better stay," she coaxed. "Think of the fun you'll miss when Dave gets into the den. It's your find; you ought to stay for the finish."

"I'll stake you to my share," said the boy. "He'll soon find all there is. But I guess I'd better be a-goin'."

"Perhaps you had," Hope replied, thoughtfully; then she rode over to the industrious Dave, while the soft-voiced twin wisely took a straight bee-line across the hills to his father's ranch.

This time Hope herself climbed the hill to the spot where the boy was digging.

"Dave, I'm afraid there are no coyotes in there, aren't you?"

He stopped work, wiped his brow with something that had once been a red bandanna handkerchief, then gravely eyed the girl, who leaned against the rocks beside him.

"But he said," pondering in perplexity. "But he said——" He looked into the ragged entrance of the hole, then at his shovel, then up again at the girl. "What makes you think there ain't no coyotes there?"

She was filled with sympathy for the boy, which perhaps he did not deserve, and she had recollected the supper at Sydney's camp, and concluded that this foolishness had gone far enough. She coaxed the boy to leave it until morning, but he was obdurate.

"No, I'm goin' to know if there's anything in here er not, an' if there ain't——" His silence was ominous; then he set to work again with renewed energy and grim determination.

She watched him for awhile, then walked out to the end of the bulging sand-rocks and climbed the grassy hill. When at length she reached the summit, the jagged rocks below which labored the breed boy seemed but a line in the smooth green of the mountain, while old Peter's cabin and the setting of green carpeted basin looked very small. On the opposite side a fine view presented itself, showing, in all of Nature's magnificent display, soft lines of green ridges, broken chains of gigantic rocks, narrow valleys traced with winding, silvery threads of rushing water. Such a picture would hold the attention of anyone, but this girl of the West, of freedom and wildness, was one with it—a part of it, and not the least beautiful and wonderful in this lavish display of God's handiwork.

She stood with bared head upon a high green ridge. A soft, gentle chinook smoothed back from her forehead the waving masses of dark hair. Myriads of wild flowers surrounded her, and from the millions below and about drifted and mingled their combined fragrance. The great orb of setting sun cast its parting rays full on her face, and lingered, while the valleys below darkened into shadow. As the last rays lighted up her hair and departed, the yep! yep! of the hounds attracted her attention, and turning about with quick, alert step she moved out of this picture—forever.

Standing upon a rocky ledge a hundred feet below the summit of the ridge she watched another scene, not the quiet picture of Nature's benevolent hand, but a discord in keeping, yet out of all harmony with it, in which she blended as naturally and completely as she had in the first. It was a race between a little fleet-footed coyote and half a dozen mongrel staghounds; they came toward her, a twisting, turning streak, led by a desperate gray animal, making, to all appearance, for the very rocks upon which she stood. Not ten yards behind the coyote a lank, slate-colored hound, more gray than stag, was closing in inch by inch. The coyote was doing nobly, so was the mongrel hound, thought Hope, who watched the race with breathless interest. The yellow dogs were falling behind, losing ground at every step, but the blue mongrel was spurting. On they came—on—on, and the girl in a tremor of excitement lay flat down upon the rocks and watched them. Her heart went out to the dog. She had seen it kicked around the yard at Harris', noticed it as it slunk about for its scanty food, and now how nobly it was doing! She wondered if any of her thoroughbreds at home could do as well, and thought not. The others were straggling far behind, but now the blue hound was but two lengths from the coyote, and its chances seemed small, but on a sudden it turned and made direct for the rocks from which the girl watched. That instant the dog saw failure, and the light of determination, of victory, died from its eyes. That same instant the coyote saw salvation from a quick end in the narrow crevices of rock so near, and the next it lay stone dead with a bullet through its brain. The gaunt hound bounded over its body, then stopped short, bewildered, and eyed its fallen foe. Then with a savage snarl he seized it by the throat as if to utterly demolish it, but the girl called him off, and somehow, in his dog's heart, he understood that the game was not his.

CHAPTER XIII

"That's a little example I'll let you work out for yourself," replied his teacher. "You're awfully stupid in arithmetic, Dave, and it's too bad, for in cases of coyotes' bounty and so forth it would be a pretty good thing for you to know. You hurry up and figure that out, for to-morrow you're going to get a hard one. It's this: If a Gatling gun fires two thousand shots a minute how many can it fire in half an hour?"

"Whew! you don't expect anybody to answer that, do you?" exclaimed the boy.

"Oh, that's easy," she laughed. "If you can't figure it out yourself you might ask old Peter or Long Bill, maybe they'd know."

The boy rode along, his thoughts absorbed in a brown study. At length he sighed and looked up.

"Well, anyway, it'll be enough to buy a horse or a new saddle with." Then as though struck with a sudden thought he asked: "Say, what made Dan give you his share of them coyotes?" She suppressed a faint inclination to smile.

"Perhaps he gave up as I did, and thought there was nothing there. Old Peter said he knew there wasn't. But it's just possible Dan wanted to be generous. Don't you think so?"

"Not Dan!" exclaimed the boy. "There ain't one chance in a million he'd ever give such snap as that away! I reckon," he concluded after some studying, "he must 'a' thought that den was empty an' was goin' to pay me back. Ain't I got it on him now, though!"

"And instead of being paid back you are getting both shares of the coyote bounty, and you know you don't deserve it. What are you going to do about it?"

"You bet he ain't a-goin' to get none of it!" was the emphatic reply; to which the girl had nothing to say.

In a few moments they came in sight of Sydney's camp. From out of the small stove-pipe of the first of the two tents rolled a volume of smoke, and across the narrow brush-covered valley came the delicious odor of cooking food. Simultaneously the two riders urged on their horses to a faster gait, for Hope at least was hungry. It is safe to say that the breed boy was in the same condition, and this invitation out to supper pleased him mightily. He was a large, stolidly built lad of fourteen years, and like all boys of that age, whether stolidly built or slender as a sapling, was always hungry.

"I'll bet I can eat the whole shootin' match," he declared, actually believing that he spoke the truth.

"I think the meal is prepared for hungry people," replied Hope, heartily agreeing with the boy's sentiments. "And I hope they have waited for us. But for goodness' sake be careful not to make yourself sick, Dave!"

The camp was pitched in an open flat beside a small sparkling mountain stream. Upon one side of the creek was brush-covered bottom land, through which the riders followed a winding trail, dim in the semi-darkness. Then they splashed across the creek, and rode up its steep bank into the clear, grass-covered government dooryard of the campers.

"Well, at last!" called a voice from the tent. "The posse was just getting ready to go in search of you. Thought the chickens must have lured you away. Come right in, the feast is prepared!"

"All right, Syd," called the girl happily, dismounting almost in the arms of old Jim McCullen, her dear "father Jim," to whom she gave the heartiest handshake he had ever received.

"Oh, I'm so glad you're back!" she exclaimed as he led her horse away to stake it out. "How's everything at home—the dogs and horses, and everything? Never mind the people! I don't want to hear a single thing about them! We're late, Syd," she apologized, as her cousin held open the tent flap for her to enter, "but oh, we've had such a stack of fun!"

She greeted the little English cook, an old acquaintance, who beamed with smiles as she entered. Then she cast her dark eyes about the tent and encountered those of Livingston.

"We were beginning to fear for your safety, Miss Hathaway," he said to her, then wondered why she should laugh. And she did laugh loudly, with a clear, sweet, reverberant ring that echoed through the little valley. Before it had died away her face settled back into its natural quiet. She threw her cowboy's hat into a far corner, and seated herself on a case of canned goods opposite Livingston, to whom she immediately devoted herself.

She was not bold, this slender, well-built girl of the prairies,—no one who knew her could conceive such an idea,—but she moved with a forwardness, a certain freedom of manner that was her own divine right. Whatever she did, whatever she said, appeared right in her—in another less graceful, less charming, less magnetic, it would in many instances seem gross boldness. But with her wonderful, forceful personality whatever she did or said was the embodiment of grace and right.

Many of her acquaintances aped her ways and little peculiarities of speech, to the utter ruination of any originality or fascination they may have themselves possessed, for such originality cannot be imitated.

She leaned nearer to Livingston.

"You should have been with us—we've had a great time! Just think, we got eight coyotes! Isn't that fine for one evening?"

"Indeed," he exclaimed, "I think that remarkable! Your cousin said that something of the kind was keeping you. I take it that you are passionately fond of hunting."

"Yes, it is the greatest sport there is in this country, and where the hunting is good, as it is at home along the Missouri River, there is nothing like it. But up here there is really no game to speak of, though the mountains at one time abounded with it. Even chickens are as hard to find as a needle in a haystack. We found a den of coyotes, seven little ones, and one of the old ones we got with the help of the dogs. You know," she said confidentially, "I shouldn't have delayed this supper for anything less than a den of coyotes."

"There won't be the sign of any kind of game left up here by the time she leaves," remarked Sydney, taking a seat on the ground beside her.

"I heard tell as how she was tryin' to make a clearance," said old Jim McCullen from the entrance.

She flashed him a quick look of surprise. He answered it with a barely perceptible squint, which she understood from years of comradeship to mean that he shared her secret. It meant more than that. He not only shared her secret, but his right hand—his life—was at her disposal, if necessary. Then, in acknowledgment of his silent message she gave him one of her rare, glorious smiles.

"You did make a pretty lively clearing," said her cousin. "Eight coyotes isn't so bad. That means numerous calves saved, young colts, a hundred or so sheep, not to mention innumerable wild birds and barnyard fowl."

"Truly, it makes us feel like conquerors, doesn't it, Dave? But we're famished, Syd!" Then placing her seat beside the table she motioned the others to join her, and soon they were enjoying a remarkably good camp supper.

The cook bustled about the tent, pouring out coffee, apologizing, praising this dish or that, and urging them to partake of more, all in one breath.

Sydney and his friend Livingston kept up the conversation, to which Hope listened, too contented and happy with the meal, the hour, and the company to enter it herself. She finally pushed back her plate, congratulated the cook upon the success of his supper, and gave the twin a warning look, which he completely ignored.

"Here, take another piece o' this pie," said the cook, who had intercepted the girl's glance. At this invitation the boy helped himself with alacrity, and with a broad smile the cook continued: "I never knowed a boy yet to kill himself eatin'. You can fill 'em plumb full to the brim, an' in a 'alf hour they're lookin' fer more. All the same, dog er Injun, halways hungry; an' a boy's just the same."

"Eat all you want, youngster, you're not in school now," said Carter. "I have a slight recollection myself of a time when I had an appetite."

"I failed to notice anything wrong with it to-night, Sydney," remarked the girl.

"There's nothin' like a happetite," observed the cook. "Did you's ever hear the meaning hoff the word? This is how hit was told to me." He stood before them emphasizing each word with a forward shake of his first finger. "H-a-p-p-y,—happy,—t-i-t-e, tight,—happy—tite—that's right, ain't hit? When you're heatin' hall you want you're tight, an' then you're happy, ain't you? An' that's what hit means,—happy-tight."

Whether this observation of the small English cook's was original or not those present had no way of ascertaining. But since this was but a sample of the many observations he aired each day, it is reasonable to suppose that it originated in his fertile brain.

"I think there's no doubt about that being the true derivation of the word," said Hope. "In fact, I am sure it is. Isn't it, Dave?"

"I don't know nothin' about it," said the boy, looking up from his last bite of pie; then giving a deep sigh he reluctantly moved away from the table.

"Well, I can guarantee that you're happy," said Hope, "and that is a positive demonstration of the truth of William's observation. But now we must go," she said, rising abruptly and picking up her hat from the corner of the tent.

"You haven't been here a half hour yet, Hopie, but I suppose I must be thankful for small favors," deplored Carter.

"I've had my supper,—a nice one, too,—and that's what I came for, Syd, dear," said the girl. "And if I may, I will come again, until you and dear old Jim both get tired of me."

"Get tired—fiddlesticks!" exclaimed McCullen, while Sydney laughed a little, and left the tent to saddle her horse. The breed boy followed him; then Livingston, too, was about to leave when McCullen stopped him.

"Just stay in here by the fire and talk to Hopie till we get your horses," he said, abruptly leaving them together.

The girl drew nearer the stove.

"It's quite chilly out this evening," she remarked.

"That is the beauty of the nights in this northern country," he replied, coming near to her.

"Why, we're alone," she observed. "I wonder where William went!"

"I didn't notice his disappearance," he replied. "But we are alone—together. Are you not frightened?"

"Frightened? No!" she said softly. "Why?"

"A senseless remark. Do not notice it—or anything, I beg of you. I am quite too happy to weigh my words."

"Then you have proved the cook's theory correct; providing you have eaten—sufficiently," she replied. They both smiled, and darts of light from the stove played about their faces.

"Will you allow me—this night—to ride home with you?" he asked, watching the fantastic shadows upon her face and catching gleams of her deep eyes as they occasionally sought his own.

She hesitated a moment before replying.

"You think me a strange girl," she said. "I wonder what you will think of me now if I refuse this."

"I think nothing except that you are the sweetest girl I have ever known—and the noblest. I thank my Maker for having met you, and spoken with you, and sat here in the firelight beside you! Your ways are your own. I shall not—cannot question you, or impose myself upon you. Our lives, it seems, lie far apart. But I cannot help it—the words burn themselves out—I love you, Hope—I love you! Forgive me!" He raised her hand to his lips and left her standing alone in the firelight.

"He loves me," she thought, far into the quiet hours of the night. "He loves me, and yet he ran away from me!"