e moving about, or peacefully basking in the sun; a few saddle horses
were standing with dejected air, hitched to various tying-posts. A
buckboard and team was standing outside his own door. The sound of the
smith's hammer falling upon the anvil sounded plaintively upon the
calmness of the sleepy village. In spite of the sensational raid of the
night before, Foss River displayed no unusual activity.

At length the great man reached his office, and threw himself, with
great danger to his furniture, into his capacious wicker chair. He was
in no mood for business. Instead he gazed long and thoughtfully out of
his office window. What somber, vengeful thoughts were teeming through
his brain would be hard to tell, his mask-like face betrayed nothing.
His sphinx-like expression was a blank.

In this way half an hour and more passed. Then his attention became
fixed upon a tall figure sauntering slowly towards the settlement from
the direction of Allandale's ranch. In a moment Lablache had stirred
himself, and a pair of field-glasses were leveled at the unconscious
pedestrian. A moment later an exclamation of annoyance broke from the
money-lender.

"Curse the man! Am I never to be rid of this damned Englishman?" He
stood now gazing malevolently at the tall figure of the Hon.
Bunning-Ford, who was leisurely making his way towards the village. For
the time being the channel of Lablache's thoughts had changed its
direction. He had hoped, in foreclosing his mortgages on the
Englishman's property, to have rid Foss River of the latter's, to him,
hateful presence. But since misfortune had come upon "Lord" Bill, the
Allandales and he had become closer friends than ever. This effort had
been one of the money-lender's few failures, and failure galled him with
a bitterness the recollection of which no success could eliminate. The
result was a greater hatred for the object of his vengeance, and a
lasting determination to rid Foss River of the Englishman forever. And
so he remained standing and watching until, at length, the entrance of
one of his clerks, to announce that the saloon dinner-time was at hand,
brought him out of his cruel reverie, and he set off in quest of the
needs of his inner man, a duty which nothing, of whatever importance,
was allowed to interfere with.

In the meantime, Horrocks, or, as he was better known amongst his
comrades, "the Ferret," was hot upon the trail of the lost cattle.
Horrocks bristled with energy at