Despite the havoc to their numbers occasioned by the battle with Jimmie Welsh, all the others stood by. With the cowboys this matter of war and its hazards was a decided improvement over the dangerous monotony of spring round-ups. Moreover, as long as one remained able to collect it, five dollars a day was several pegs better than forty dollars a month and all found.

To-day as the late sun drooped low toward the horizon revolvers and guns were being oiled, and other preparations made for a vigorous campaign. The camp backed directly on the river at the only fordable spot within ten miles, the stream forming the fourth side to a square, the other three sides of which were breastworks of earth and trenches.

A rope stretched from the three cook-wagons served as a coral for the horses, and in it were gathered fully sixty-five animals, waiting impatiently to be hobbled, and turned out to feed. They waited in vain, however, for it was a matter of course that they should stand saddled and ready for instant use.

Directly before the front of these earthworks were the pits and chevaux de frise of sharp stakes that had been reported to Bud. The intention was to stampede the animals if possible, and run them into the pits and upon the stakes while a force of men, protected by the trenches, poured a withering and continuous fire into the on-surging mass. Meanwhile the greater force on horseback would be engaging the sheepmen.

That the cowboys knew the location of the flocks goes without saying, for had they not had spies on the lookout, the telltale pillar of dust that ever floated above the marching thousands would have betrayed their exact position.

The sun had just dropped below the horizon, when a man in the cowpunchers' camp discerned a weary horse bearing a hump-shouldered rider disconsolately in the direction of the ford. The man, bore strange-looking paraphernalia, and could be classified as neither fish, flesh, nor fowl—that is, cowboy, sheepman, or granger.

Without pausing the man urged his horse into the water at the ford, where it drank deeply. The man flung himself off the saddle and, scooping the water in his hands, imitated the horse's eagerness. When he had apparently satisfied an inordinate thirst he looked up at the man across the river and said:

"Say, could I git some grub in yore camp?"

"Yuh better move on, pardner. This here's resky territory," replied the other, his Winchester swinging idly back and forth across the stranger's middle.

"I'm hungry enough to take a chance," was the reply as Lester walked his mount deliberately across the stream. "Besides, I want to do business with yuh."

Another man, hearing the controversy, came up and ordered the newcomer away. Lester asked him who he was.

"My name's Bissell," snorted the man.

Lester advanced the rest of the way to shore his hand outstretched.

"I'm plumb glad to know yuh," he said. "My name's Skidmore, an' I've just come from the Bar T. I take pitchers, I do—yessir, the best in the business; an' if yuh don't believe me, just look at these."

From somewhere in his saddle-bags Skidmore whipped out two photographs and handed them to Bissell.

There, looking at him, sat Martha, in some of her long-unused finery, and Juliet, the daughter who had until now been the greatest blessing of his life.

Bissell started back as though he had seen a ghost, so excellent and speaking were the likenesses.

"Yes, they asked me to come an' take one of yuh, Mr. Bissell," went on the photographer.

"They did?" snapped Beef suspiciously. "How'd they know where I was?"

"Stelton told 'em. I was there when he got home."

"Oh, yes—Stelton, of course," apologized the owner. "How d'ye take the blame things? With that contraption yuh've got there?"

"Yes, and I think there is still light enough for me to get you!" cried Skidmore, snatching his outfit from the back of his horse and starting hurriedly to set it up.

By this time quite a crowd had gathered, some of whom had never seen a camera in operation, and none of whom had seen such pictures as Skidmore was able to pass around.

Bissell posed with the embarrassed air of a schoolboy saying his first piece, and after that Skidmore was busy arranging his subjects long after it was too dark to make an impression on the plates. Finally, affecting utter weariness, he asked for food, and the best in the camp was laid before him.

"Can't do any more to-night," he said when he had finished. "But to-morrow I can take a few; I have about half-a-dozen plates left."

"I may not look as tidy to-morrow morning as I do now," remarked one puncher suggestively. "Too bad yuh can't take pictures at night as well as in the daytime."

"I can," announced Skidmore, quite complacently.

"Well, didn't yuh just tell me," demanded an irate cowboy who vainly undertook to grasp the science of photography, "that the light actin' on the plate made the pitcher?"

"Yes."

"Well, how in the road to hell can yuh take 'em when it's dark?"

"He rents a star, yuh fool!" volunteered another.

"I make my own light," explained Skidmore.

"How? With a wood-fire?" asked the curious puncher.

"No. Shall I show yuh?"

"Yes."

The reply came in a chorus, for the arrival of this man with his strange apparatus had created a stir among his hosts that one cannot conceive in these days of perfect pictures. The cowpunchers were not worrying about attack, for they had outposts on duty who could warn them of the advance of the enemy in plenty of time. The amusement of the camera was a fine thing with which to pass the lagging hours.

"All right," said Skidmore. "By George," he cried, "I've just the idea! My plates are low, and I'll take a picture of the whole outfit together."

"What! Get seventy men on the same thing that'll only hold one?" cried another puncher, furious that these wonders eluded him. "If yuh're foolin' with me, son, I'll shoot yer contraption into a thousand pieces."

"Easiest thing in the world," said the photographer carelessly. "Only I'll have to ask yuh to move away from the fire; that'll spoil the plate. I think over here is a good place." He led the way to a spot directly in front of the horse corral.

Then he caused the lowest row to sit on the ground, the one behind it kneel, and the last stand up, and after peering through his camera made them close up tightly so that all could get into the picture. By the glow from the camp-fire it was a wonderful scene. The light showed broad hats, knotted neckerchiefs, and weather-beaten, grinning faces. It glanced dully from holsters and brightly from guns and buckles.

On a piece of board Skidmore carefully arranged his flashlight powder and took the cap off the lens. Then he ran to the fire and picked up a burning splinter, telling them all to watch it.

"Steady, now!" he commanded. "All quiet."

He thrust the lighted spill into the powder, and there was a blinding flash, accompanied by a hollow roar like a sudden gust of wind.

The next instant a terrific commotion arose in the corral. There were squeals of terror, and before the men could catch their breath the sixty-five cow ponies had bolted in a mad stampede, overturning the cook-wagons and thundering across the prairie.

The punchers, absolutely sightless for the instant from looking at the flash of the powder, broke into horrible cursing, and ran blindly here and there, colliding with one another and adding to the already great confusion. Their one desire was to lay hands on the wretched photographer, but that desire was never fulfilled.

For Lester Larkin, having shut his eyes during the flash, easily evaded the men and made his way to his horse that had been tethered to a tree near the river. With his instrument under his arm he untied the animal, climbed on his back, and dug in the spurs. A moment later, during the height of the confusion, he was galloping along parallel to the river. A mile and a half from the camp he turned his horse's head and sped at full speed toward the advancing herds.



CHAPTER XXIII

THE CROSSING

Darkness had scarcely fallen over the Larkin flocks and herd when the former were set in motion. The bells had been removed and the sheep were urged forward at the fastest possible pace.

Riders going by long detours had found a spot on the banks of the river two miles up from the camp of the cowmen where the water was not more than five or six feet deep at most, though of considerable swiftness. It was here that it had been determined the sheep should cross. So, when the last march was begun, the animals were driven at an angle, avoiding all the pits and defenses of the cowmen's ingenuity.

The herders, some of them on horseback and others on foot, did not speak. The only sounds that rose from the densely packed flocks were the clatter of their hard feet on the earth, the cracking of their ankle bones, and an occasional bawl of protest. But even this last was rare, for the sheep, worn with fast traveling and ignorant of the meaning of the strange things that were happening to them, were half-frightened; and only contented flocks blether much.

Bud Larkin and Sims rode back and forth, one on each side of the dim, heaving line, seeing that the herders and dogs kept their places and preventing any tendency to bolt.

An hour after the start half the distance was accomplished. It was just at this time that Larkin, looking northeast toward the camp of the cowmen, saw a sudden brilliant flash of light, and knew that Lester had succeeded in his daring project. A moment later and the distant rumble of the earth told him of the stampeded horses.

In depriving the cowboys of their ponies Larkin had accomplished a master-stroke, for he had played upon the one weakness of their equipment. A cowboy without his horse is less effective than a seal on land. His boots, tight-fitting and with high heels, make walking not only a difficult operation, but a painful one. Unaccustomed to this means of locomotion, a puncher is weary and footsore within two miles.

Aside from this fact, a cowboy disdains setting his foot on the ground except in a cow town, and even there daring ones sometimes rode their animals into saloons and demanded their drinks. It is a saying that a puncher will chase his horse half a mile in order to ride a quarter of a mile on an errand.

The coup of Lester Larkin had, therefore, left the camp of the cowmen in serious straits. Afraid to chase their animals and leave the camp deserted, as soon as they recovered enough sight to recognize their surroundings they took their places in the trenches to carry on their defense as best they could.

Busy as Larkin's thoughts were with the duty of getting his sheep safely across the river, his mind occasionally flashed back to the rear of the flock where the cook-wagons were trailing, for there in the company of a friendly sheepman rode Juliet Bissell.

Only that afternoon she had left the Bar T ranch-house, and, directed by one of the men guarding the rustlers there, had set out to find the sheepmen's camp. Not realizing how fast the outfit was traveling, she had struck the trail far to the rear, and had not overtaken Larkin until just at the time when the sheep were set in motion.

Then she realized her mission would have to wait until a later time. But so sweet and full-hearted had been Bud's joyful greeting that her faith in him had again returned, and she rode along meekly where he placed her, fond and comforted.

The proprieties of the situation never occurred to her. She knew that she was safe in his hands, and only bided the time when she could pour out her sorrow and pain to him after all this struggle was over.

To Bud her coming had been inexpressibly sweet. He knew by her face that some great necessity had driven her to him, but he did not question her, and with the undisturbed security of a clean conscience he wondered anxiously what had occurred.

At the time when the sheep were half-way to the river-bank there was another movement back at the camp where the cattle had been left. Men there working on schedule started the cattle-drive. But this drive was not at any diverging angle. It led straight forward to the pits and sharpened stakes of the cowmen's defenses.

Presently the outposts of the force by the ford heard a distant rumbling of the earth. These men on their horses—for they had not been in camp at the time of the flashlight—rode slowly forward and waited. But not long. Nearer and nearer came the sound until there was no more doubt that an animal-drive was headed in their direction.

Slowly they retreated to the camp and gave the warning. Immediately the fire was extinguished, and the punchers, still cursing over their misfortune, loaded every available weapon, breathing a hot and complete vengeance against the men that had outwitted them. Much to their chagrin they now recognized that Skidmore was but a clever member of the enemy, for if he had not been they felt that he would not have accomplished such a speedy and well-planned escape.

Now, as the sheepmen drove their animals nearer and nearer to the pits, they urged them faster until the unhappy creatures, besides themselves at the weird occurrences of a night of terror, were at a headlong gallop.

Suddenly one of the punchers heard that unmistakable accompaniment of running steers and the clashing of horns as the animals with lowered heads charged the works.

"They're cows!" he yelled. "Don't shoot!"

But it was too late. The maddened cattle were already at the first pits, plunging in with terrified bellows, or being transfixed on the stakes by the onrush of those behind. The pits were not more than ten feet deep, and only served to check the herd until they were full. Then those following trampled over their dying companions and charged the trenches where the cowboys lay.

"Fire!" yelled Bissell, who was in command, and the guns of nearly seventy men poured a leaden hail of death into the forefront of the heedless cattle.

Larkin's men by this time had drawn off to see that the havoc ran its course, and when they heard the desperate volleys they turned and rode southwest along the river-bank to the point where the sheep expected to cross.

The cattle, which had been driven in a rather narrow column, continued to come on endlessly. The leaders dropped in windrows, but the followers leaped over them only to fall a little farther on.

Driven by the resistless impulse of these behind, the animals unconsciously appeared like a charging regiment. Nearer and nearer the tide approached the cowboys' defenses; but now it was coming more slowly because of the dead bodies and the wounded animals that dragged themselves here and there, bellowing with pain and terror.

At last, at the very mouths of the spitting guns the last of the steers dropped, and the few that remained alive turned tail and fled wildly back the way they had come. In front of the trenches was a horrible tangle of trampled, wounded creatures, rearing as best they could and stabbing one another with their long, sharp horns.

"Everybody out an' kill the ones that ain't dead!" yelled Bissell, and the cowboys leaped over the breastworks on this hazardous errand of mercy.

"Where are the sheep?" was the question every man asked himself and his neighbor, but no one could reply.

It had been reported to Bissell by the scouts that with the sheep were a body of cattle. Consequently when the steers charged all had expected the sheep to follow. But in all that grisly battle-field there was not a head of mutton to be found, and the punchers looked at one another in mystified wonder.

"They must be crossin' somewheres else," said Bissell, wringing his hands in despair. "Oh, blast that man that stampeded them horses!"

The thought was in every man's mind, for here the beauty of that strategy was made manifest. Uninjured, full of fight, and furious, the forces of the cowmen were helpless because they had nothing to ride, and were utterly useless on foot.

Two miles away on the bank of the river another scene was being enacted.

Here the eight thousand sheep had come to a halt with the leaders on the very bank, and the herders walking back and forth talking to them to keep them quiet. The river was not more deep than the height of a man, but the current was swift and icy with the snows of the far-off Shoshone Mountains.

"Are you ready, boys?" sang out Larkin.

"All ready."

"Strip and into it, then," and, the first to obey his own command, he hurried off his clothes and plunged into the frigid river.

Sims, who had devised this scheme from memory of an Indian custom, stood at the head of the leaders to superintend the crossing.

Now the men entered the water by tens, and stretched out in a double line all the way from bank to bank, facing each other and leaving but a scant yard between them.

"Ready?" yelled Sims.

"Ready! Let 'em go!" sang out Larkin.

The chief herder and others heaved the leading sheep into the water between the first two men. These lifted it along to the next pair who shoved it on, swimming all the time. So it came snorting and blatting to the other side and climbed up the bank.

After it came the next, and then the next, and as the work became easier the sheep caught the notion that man had suggested and incorporated it into the flock mind. They took to the water because their predecessors had.

And now the stream of sheep was steady and continuous. The current was swift and the men's bodies ached and grew numb in the intense cold, but they stood their ground. Only in one place was the water too deep to work, and here they lost a few terror-stricken animals who turned aside from the chain and were swept downstream.

The river between the men was churned like that of a rapid; there was heard the constant slap-slap! of their arms as they smote the water in pushing the sheep along. A man took cramp and clung to a companion until he could kick it out of himself.

At last, though, all the sheep had passed over the river, and Bud Larkin had won!

Then came the getting over of the wagons and camp outfits, all done in the dark, and with scarcely sound enough to be heard a furlong away. As some men worked, others dressed and swam the horses over, leading them in bunches.

Presently, dressed, happy, and glowing with the reaction from his icy bath, Bud Larkin appeared out of the dark beside Juliet Bissell.

"You are the one who has enabled me to do all this," he said gently. "Now, will you go over with me or will you go down the river to your father two miles away?"

She looked up at him proudly.

"To the victor belongs the spoils," she said, and lifted her face to him. "Are you going to make me go?"

"Darling!" he cried in the sweet, low voice she loved and drew her to him.



CHAPTER XXIV

THE STORY OF LESTER

Bud's sleep of exhaustion was ended by the sound of voices calling to one another. So deep had been his unconsciousness that as he slowly struggled back to light and reason he forgot where he was and what had happened.

One thing was certain, the sun had been up a long while, and it was growing extremely hot even under the sheltering cottonwood tree where he lay.

The voices continued to call to one another, and Bud finally sat up to investigate.

On the opposite bank another camp was being made by bow-legged men who wore heavy chaps over their trousers, broad hats, and knotted neckerchiefs. Some of these men limped, and most of them swore at their cramped toes as they went about the business in hand.

A short distance away from where Bud sat some of the sheepmen were lying comfortably on their elbows, chaffing the punchers.

"I allow you cowmen're gettin' pretty swell," remarked one. "They tell me yuh kinder hanker after photygrafts of yerselves. How about it?"

"Better lose a hoss fer the sake of yer good looks than be a comic valentine all yore life, what?" was the drawling retort.

"Mebbe so, but if I'd lost hosses the way you fellers did last night I wouldn't have enough vanity left no ways to look a pony in the left leg. I'd go to raisin' grasshoppers to sell to old ladies' chicken ranches, I plumb would."

At this sally such a guffaw of laughter greeted the discomfited punchers that they retired from the field for the time being. Larkin grinned with the rest. Then he turned his attention to the little tent set up near by between two trees. He remembered that Julie had slept there and wondered if she were awake yet.

He called her name and presently a very sleepy voice responded, so tender and helpless in its accents that he laughed for joy.

"Lazy girl!" he cried. "Do you know what time it is? I've been up for hours."

"All right; I'll get up, I suppose. Is breakfast ready?"

"Not quite," he replied seriously, "but I'll have the maid bring it in as soon as the eggs are shirred."

"Bud Larkin, you're horrid!" she cried. "I don't believe you have even started a fire. Do you expect me to get your breakfast?"

"It would tickle me silly," he confessed, unrepentant. "Shall I wait for you? You see the cooks are getting dinner now. Breakfast was over hours ago."

"Oh, dear, I suppose so! We're not even married and you want me to cook for you. Oh, dear!"

"Well," he said, relenting, "I'll get things started, but you come out as soon as you can."

So saying he beckoned to Ah Sin who had been waiting for the boss, and gave him a number of orders. Then he thrashed about the river bank as though looking for fagots, while Julie continued pretending to mourn over her hard lot. When at last she appeared, however, and had dashed the sleep from her eyes in the icy waters of the river, it was not to cook, but to sit down at one of Ah Sin's little tables and eat a glorious breakfast.

"You perfect darling!" she cried happily and ran and kissed Bud though the Chinaman was looking on.

During breakfast she noticed the work going forward on the other side of the river and asked Bud about it.

"The cowmen moved their camp down here opposite us as soon as they could find out where we were," he explained. "I guess they want to talk with me regarding several matters. I'm pretty sure I have a thing or two to say to them, now that I am out of their clutches."

"Oh, then my father must be among those men."

"He must, although I have not seen him. I intend to take you over to him immediately after breakfast."

Suddenly for the first time, the girl's face clouded; through their sweet bantering pierced the hideous visage of the thing that haunted her and that she had come to ask him about.

"Talk to me a little while first, will you?" she pleaded. "You know I came to see you for a special reason last night but had no time to discuss it then."

"Certainly, dear girl," he replied.

When they had finished eating they strolled a little way up the noisy stream and finally found a cozy nook between two trees. All about them in the succulent grass of the banks and river bottoms they could hear the bells and contented blethering of the flocks; for Sims had determined to rest his animals for a few days before starting again the long trek north.

"Bud," she began, speaking slowly so as to choose her words, "I am going to ask you questions about things that you have never chosen to discuss with me for some reason I could not fathom. If it is unmaidenly I am sorry, but I must ask them. I cannot stand any more such anxiety and pain as I have suffered in the last few weeks."

Bud's features settled themselves into an expression of thought that told the girl absolutely nothing.

"Yes, go on," he said.

"First I want you to read this note," she continued, drawing a soiled bit of paper from the bosom of her dress. "A photographer called Skidmore was held up by the rustlers and asked to bring it to the Bar T and give it to me."

Her hand trembled a little as she held the paper out to him. He took it gravely, unfolded and read it.

Then he smiled his old winning smile at her and kissed the hand she had extended.

"Lies! All lies!" he said. "Please think no more about them."

She looked at him steadily and withdrew her hand.

"That won't do, Bud," she replied firmly, but in a low voice. "What is the thing for which Caldwell blackmailed you three years ago and again this year?"

Bud looked at her quizzically for a moment, and then seemed to recede into thought. She waited patiently, and, after a while, he began to speak.

"Yes, I suppose you are right," he said. "It is a woman's privilege to know what a man's life holds if she desires it. There are but a few rare souls who can marry men against whom the world holds something, and say: 'Never tell me what you were or what you have done; what you are and what you will be are enough for me.'

"Putting myself in your place, I am sure I should do what you are doing, for I have always told myself that those who marry with points unsettled between them have taken the first step toward unhappiness. Suspicion and deceit would undermine the greatest love that ever existed. Acts in the past that cannot be explained create suspicion, and those in the present that are better unobserved father deceit."

He paused for a few moments, and appeared to be thinking.

"Do you know who that Ed Skidmore is?" he asked abruptly.

"No; only he was quite nice, and evidently from the East."

"He is my brother Lester, and he is the man who stampeded the punchers' horses last night with his flashlight."

"He is? I should never have suspected it; you are absolutely different in looks."

"I know we are, or I shouldn't have risked his life last night. Well, I bring him into this because I have to. He is part of the story. Lester was always a wild youth, particularly after the governor stuck him on a bookkeeper's stool and tried to make a business man out of him. The boy couldn't add a column of figures a foot long correctly inside of ten tries. I took to the game a little better than he did, and managed to get promoted occasionally. But Lester never did.

"Father believed, and announced often enough, that anybody that couldn't add figures and keep accounts had no business to handle money. To discipline Lester, who he thought was loafing when he really was incapable, the governor cut off the boy's allowance almost entirely and told him he would have to live on his wages until he showed he could earn more.

"Well, Julie, you know what kind of a cad I was back in the old days—rich, spoiled, flattered by men, and sought after by women. (I can say these things now, since I've learned their opposites!) Just try to imagine, then, the effect of such an order on Lester, who was always the petted one of us two because he was small and delicate! It was like pouring cold water on a red-hot stove lid.

"Tied more than ever to his desk, Lester wanted more amusements than ever. But he had only about fifteen a week where he had been accustomed to five times the amount. He drifted and borrowed and pledged and pawned, and finally was caught by some loan-sharks, who got him out of one difficulty only to plunge him into three others.

"Although my father had a narrow-gauge mind as far as life in general is concerned, I will say this for him: that he was right in everything he did about business. He had made it a rule of the firm that anybody who borrowed money was fired on the spot. Lester knew this, and, while he would have liked nothing better than the sack, he did not want to disgrace the governor before his employees and all the business world. So he clung along and tried to make a go of it.

"I must confess that I think some of the blame for what followed should be laid at my door. I had been patient with the kid and loaned him money until I came to the conclusion that it was like throwing it down a well. Then I got fond of a certain person"—he paused a moment and smiled at Julie—"and I needed all my money to entertain her properly; so I quit loaning.

"I don't know whether to tell you the rest or not; it isn't what I would want anyone else to tell you, even about a perfect stranger, but I think it is right you should know everything if you know anything."

The girl nodded without speaking.

"In the loan-shark office was a very pretty little girl, and Lester thought he fell in love with her. She had a red-headed cousin and an admirer named Smithy Caldwell, who belonged to a tough gang on the South Side.

"The girl was fond of Lester for a while, but she wouldn't forsake her friends as he ordered her to, and they quarreled. Her name was Mary, and after the fuss the three friends, together with the loan-shark people, played Lester for a gilt-edged idiot, basing their operations on alleged facts concerning Mary. In reality Smithy Caldwell had married her in the meantime, and Lester eventually proved he had always treated her honorably, though now she denied it."

"Poor, innocent boy in the hands of those blood-suckers!" cried Juliet compassionately.

"Naturally driven frantic by the fear of exposure and the resulting disgrace of the whole family, the boy lost his head and tried to buy his persecutors off. And to do this he took money out of the safe. But what's the use of prolonging the agony? Finally he forged my father's signature, and when the check came back from the bank he tried to 'fix' the books, and got caught.

"I'll pass over everything that followed, except to say that the disgrace did not become public. But it broke father's heart and hastened his death. When that occurred it was found that practically all the estate had come to me, and this fellow Smithy Caldwell threatened to disclose the forgery if I did not buy him off.

"That scared me, because I was now the head of the family, and I handed over two thousand dollars. Then I came West, and thought the whole matter was buried, until Caldwell turned up at the Bar T that night for supper.

"That's about all. You see, it's an ugly story, and it paints Lester pretty black. But I've thought the thing over a great many times, and can't blame him very much, after all, for it really was the result of my father's stern and narrow policy. The boy was in his most impressionable years, and was left to face the music alone. It seemed to age him mightily."

"But what will happen now?" asked Julie anxiously. "Aren't the other two still alive? Can't they make trouble?"

"Yes, but I don't think they will. I have the drop on Smithy now, and he will either write a full dismissal of the matter for all three of them or he will swing with the rustlers. And if I know my Smithy Caldwell, he won't be able to get pen and paper fast enough."

"But can you save him, even at that cost, do you think? The cowmen won't understand all this."

"That will rest with your father, dear," replied Bud, getting to his feet. "Now, let's go over and see him, for I have something else I want to ask him."

His face that had been clouded during his recital was suddenly flooded with the sunlight of his smile, and Julie realized for the first time what it had cost him to lay bare again these painful memories of a past he had sought to bury.

When he had helped her to her feet she went to him and laid her hands on his shoulders, looking up into his face with eyes that brimmed with the loosed flood of her love, so long pent up.

"Can I ever be worth what I have cost you to-day?" she asked humbly.

Tenderly he gathered her to him.

"In love there is no such word as cost," he said.



CHAPTER XXV

THE THREADS MEET

It could not have been later than ten o'clock in the morning when a puncher with sharp eyes might have seen two figures approaching the Bar T ranch house on horseback. They rode needlessly close together and swung their clasped and gauntleted hands like happy children.

One was a girl into whose radiant eyes a new wonder had come, and the other a handsome, tanned young man bathed in a deliriously happy expression.

"Isn't it jolly to be married without anyone's knowing?" cried Julie. "Oh, but won't they be surprised at home?"

"Rather!" remarked Bud, with a sobered expression. "I only hope your father doesn't widow you just as I ride into the yard with the olive branch."

"Stop it, Bud! What puts such awful thoughts into your head?"

"Experience. Your father was so mad about my getting the sheep across the river that he started his punchers walking home that same night, and nobody has seen him since."

Larkin spoke the truth, but little exaggerated. Beef Bissell, humiliated, beaten, and forced to accept the small end of a deal for once in his life, had started from the useless cowmen's camp by the Gray Bull the very night of the crossing. He ordered the men to follow and round up their stampeded horses and then to ride home.

Meanwhile he appropriated one horse that had not been in the corral and trotted homeward, eaten by chagrin and beside himself with impotent fury.

Bud and Julie had found this out the day of their talk concerning Lester, when they forded the stream on horses and asked for Bissell. Under the circumstances Bud developed a genius for inspiration that was little short of marvelous.

"What's the use of riding all the way home and having a grand row with your father?" he asked. "Why not go over to Rattlesnake, where there's a sky-pilot, and be married? Then we'll go home, and there can't be any row, because there will only be one party in the mood for it."

But the girl demurred. It was cruel to her father and mother, she said, not to have them present on the greatest day of her life. She allowed it was mighty ungrateful after all they had done for her. Then Bud took her hand in his and told her his principal reasons.

"I'm a business man, honey, and I've got to start north after Simmy and the sheep in three or four days," he said. "Shearing is late now, but I guess we can make it. This trouble has set me behind close to fifteen thousand dollars, and everything is in a critical state.

"I know it don't sound much like a lover, but as soon as we get on our feet we'll take a honeymoon to Japan that will make you think I'd never heard of a sheep.

"You want your mother and father in on the joy, I know, but it doesn't seem to me there can be much joy with nine or ten men sitting around waiting for their necks to be stretched. Does it to you?"

"No," said Julie, and shuddered.

"Then come along over to Rattlesnake and be married. Then we'll ride back to the Bar T, so you can see your folks, and I can see Caldwell. We can be through and away before anything is really done about the rustlers."

So it was arranged, and the two were married by an Episcopal clergyman who had a surplice but no cassock, and whose trouser-legs looked very funny moving about inside the thin, white material—and Julie nearly laughed out loud.

After the ceremony they had ridden out of town with their equipment and made their first honeymoon camp in a cool, green place beside a little brook that had trout in it and sang to them for hours on end.

Now, the day afterward, they were on the way home, and not without a few secret misgivings.

As they neared the Bar T a single man rode out to meet them. It was Lester, who had come the night before and was waiting for Bud, so as to be present at the interview with Smithy Caldwell, whom he had not yet seen.

He congratulated the pair warmly and rode with them to the corral.

Suddenly there was a shriek, and Martha Bissell tore out of the cook-house. She ran to Julie, kissed her, and welcomed her back; then when she heard the news she picked up her apron to start crying, and dropped it again, undecided what to do.

What with Bissell's safe arrival and Julie's glorious home-coming the poor woman was nearly out of her mind.

The excitement brought Beef Bissell around the house from the front veranda, where he had been grumbling and swearing all the morning. At sight of Larkin he halted in his tracks and began to redden. But he got no farther, for Julie flung herself into his arms, tears of happiness streaming down her face, and overwhelmed him with caresses.

Bissell was mightily relieved to see her. In fact, it had been all his wife could do to restrain him from starting out to unearth Julie when he arrived home and found her gone. But Martha said that the girl had gone to find Larkin, and added that the two were old enough to settle their troubles between them. So Bissell, remembering his last miserable interview with his daughter, decided not to interfere.

"Father, I'm married; please be happy and good to me," the girl said, clinging to him, and the fury that had flown to his head like wine died a natural death. After all, to see her happy was what he most wanted.

"Are you sure he will love you always?" he asked gently.

"Yes, father, I am. I refused to marry him long ago in Chicago." He kissed her for the first time in a long while, and then gently disengaged himself and took a step toward Bud.

"Larkin," he said, "yuh were always lucky, but yuh've beat all records for Wyoming now. I allow yuh can take her away with yuh on one condition."

"What's that?"

"That yuh never beat her like yuh beat me."

"Agreed!" laughed Bud, and grasped the other's hand. "But can you stand a sheepman in the family?"

"I sure can, Larkin. Ever since I seen Jimmie Welsh and his men fight, I ain't got anythin' against sheepmen."

"Jimmie Welsh!" cried Bud. "Tell me, did any of his party come through alive?"

"Jes' Jimmie himself; the boys couldn't kill him, so he's over at Billy Speaker's mendin' up. Heart's pretty near broke because he hasn't seen yuh to explain why he's still alive."

"Good old Jimmie!" said Bud, the tears leaping to his eyes. "Dearest," he added, turning to Julie, "there's one more stop on our honeymoon, and that's at Billy Speaker's to-morrow."

Bissell continued the conversation, and asked for the full story of how Bud had run down and captured the rustlers, saying that the whole cow country owed him a debt, and if they had only known of the capture in time would have let his sheep through without protest.

"I imagined as much," remarked Bud; "but I didn't care to get them through that way once I had started the other. I hope, Mr. Bissell, that we can be friends, although we have been enemies up to now. I'm sorry I had to sacrifice those cattle of the association, but there was no other way out of it."

"I'll tell yuh this, Larkin," returned Bissell. "Anybody that can beat me at anything is good enough to be my friend fer life, an' I'm here to state that yuh could count my friends of that type, before you came, on the hairs of a hairless dog!"

Bud laughed, they shook hands again, and peace was finally made between them; but not until Beef Bissell had signed away half of the interest in the Bar T to Julie as her dower.

That was a happy and hilarious dinner at the ranch. Some of the cowboys coming in at noon from near-by ranges heard of the marriage and cheered the bride lustily when she appeared on the veranda. Bud made himself solid with the disgruntled punchers by walking out to them and talking over the battle of Welsh's Butte, while he rolled cigarettes and smoked them one after another.

Shortly afterward, Bud and Lester found themselves in a room with Smithy Caldwell. The blackmailer, when he saw Lester, fell down in a faint, so great was the shock to his already wrecked nervous system. The man was really in a terrible condition both from physical fear and the tormenting by his comrades. He started at every slight sound, whirled about fearfully to meet any footfall that sounded near, and trembled with uncontrollable nervous spasms.

To both the Larkins he was a piteous sight, and Bud wondered that the miserable creature had not gone mad.

The wretch fell on his knees and pleaded with them for his life, so that when Bud put the proposition squarely up to him that he forswear everything in regard to the Larkin family, he could not accept it eagerly enough.

"But about the papers that you said were in Chicago?" asked Bud.

"I lied about them," replied Smithy. "They're sewed in the lining of my shirt. Give me your knife and I'll get 'em for you."

"Give me your shirt and I'll find them," countered Bud; and he presently did.

Together the brothers looked them over. Every bit of incriminating evidence was there, and as Bud slipped it all into his pocket he gave a great sigh: "Thank Heaven, that's over!"

He did not let Caldwell off, however, without securing from him the written and signed statement that he wanted. When all was done they let him go, and now his mind was almost as unbalanced by joy as it had formerly been by fear.

Bissell, knowing Caldwell's condition, had agreed to his being released on clearing his account with the Larkins, for he realized that the man, in fearing death, had suffered the penalty a thousand times, and that the memory would remain with him through life, and perhaps help keep him straight.

Shortly after Bud and Lester had joined the others on the veranda again, a sudden scream was heard from the bunk-house, followed by the sounds of a terrible struggle. All hands rushed around to the rear and, with drawn revolvers, forced an entrance among the sullen rustlers.

On the floor in the middle of the room lay Smithy Caldwell, white and contorted, while Mike Stelton was just rising from his prostrate body, making sounds in his throat like a wild animal. Smithy was dead.

"How'd it happen, boys?" asked Bissell.

"This here Caldwell come out an' 'lowed as how he wasn't goin' to swing like the rest of us, an' he began packin' up his truck. Stelton asked him about it, an' when Smithy repeated what he said before and got plumb cocky about it, Mike there smeared him plenty. Then he broke his neck. Smithy betrayed Stelton, yuh know."

There is not much more to tell, except that, three days later, the rustlers paid the penalty of their lawless daring. It was the biggest "hangin' bee" Wyoming had ever seen, and was largely attended by men of all sections who stood for right and justice, if not law and order.

Bud and Julie brought pride and sunlight to a slowly recuperating Jimmie Welsh on their way north, and from him and Billy Speaker heard again the details of the great fight. Now, if you go to Welsh's Butte, you will see a tall white shaft rising amid the tumbling of the wretched hogbacks. On one side are the names of the sheepmen who fell (including Jimmie, who is still alive), and on the other those of the cowmen. It is the humble offering of Bud and Julie Larkin.

Time has proven that Bud's prophecy in regard to sheep was right. Wyoming has far more sheep than cattle now, and one of the biggest of the ranches is the former Bar T, run under the Larkin name, in connection with the home ranch in Montana.

I hope it will not be a shock to some readers to know that the first Bud and Julie have another Bud and Julie, who are over twenty years of age, quite old enough to have romances of their own.

All their lives they have heard the story of the adventures that brought their parents together, but all four rather sadly admit that the Free Range, which Bud fought for so hard, is now almost a thing of the past, that the great drives have passed never to return, and that the cowboy himself is a dim figure against the prairie sunset.

THE END



* * * * *



JOHN FOX, JR'S. STORIES OF THE KENTUCKY MOUNTAINS

May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.



THE TRAIL OF THE LONESOME PINE.

Illustrated by F. C. Yohn.

The "lonesome pine" from which the story takes its name was a tall tree that stood in solitary splendor on a mountain top. The fame of the pine lured a young engineer through Kentucky to catch the trail, and when he finally climbed to its shelter he found not only the pine but the foot-prints of a girl. And the girl proved to be lovely, piquant, and the trail of these girlish foot-prints led the young engineer a madder chase than "the trail of the lonesome pine."

THE LITTLE SHEPHERD OF KINGDOM COME.

Illustrated by F. C. Yohn.

This is a story of Kentucky, in a settlement known as "Kingdom Come." It is a life rude, semi-barbarous; but natural and honest, from which often springs the flower of civilization.

"Chad," the "little shepherd" did not know who he was nor whence he came—he had just wandered from door to door since early childhood, seeking shelter with kindly mountaineers who gladly fathered and mothered this waif about whom there was such a mystery—a charming waif, by the way, who could play the banjo better that anyone else in the mountains.

A KNIGHT OF THE CUMBERLAND.

Illustrated by F. C. Yohn.

The scenes are laid along the waters of the Cumberland, the lair of moonshiner and feudsman. The knight is a moonshiner's son, and the heroine a beautiful girl perversely christened "The Blight." Two impetuous young Southerners' fall under the spell of "The Blight's" charms and she learns what a large part jealousy and pistols have in the love making of the mountaineers.

Included in this volume is "Hell fer-Sartain" and other stories, some of Mr. Fox's most entertaining Cumberland valley narratives.

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THE NOVELS OF STEWART EDWARD WHITE

THE RULES OF THE GAME. Illustrated by Lajaren A. Hiller.

The romance of the son of "The Riverman." The young college hero goes into the lumber camp, is antagonized by "graft" and comes into the romance of his life.

ARIZONA NIGHTS. Illus. and cover inlay by N. C. Wyeth.

A series of spirited tales emphasizing some phases of the life of the ranch, plains and desert. A masterpiece.

THE BLAZED TRAIL. With illustrations by Thomas Fogarty.

A wholesome story with gleams of humor, telling of a young man who blazed his way to fortune through the heart of the Michigan pines.

THE CLAIM JUMPERS. A Romance.

The tenderfoot manager of a mine in a lonesome gulch of the Black Hills has a hard time of it, but "wins out" in more ways than one.

CONJUROR'S HOUSE. Illustrated Theatrical Edition.

Dramatized under the title of "The Call of the North."

"Conjuror's House" is a Hudson Bay trading post where the head factor is the absolute lord. A young fellow risked his life and won a bride on this forbidden land.

THE MAGIC FOREST. A Modern Fairy Tale. Illustrated.

The sympathetic way in which the children of the wild and their life is treated could only belong to one who is in love with the forest and open air. Based on fact.

THE RIVERMAN. Illus. by N. C. Wyeth and C. Underwood.

The story of a man's fight against a river and of a struggle between honesty and grit on the one side, and dishonesty and shrewdness on the other.

THE SILENT PLACES. Illustrations by Philip R. Goodwin.

The wonders of the northern forests, the heights of feminine devotion, and masculine power, the intelligence of the Caucasian and the instinct of the Indian, are all finely drawn in this story.

THE WESTERNERS.

A story of the Black Hills that is justly placed among the best American novels. It portrays the life of the new West as no other book has done in recent years.

THE MYSTERY. In collaboration with Samuel Hopkins Adams With illustrations by Will Crawford.

The disappearance of three successive crews from the stout ship "Laughing Lass" in mid-Pacific, is a mystery weird and inscrutable. In the solution, there is a story of the most exciting voyage that man ever undertook.

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LOUIS TRACY'S CAPTIVATING AND EXHILARATING ROMANCES

May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.

CYNTHIA'S CHAUFFEUR. Illustrated by Howard Chandler Christy.

A pretty American girl in London is touring in a car with a chauffeur whose identity puzzles her. An amusing mystery.

THE STOWAWAY GIRL. Illustrated by Nesbitt Benson.

A shipwreck, a lovely girl stowaway, a rascally captain, a fascinating officer, and thrilling adventures in South Seas.

THE CAPTAIN OF THE KANSAS.

Love and the salt sea, a helpless ship whirled into the hands of cannibals, desperate fighting and a tender romance.

THE MESSAGE. Illustrated by Joseph Cummings Chase.

A bit of parchment found in the figurehead of an old vessel tells of a buried treasure. A thrilling mystery develops.

THE PILLAR OF LIGHT.

The pillar thus designated was a lighthouse, and the author tells with exciting detail the terrible dilemma of its cut-off inhabitants.

THE WHEEL O'FORTUNE. With illustrations by James Montgomery Flagg.

The story deals with the finding of a papyrus containing the particulars of some of the treasures of the Queen of Sheba.

A SON OF THE IMMORTALS. Illustrated by Howard Chandler Christy.

A young American is proclaimed king of a little Balkan Kingdom, and a pretty Parisian art student is the power behind the throne.

THE WINGS OF THE MORNING.

A sort of Robinson Crusoe redivivus with modern settings and a very pretty love story added. The hero and heroine are the only survivors of a wreck, and have many thrilling adventures on their desert island.

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STORIES OF WESTERN LIFE

May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.

RIDERS OF THE PURPLE SAGE, By Zane Grey. Illustrated by Douglas Duer.

In this picturesque romance of Utah of some forty years ago, we are permitted to see the unscrupulous methods employed by the invisible hand of the Mormon Church to break the will of those refusing to conform to its rule.

FRIAR TUCK, By Robert Alexander Wason. Illustrated by Stanley L. Wood.

Happy Hawkins tells us, in his humorous way, how Friar Tuck lived among the Cowboys, how he adjusted their quarrels and love affairs and how he fought with them and for them when occasion required.

THE SKY PILOT, By Ralph Connor. Illustrated by Louis Rhead.

There is no novel, dealing with the rough existence of cowboys, so charming in the telling, abounding as it does with the freshest and the truest pathos.

THE EMIGRANT TRAIL, By Geraldine Bonner.

Colored frontispiece by John Rae.

The book relates the adventures of a party on its overland pilgrimage, and the birth and growth of the absorbing love of two strong men for a charming heroine.

THE BOSS OF WIND RIVER, By A. M. Chisholm. Illustrated by Frank Tenney Johnson.

This is a strong, virile novel with the lumber industry for its central theme and a love story full of interest as a sort of subplot.

A PRAIRIE COURTSHIP, By Harold Bindloss.

A story of Canadian prairies in which the hero is stirred, through the influence of his love for a woman, to settle down to the heroic business of pioneer farming.

JOYCE OF THE NORTH WOODS, By Harriet T. Comstock. Illustrated by John Cassel.

A story of the deep woods that shows the power of love at work among its primitive dwellers. It is a tensely moving study of the human heart and its aspirations that unfolds itself through thrilling situations and dramatic developments.

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GROSSET & DUNLAP'S DRAMATIZED NOVELS

THE KIND THAT ARE MAKING THEATRICAL HISTORY

May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.

WITHIN THE LAW. By Bayard Veiller & Marvin Dana. Illustrated by Wm. Charles Cooke.

This is a novelization of the immensely successful play which ran for two years in New York and Chicago.

The plot of this powerful novel is of a young woman's revenge directed against her employer who allowed her to be sent to prison for three years on a charge of theft, of which she was innocent.

WHAT HAPPENED TO MARY. By Robert Carlton Brown. Illustrated with scenes from the play.

This is a narrative of a young and innocent country girl who is suddenly thrown into the very heart of New York, "the land of her dreams," where she is exposed to all sorts of temptations and dangers.

The story of Mary is being told in moving pictures and played in theatres all over the world.

THE RETURN Of PETER GRIMM. By David Belasco. Illustrated by John Rae.

This is a novelization of the popular play in which David Warfield, as Old Peter Grimm, scored such a remarkable success.

The story is spectacular and extremely pathetic but withal, powerful, both as a book and as a play.

THE GARDEN OF ALLAH. By Robert Hichens.

This novel is an intense, glowing epic of the great desert, sunlit, barbaric, with its marvelous atmosphere of vastness and loneliness.

It is a book of rapturous beauty, vivid in word painting. The play has been staged with magnificent cast and gorgeous properties.

BEN HUR. A Tale of the Christ. By General Lew Wallace.

The whole world has placed this famous Religious-Historical Romance on a height of pre-eminence which no other novel of its time has reached. The clashing of rivalry and the deepest human passions, the perfect reproduction of brilliant Roman life, and the tense, fierce atmosphere of the arena have kept their deep fascination. A tremendous dramatic success.

BOUGHT AND PAID FOR. By George Broadhurst and Arthur Hornblow. Illustrated with scenes from the play.

A stupendous arraignment of modern marriage which has created an interest on the stage that is almost unparalleled. The scenes are laid in New York, and deal with conditions among both the rich and poor.

The interest of the story turns on the day-by-day developments which show the young wife the price she has paid.

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STORIES OF RARE CHARM BY GENE STRATTON-PORTER

May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.

THE HARVESTER

Illustrated by W. L. Jacobs

"The Harvester," David Langston, is a man of the woods and fields, who draws his living from the prodigal hand of Mother Nature herself. If the book had nothing in it but the splendid figure of this man, with his sure grip on life, his superb optimism, and his almost miraculous knowledge of nature secrets, it would be notable. But when the Girl comes to his "Medicine Woods," and the Harvester's whole sound, healthy, large outdoor being realizes that this is the highest point of life which has come to him—there begins a romance, troubled and interrupted, yet of the rarest idyllic quality.

FRECKLES.

Decorations by E. Stetson Crawford.

Freckles is a nameless waif when the tale opens, but the way in which he takes hold of life; the nature friendships he forms in the great Limberlost Swamp; the manner in which everyone who meets him succumbs to the charm of his engaging personality; and his love-story with "The Angel" are full of real sentiment.

A GIRL OF THE LIMBERLOST. Illustrated by Wladyslaw T. Brenda.

The story of a girl of the Michigan woods; a buoyant, lovable type of the self-reliant American. Her philosophy is one of love and kindness towards all things; her hope is never dimmed. And by the sheer beauty of her soul, and the purity of her vision, she wins from barren and unpromising surroundings those rewards of high courage.

It is an inspiring story of a life worth while and the rich beauties of the out-of-doors are strewn through all its pages.

AT THE FOOT OF THE RAINBOW.

Illustrations in colors by Oliver Kemp. Design and decorations by Ralph Fletcher Seymour.

The scene of this charming, idyllic love story is laid in Central Indiana. The story is one of devoted friendship, and tender self-sacrificing love; the friendship that gives freely without return, and the love that seeks first the happiness of the object. The novel is brimful of the most beautiful word painting of nature, and its pathos and tender sentiment will endear it to all.

Ask for a complete free list of G. & D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction. Grosset & Dunlap, 526 West 26th St., New York



MYRTLE REED'S NOVELS

May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.

LAVENDER AND OLD LACE.

A charming story of a quaint corner of New England where bygone romance finds a modern parallel. The story centers round the coming of love to the young people on the staff of a newspaper—and it is one of the prettiest, sweetest and quaintest of old fashioned love stories, * * * a rare book, exquisite in spirit and conception, full of delicate fancy, of tenderness, of delightful humor and spontaneity.

A SPINNER IN THE SUN.

Miss Myrtle Reed may always be depended upon to write a story in which poetry, charm, tenderness and humor are combined into a clever and entertaining book. Her characters are delightful and she always displays a quaint humor of expression and a quiet feeling of pathos which give a touch of active realism to all her writings. In "A Spinner in the Sun" she tells an old-fashioned love story, of a veiled lady who lives in solitude and whose features her neighbors have never seen. There is a mystery at the heart of the book that throws over it the glamour of romance.

THE MASTER'S VIOLIN.

A love story in a musical atmosphere. A picturesque, old German virtuoso is the reverent possessor of a genuine "Cremona." He consents to take for his pupil a handsome youth who proves to have an aptitude for technique, but not the soul of an artist. The youth has led the happy, careless life of a modern, well-to-do young American and he cannot, with his meagre past, express the love, the passion and the tragedies of life and all its happy phases as can the master who has lived life in all its fulness. But a girl comes into his life—a beautiful bit of human driftwood that his aunt had taken into her heart and home, and through his passionate love for her, he learns the lessons that life has to give—and his soul awakes.

Founded on a fact that all artists realize.

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B. M. Bower's Novels Thrilling Western Romances

Large 12 mos. Handsomely bound in cloth. Illustrated

CHIP, OF THE FLYING U

A breezy wholesome tale, wherein the love affairs of Chip and Delia Whitman are charmingly and humorously told. Chip's jealousy of Dr. Cecil Grantham, who turns out to be a big, blue eyed young woman is very amusing. A clever, realistic story of the American Cow-puncher.

THE HAPPY FAMILY

A lively and amusing story, dealing with the adventures of eighteen jovial, big hearted Montana cowboys. Foremost amongst them, we find Ananias Green, known as Andy, whose imaginative powers cause many lively and exciting adventures.

HER PRAIRIE KNIGHT

A realistic story of the plains, describing a gay party of Easterners who exchange a cottage at Newport for the rough homeliness of a Montana ranch-house. The merry-hearted cowboys, the fascinating Beatrice, and the effusive Sir Redmond, become living, breathing personalities.

THE RANGE DWELLERS

Here are everyday, genuine cowboys, just as they really exist. Spirited action, a range feud between two families, and a Romeo and Juliet courtship make this a bright, jolly, entertaining story, without a dull page.

THE LURE OF DIM TRAILS

A vivid portrayal of the experience of an Eastern author, among the cowboys of the West, in search of "local color" for a new novel. "Bud" Thurston learns many a lesson while following "the lure of the dim trails" but the hardest, and probably the most welcome, is that of love.

THE LONESOME TRAIL

"Weary" Davidson leaves the ranch for Portland, where conventional city life palls on him. A little branch of sage brush, pungent with the atmosphere of the prairie, and the recollection of a pair of large brown eyes soon compel his return. A wholesome love story.

THE LONG SHADOW

A vigorous Western story, sparkling with the free, outdoor, life of a mountain ranch. Its scenes shift rapidly and its actors play the game of life fearlessly and like men. It is a fine love story from start to finish.

Ask for a complete free list of G. & D. Popular Copyrighted Fiction. Grosset & Dunlap, 526 West 26th St., New York