best
roper in the country, of proved gameness, popular, keen as an Italian
stiletto, and absolutely trustworthy. Since the first day he had seen her
Jack had been devoted to the service of Bertie Lee Snaith. No dog could
have been humbler or less critical of her shortcomings. The girl despised
his wooing, but she was forced to respect the man. As a lover she had no
use for Goodheart; as a friend she was always calling upon him.

"I knew you'd go, Jack," she told him.

"Yes, I'd lie down and make of myself a door-mat for you to trample on,"
he retorted with a touch of self-contempt. "Would you like me to do it
now?"

Lee looked at him in surprise. This was the first evidence he had ever
given that he resented the position in which he stood to her.

"If you don't want to go I'll ask some one else," she replied.

"Oh, I'll go."

He turned and strode to his horse. For years he had been her faithful
cavalier and he knew he was no closer to his heart's desire than when he
began to serve. The first faint stirrings of rebellion were moving in
him. It was not that he blamed her in the least. She was scarcely
nineteen, the magnet for the eyes of all the unattached men in the
district. Was it reasonable to suppose that she would give her love to a
penniless puncher of twenty-eight, lank as a shad, with no recommendation
but honesty? None the less, Jack began to doubt whether eternal patience
was a virtue.

Chapter XIV

The Gun-Barrel Road

Jack Goodheart followed the gun-barrel road into a desert green and
beautiful with vegetation. Now he passed a blooming azalea or a yucca
with clustering bellflowers. The prickly pear and the cat-claw clutched
at his chaps. The arrowweed and the soapweed were everywhere, as was also
the stunted creosote. The details were not lovely, but in the sunset
light of late afternoon the silvery sheen of the mesquite had its own
charm for the rider.

Back of the saddle he carried a "hot roll" of blankets and supplies, for
he would have to camp out three or four nights. Flour, coffee, and a can
of tomatoes made the substance of his provisions. His rifle would bring
him all the meat he needed. The one he used was a seventy-three because
the bullets fired from it fitted the cylinder of his forty-four revolver.

Solitude engulfed him. Once a mule deer stared at him in surprise from an
escarpment back of the mesa. A rattlesnake buzzed its ominous warning.

He left the road to follow the