always close itself, if one is careless enough to ride on and
leave it open. I have it all worked out in my alleged brain. I shall
do it right away, too. Aunt Marthy is rather nervous about this gorge,
now. Every evening she walks up here herself to make sure the bars are
closed."

"You may as well make up your mind to it," said Billy Louise
irrelevantly, in a tone of absolute certainty. "Those calves were
driven out of the gorge. That means stolen. You needn't accuse anyone
in particular; I don't suppose you could. But they were stolen."

Charlie frowned and glanced up speculatively at the bluff's rim.

"Oh, your mountain-sheep theory is no good," Billy Louise giggled. "I
doubt if a lizard, even, would try to leave the Cove over the bluff."
Which certainly was a sweeping statement, when you consider a lizard's
habits. "A mountain sheep couldn't, anyway."

"They're hummers to climb--"

"But calves are not, Mr. Fox! Not like that. You know yourself they
were stolen; why not admit it?"

"Would that do any good--bring them back?" he countered, looking up at
her.

"N-o, but I do hate to see a person deliberately shut his eyes in front
of a fact. We may as well admit to ourselves that there is a rustler
in the country. Then we can look out for him."

Charlie's eyes had the troubled look. "I hate to think that. Aunt
Martha insists that is what we are up against, but--"

"Well, she knows more about it than you do, believe me. If you'll let
down the bars, Mr. Fox, I'll hit the trail. And if I find out
anything, I'll let you know at once."

When she rode over the bleak upland she caught herself wishing that she
might talk the thing over with Ward. He would know just what ought to
be done. But winter was coming, and she would drive her stock down
into the fields she had ready. They would be safe there, surely.
Still, she wished Ward would come. She wanted to talk it over with a
man who understood and who knew more about such things than she did.

CHAPTER VII

WARD HUNTS WOLVES

The fate of the four heifer calves became permanently wrapped in the
blank fog of mystery. Billy Louise watched for them when she rode out
in the hills, and spent a good deal of time heretofore given over to
dreaming in trying to solve the riddle of their disappearance. Charlie
Fox insisted upon keeping to the theory that they had merely strayed.
Marthy grumbled sometimes over the loss, and Ward--well, Ward did