th market reports, and many sheets of paper covered with
untidy figures, looked up at Lee's entrance.

"Hello, Bud," he said, reaching for cigarette and match. "Got
everything ready for to-morrow?"

"Why didn't you tell me Miss Sanford had gone away?" was Lee's sharp
rejoinder. Hampton flushed.

"Devil take those two eyes of yours, Bud," he said testily. "They've
got a way of boring through a man until he feels like they were
scorching the furniture behind him. Well, I'll tell you. While Judith
is away I am running this outfit. And if the men think I'm coming
straight from her with an order they obey it. If they get the notion
she isn't here, they're apt to ask questions. That's why."

"This sale to Doan, Rockwell & Haight," said Lee quickly. "You didn't
cook that up, did you, Hampton?"

"Lord, no!" cried Hampton. From its place on a file he took a yellow
slip of paper, tossing it to Lee. "She sent me that this morning."

It was a Western Union telegram, saying briefly:

POLLOCK HAMPTON,
Blue Lake Ranch.

Am forced to sell heavily. Sending Doan, Rockwell & Haight Wednesday
morning, one hundred horses; as many beef cattle as Carson can round
up. Accept terms made in their letter to you last week.

JUDITH SANFORD.

The date-line upon the message gave the sending point as San Francisco.

"They wrote _you_ a letter offering to buy?" said Lee thoughtfully, his
eyes rising slowly from the paper in his fingers. "How'd it happen
they didn't write to _her_?"

"Well, it's a natural enough mistake, isn't it? Knowing that she and I
were both part-owners, knowing that we were both here, isn't it quite
to be expected that they would write to the man instead of to the
woman? Of course I gave her the letter as soon as I had opened it."

"Of course," answered Lee.

But his thoughts were not with his answer. They were with Bayne
Trevors. He knew that Trevors had long ago sold to these people; he
knew, too, that at least two of the heavy shareholders in the Western
Lumber Company were interested in Doan, Rockwell & Haight. Tom
Rockwell himself was second vice-president of the lumber company.

"Have you had any other word from Miss Sanford?" he asked.

"No."

"Know who her lawyers are?"

"No. I don't."

"Anything in her papers here that would tell us?"

"No. Her papers are in the safe yonder and it's locked and I don't
know the combination."

"Know what hotel she is stopping at in the ci