th was up betimes and
breakfasted alone. Lunching early, noon found her in the office
expecting Charlie Miller. She was at work on the pay-roll book when
her telephone rang. It was Doc Tripp and there was suppressed
excitement in his voice.

"Bad news, Judy," he began. "It sure looks as though you were getting
your share."

"What is it, Doc?" she broke in sharply. "Tell me!"

"It's Charlie Miller. Hurt. No, not bad. Thrown off his horse, back
in Squaw Creek canon. And--robbed."

Quickly he told all that had happened. Miller, hastening back with the
wage money, was riding through the narrow gorge when a man had sprung
out suddenly in front of him. Miller's horse, shying, swerving
unexpectedly, had thrown him. Before he could get to his feet the bag
of gold under his coat had been torn off, his revolver wrenched away
and the highwayman, his face masked with a red bandana handkerchief,
had run into the thick timber.

"Charlie just walked in, reeling like a drunken man," Tripp concluded.
"His fall and a rap over the head with a gun-butt have made him pretty
sick. I am sending out a posse of men from this end to try and get the
stick-up man. You'd better do the same up there."

For a moment Judith sat staring at the telephone dully. Robbed of a
thousand dollars, and in broad daylight! A thing like this had not
occurred on the Blue Lake for a dozen years.

"Bayne Trevors!" she gasped. For, suddenly, she thought that she
understood the significance of the rumor which had twice in a week come
to her. Perhaps, as Tripp himself had said, she was getting nerves.
Trevors himself was on the ranch right now. . . . Her two fists
clinched. Yes, Trevors was here with triple purpose: To curry favor
with Hampton against a possible need of it, to establish an alibi for
himself, to witness Judith's discomfiture, when at six o'clock she must
turn the men away with an excuse.

VIII

RIFLE SHOTS FROM THE CLIFFS

Thank Heaven it was just noon! Judith sprang to her feet, her eyes
bright and hard, and ran down to the men's quarters. Coming up from
the corral were Carson and Bud Lee.

"Miller with the pay-roll money has been held up and robbed at Squaw
Creek," she told them swiftly. "Get some men together, Carson, and try
to head the robber off."

The two men, having glanced quickly at each other, stood a moment
looking at her curiously.

"That's on the level, is it, Miss Judith?" demanded Carson slo