a personal injury. It represented
to him that civilization from which he had fled fifteen years ago with
his wife and baby girl, and when five years later he laid his wife in
the lonely grave that could be seen on the shaded knoll just fronting
his cabin door, the last link to his past was broken. From all that
suggested the great world beyond the run of the Prairie he shrank as one
shrinks from a sudden touch upon an old wound.

"I guess I'll have to move back," he said to me gloomily.

"Why?" I said in surprise, thinking of his grazing range, which was
ample for his herd.

"This blank Sky Pilot." He never swore except when unusually moved.

"Sky Pilot?" I inquired.

He nodded and silently pointed to the notice.

"Oh, well, he won't hurt you, will he?"

"Can't stand it," he answered savagely, "must get away."

"What about Gwen?" I ventured, for she was the light of his eyes. "Pity
to stop her studies." I was giving her weekly lessons at the old man's
ranch.

"Dunno. Ain't figgered out yet about that baby." She was still his baby.
"Guess she's all she wants for the Foothills, anyway. What's the use?"
he added, bitterly, talking to himself after the manner of men who live
much alone.

I waited for a moment, then said: "Well, I wouldn't hurry about doing
anything," knowing well that the one thing an old-timer hates to do is
to make any change in his mode of life. "Maybe he won't stay."

He caught at this eagerly. "That's so! There ain't much to keep him,
anyway," and he rode off to his lonely ranch far up in the hills.

I looked after the swaying figure and tried to picture his past with its
tragedy; then I found myself wondering how he would end and what would
come to his little girl. And I made up my mind that if the missionary
were the right sort his coming might not be a bad thing for the Old
Timer and perhaps for more than him.

CHAPTER IV

THE PILOT'S MEASURE

It was Hi Kendal that announced the arrival of the missionary. I was
standing at the door of my school, watching the children ride off
home on their ponies, when Hi came loping along on his bronco in the
loose-jointed cowboy style.

"Well," he drawled out, bringing his bronco to a dead stop in a single
bound, "he's lit."

"Lit? Where? What?" said I, looking round for an eagle or some other
flying thing.

"Your blanked Sky Pilot, and he's a beauty, a pretty kid--looks too
tender for this climate. Better not let him out on the range