wasn't very good friends, seeing as how I'd had to kill his
daddy, so he turned 'em loose. I'm damned if those four Greasers didn't
beat me back to Jonesville." Blaze shook his head ruminatively. "This
was a hard country, those days. There wasn't but two honest men in this
whole valley--and the other one was a nigger."

Dave Law's duties as a Ranger rested lightly upon him; his instructions
were vague, and he had a leisurely method of "working up" his evidence.
Since he knew that Blaze possessed a thorough knowledge of this section
and its people, it was partly business which had brought him to the
Jones home this afternoon.

Strictly speaking, Blaze was not a rancher, although many of his acres
were under cultivation and he employed a sizable army of field-hands.
His disposition was too adventurous, his life had been too swift and
varied, for him to remain interested in slow agricultural pursuits;
therefore, he had speculated heavily in raw lands, and for several
years past he had devoted his energies to a gigantic colonization
scheme. Originally Blaze had come to the Rio Grande valley as a
stock-raiser, but the natural advantages of the country had appealed to
his gambling instinct, and he had "gone broke" buying land.

He had located, some fifteen miles below the borders of Las Palmas, and
there he had sunk a large fortune; then as a first step in his
colonization project he had founded the town of Jonesville. Next he had
caused the branch line of the Frisco railroad to be extended until it
linked his holdings with the main system, after which he had floated a
big irrigation company; and now the feat of paying interest on its
bonds and selling farms under the ditch to Northern people kept him
fully occupied. It was by no means a small operation in which he was
engaged. The venture had taken foresight, courage, infinite hard work;
and Blaze was burdened with responsibilities that would have broken
down a man of weaker fiber.

But his pet relaxation was reminiscence. His own experience had been
wide, he knew everybody in his part of the state, and although events
in his telling were sometimes colored by his rich imagination, the
information he could give was often of the greatest value--as Dave Law
knew.

After a time the latter said, casually, "Tell me something about Tad
Lewis."

Blaze looked up quickly. "What d'you want to know?"

"Anything. Everything."

"Tad owns a right nice ranch between here and Las