"Anything new?" questioned the latter, as he had questioned Leviatt.

"Nothin' doin'," returned Ferguson.

Leviatt now turned from the window. He spoke to Stafford, sneering.

"Ben Radford's quite a piece away from where he's hangin' out," he said. He again turned to the window.

Ferguson's lips smiled, but his eyes narrowed. Stafford stiffened in his chair. He watched the stray-man's hands furtively, fearing the outcome of this meeting. But Ferguson's hands were nowhere near his guns. They were folded over his chest--lightly--the fingers of his right hand caressing his chin.

"You ridin' up the crick to-day?" he questioned of Leviatt. His tone was mild, yet there was a peculiar quality in it that hinted at hardness.

"No," answered Leviatt, without turning.

Ferguson began rolling a cigarette. When he had done this he lighted it and puffed slowly. "Well, now," he said, "that's mighty peculiar.

I'd swore that I saw you over in Bear Flat."

Leviatt turned. "You've been pickin' posies too long with Mary Radford," he sneered.

Ferguson smiled. "Mebbe I have," he returned. "There's them that she'll let pick posies with her, an' them that she won't."

Leviatt's face crimsoned with anger. "I reckon if you hadn't been monkeyin' around too much with the girl, you'd have run across that dead Two Diamond cow an' the dogie that she left," he sneered.

Ferguson's lips straightened. "How far off was you standin' when that cow died?" he drawled.

A curse writhed through Leviatt's lips. "Why, you d.a.m.ned----"

"Don't!" warned Ferguson. He coolly stepped toward Leviatt, holding by the thongs the leather tobacco pouch from which he had obtained the tobacco to make his cigarette. When he had approached close to the range boss he held the pouch up before his eyes.

"I reckon you'd better have a smoke," he said quietly; "they say it's good for the nerves." He took a long pull at the cigarette. "It's pretty fair tobacco," he continued. "I found it about ten miles up the crick, on a ridge above a dry arroyo. I reckon it's your'n. It's got your initials on it."

The eyes of the two men met in a silent battle. Leviatt's were the first to waver. Then he reached out and took the pouch. "It's mine,"

he said shortly. Again he looked straight at Ferguson, his eyes carrying a silent message.

"You see anything else?" he questioned.

Ferguson smiled. "I ain't sayin' anything about anything else," he returned.

Thus, unsuspectingly, did Stafford watch and listen while these two men arranged to carry on their war man to man, neither asking any favor from the man who, with a word, might have settled it. With his reply that he wasn't "sayin' anything about anything else," Ferguson had told Leviatt that he had no intention of telling his suspicions to any man.

Nor from this moment would Leviatt dare whisper a derogatory word into the manager's ear concerning Ferguson.

CHAPTER XIV

ON THE EDGE OF THE PLATEAU

Now that Ferguson was satisfied beyond doubt that Leviatt had been concealed in the thicket above the bed of the arroyo where he had come upon the dead Two Diamond cow, there remained but one disturbing thought: who was the man he had seen riding along the ridge away from the arroyo? Until he discovered the ident.i.ty of the rider he must remain absolutely in the dark concerning Leviatt's motive in concealing the name of this other actor in the incident. He was positive that Leviatt knew the rider, but he was equally positive that Leviatt would keep this knowledge to himself.

But on this morning he was not much disturbed over the mystery. Other things were troubling him. Would Miss Radford go riding with him?

Would she change her mind over night?

As he rode he consulted his silver timepiece. She had told him not to come before ten. The hands of his watch pointed to ten thirty when he entered the flat, and it was near eleven when he rode up to the cabin door--to find Miss Radford--arrayed in riding skirt, dainty boots, gauntleted gloves, blouse, and soft felt hat--awaiting him at the door.

"You're late," she said, smiling as she came out upon the porch.

If he had been less wise he might have told her that she had told him not to come until after ten and that he had noticed that she had been waiting for him in spite of her apparent reluctance of yesterday. But he steered carefully away from this pitfall. He dismounted and threw the bridle rein over Mustard's head, coming around beside the porch.

"I wasn't thinkin' to hurry you, ma'am," he said. "But I reckon we'll go now. It's cert'nly a fine day for ridin'." He stood silent for a moment, looking about him. Then he flushed. "Why, I'm gettin' right box-headed, ma'am," he declared. "Here I am standin' an' makin' you sick with my palaver, an' your horse waitin' to be caught up."

He stepped quickly to Mustard's side and uncoiled his rope. She stood on the porch, watching him as he proceeded to the corral, caught the pony, and flung a bridle on it. Then he led the animal to the porch and cinched the saddle carefully. Throwing the reins over the pommel of the saddle, he stood at the animal's head, waiting.

She came to the edge of the porch, placed a slender, booted foot into the ox-bow stirrup, and swung gracefully up. In an instant he had vaulted into his own saddle, and together they rode out upon the gray-white floor of the flat.

They rode two miles, keeping near the fringe of cottonwoods, and presently mounted a long slope. Half an hour later Miss Radford looked back and saw the flat spread out behind, silent, vast, deserted, slumbering in the swimming white sunlight. A little later she looked again, and the flat was no longer there, for they had reached the crest of the slope and their trail had wound them round to a broad level, from which began another slope, several miles distant.

They had ridden for more than two hours, talking very little, when they reached the crest of the last rise and saw, spreading before them, a level many miles wide, stretching away in three directions. It was a gra.s.s plateau, but the gra.s.s was dry and drooping and rustled under the ponies' hoofs. There were no trees, but a post oak thicket skirted the southern edge, and it was toward this that he urged his pony. She followed, smiling to think that he was deceiving himself in believing that she had not yet explored this place.

They came close to the thicket, and he swung off his horse and stood at her stirrup.

"I was wantin' you to see the country from here," he said, as he helped her down. She watched him while he picketed the horses, so that they might not stray. Then they went together to the edge of the thicket, seating themselves in a welcome shade.

At their feet the plateau dropped sheer, as though cut with a knife, and a little way out from the base lay a narrow ribbon of water that flowed slowly in its rocky bed, winding around the base of a small hill, spreading over a shallow bottom, and disappearing between the b.u.t.tes farther down.

Everything beneath them was distinguishable, though distant. k.n.o.bs rose here; there a flat spread. Mountains frowned in the distance, but so far away that they seemed like papier-mache shapes towering in a sea of blue. Like a map the country seemed as Miss Radford and Ferguson looked down upon it, yet a big map, over which one might wonder; more vast, more nearly perfect, richer in detail than any that could be evolved from the talents of man.

Ridges, valleys, gullies, hills, k.n.o.bs, and draws were all laid out in a vast basin. Miss Radford's gaze swept down into a section of flat near the river.

"Why, there are some cattle down there!" she exclaimed.

"Sure," he returned; "they're Two Diamond. Way off there behind that ridge is where the wagon is." He pointed to a long range of flat hills that stretched several miles. "The boys that are workin' on the other side of that ridge can't see them cattle like we can. Looks plum re-diculous."

"There are no men with those cattle down there," she said, pointing to those below in the flat.

"No," he returned quietly; "they're all off on the other side of the ridge."

She smiled demurely at him. "Then we won't be interrupted--as we were yesterday," she said.

Did she know that this was why he had selected this spot for the end of the ride? He looked quickly at her, but answered slowly.

"They couldn't see us," he said. "If we was out in the open we'd be right on the skyline. Then anyone could see us. But we've got this thicket behind us, an' I reckon from down there we'd be pretty near invisible."

He turned around, clasping his hands about one knee and looking squarely at her. "I expect you done a heap with your book yesterday--after I went away?"

Her cheeks colored a little under his straight gaze.

"I didn't stay there long," she equivocated. "But I got some very good ideas, and I am glad that I didn't write much. I should have had to destroy it, because I have decided upon a different beginning. Ben made the trip to Dry Bottom yesterday, and last night he told something that had happened there that has given me some very good material for a beginning."

"That's awful interestin'," he observed. "So now you'll be able to start your book with somethin' that really happened?"