"It wouldn't be right for her to marry him," he observed.

"She sh.o.r.e is one pretty girl. I wonder now if I have got any chance. She's rich, an' I ain't, but I sh.o.r.e do love her a lot. Kate Loudon--that's a right nice-soundin' name."

He lowered his head and smoked silently for several minutes. The horse, reins on his neck, swung along steadily.

"Ranger fellah," said Loudon, "she'd ought to be willin'

to wait till we make a stake, oughtn't she now? That's right.

Wiggle one ear for yes. You know, don't yuh, old tiger-eye?"

When the lights of the ranch sparked across the flat, Ranger pointed his ears, lifted his head, and broke into a foxtrot. Pa.s.sing the ranch house, on his way to the corral, Loudon heard the merry tinkle of a guitar. Through an open window Loudon saw the squat figure of Mr. Saltoun bent over a desk. On the porch, in the corner where the hammock hung, flickered the glowing tip of a cigarette. With a double thrum of swept strings the guitar-player in the hammock swung from "The Kerry Dance" into "Loch Lomond."

Loudon swore under his breath, and rode on.

Jimmy, the cook, and Chuck Morgan, one of the punchers, were lying in their bunks squabbling over the respective merits of Texas and New Mexico when Loudon entered the bunkhouse. Both men immediately ceased wrangling and demanded letters.

"I ain't read 'em all yet," replied Loudon, dropping his saddle and bridle in a corner. "Wait till to-morrow."

"Jimmy's expectin' one from a red-headed gal," grinned Chuck Morgan. "He's been restless all day. 'Will she write?' says he, 'an' I wonder if she's sick or somethin'.' Don't you worry none, cookie. Them red-headed gals live forever. They're tough, same as a yaller hoss."

"You shut up!" exclaimed Jimmy. "Who'd write to you, you frazzled end of a misspent life? D'jever look at yoreself in the gla.s.s? You! Huh! Gimme my letter, Tommy."

"Letter? What letter? I didn't say there was a letter for yuh."

"Well, ain't there?"

"You gimme somethin' to eat, an' then we'll talk about letters."

"You got a nerve!" roared the cook, indignantly. "Comin'

rollickin' in 'round midnight an' want yore chuck! Well, there it is"--indicating Chuck Morgan--"go eat it."

"You fry him an' I will. I'll gamble he wouldn't taste any worse than them steaks you've been dishin' out lately."

"You punchers gimme a pain," growled the cook, swinging his legs out of the bunk. "Always eatin,' eatin'. I never seen nothin' like it nohow."

"He's sore 'cause Buff put a li'l dead snake in his bunk,"

explained Chuck Morgan placidly. "Just a li'l snake--not more'n three foot long at the outside. He sh.o.r.e is the most fault-findin' feller, that Jimmy is."

"There ain't anythin' for yuh, Chuck," said Loudon.

"Here's yore letter, Jimmy."

The cook seized the grimy missive and retreated to his kitchen. Twenty minutes later Loudon was eating supper.

He ate leisurely. He was in no hurry to go up to the ranch house.

"Got the makin's!" Chuck Morgan's voice was a roar.

"Be careful," said Loudon, turning a slow head. "Yo're liable to strain yore throat, an' for a fellah talkin' as much as you do, that would sh.o.r.e be a calamity."

"It sh.o.r.e would," agreed Morgan. "I only asked yuh for the makin's three times before I hollered."

"Holler first next time," advised Loudon, tossing paper and tobacco across to Morgan. "Have yuh got matches?

Perhaps yuh'd like me to roll yuh a pill an' then light it for yuh?"

"Oh, that ain't necessary; none whatever. I got matches.

They're all I got left. This aft'noon Jimmy says 'gimme a pipeful,' an' I wants to say right here that any jigger that'll smoke a pipe will herd sheep. 'Gimme a load,' says Jimmy.

'Sh.o.r.e,' says I, an' Jimmy bulges up holdin' the father of all corncobs in his hand. I forks over my bag, an' Jimmy wades in to fill the pipe. But that pipe don't fill up for a plugged nickel.

"He upends my bag, shakes her empty, an' hands her back.

'Thanks,' says Jimmy. 'That's all right,' I says, 'keep the bag, too. It'll fit in right handy to mend yore shirt with, maybe.' Come to find out, that pipe o' Jimmy's hadn't no bottom in her, an' all the tobacco run through an' into a bag Jimmy was holdin' underneath. A reg'lar Injun trick, that is. Yuh can't tell me Jimmy ain't been a squaw-man.

Digger Injuns, too, I'll bet."

Jimmy, leaning against the door-jamb, laughed uproariously.

"Yah," he yelped. "I'll teach yuh to steal my socks, I will. I'd just washed a whole pair an' I was a-dryin' 'em behind the house, an' along comes Chuck an' gloms both of 'em, the hawg."

Leaving the two wrangling it out between them, Loudon pushed back his chair and went to the door. For a time he stood looking out into the night. Then he went to his saddle, picked up the bag containing the mail for Mr. Saltoun, and left the bunkhouse.

On the way to the ranch house he took out of his shirt the parcel of ribbon and smoothed it out. Skirting the house on the side farthest from the porch corner where sat Kate and Blakely, Loudon entered the kitchen and walked through the dining room to the open doorway of the office. Mr. Saltoun half turned at Loudon's entrance.

"h.e.l.lo," said Mr. Saltoun, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up his eyes. "I was just wonderin' when you'd pull in."

"'Lo," returned Loudon. "Here's the mail, an' here's a package for Miss Kate."

There was a rush of skirts, and handsome, black-haired Kate Saltoun, her dark eyes dancing, stood in the doorway.

"Did you get my ribbon, Tom?" cried she, and pounced on the flat parcel before Loudon could reply.

She smiled and glowed and held the ribbon under her olive chin, exclaimed over it and thanked Loudon all in a breath.

Her father beamed upon her. He loved this handsome girl of his.

"Come out on the porch, Tom," said Kate, "when you're through with father. Mr. Blakely's here. Thank you again for bringing my ribbon."

Kate swished away, and Mr. Saltoun's beaming expression vanished also. Mr. Saltoun was not especially keen. He rarely saw anything save the obvious, but for several weeks he had been under the impression that Kate and this tall, lean puncher with the gray eyes were too friendly.

And here was Kate, while entertaining the 88 manager, inviting Loudon to join her on the porch. Mr. Saltoun was ambitious for his daughter. He had not the remotest intention of receiving into his family a forty-dollar-a-month cowhand. He would have relished firing Loudon. But the latter was a valuable man. He was the best rider and roper in the outfit. Good cowboys do not drift in on the heels of every vagrant breeze.

Mr. Saltoun resolved to keep an eye on Loudon and arrange matters so that Kate and the puncher should meet seldom, if at all. He knew better than to speak to his daughter.

That would precipitate matters.

By long experience Mr. Saltoun had learned that opposition always stiffened Kate's determination. From babyhood her father had spoiled her. Consequently the Kate of twenty-three was hopelessly intractable.

Mr. Saltoun drummed on the desk-top with a pencil.

Loudon shifted his feet. He had mumbled a non-committal reply to Kate's invitation. Not for a great deal would he have joined the pair on the porch. But Mr. Saltoun did not know that.

"Chuck tells me," said Mr. Saltoun, suddenly, "that he jerked five cows out o' that mud-hole on Pack-saddle Creek near Box Hill. Yeah, that one. To-morrow I want yuh to ride along Pack-saddle an' take a look at them other two holes between Box Hill an' Fishtail Coolee. If yuh see any cows driftin' west, head 'em east. When that ---- barb-wire comes--if it ever does, an' I ordered it a month ago--you an'

Chuck can fence them three mud-holes. Better get an early start, Tom."

"All right," said Loudon, and made an unhurried withdrawal--by way of the kitchen.

Once in the open air Loudon smiled a slow smile. He had correctly divined the tenor of his employer's thoughts.

Before he reached the bunkhouse Loudon had resolved to propose to Kate Saltoun within forty-eight hours.