es," he hastened to ask, "if
you'll kindly tell me what my work is to be this afternoon."

The older man's frown relaxed. "Did you come out here from Stockchute?"

"Yes."

"Think you could find your way back?"

"Why, yes; though we wandered all around--But surely, Mr. Knowles,
you'll not require me--"

"I want a man to ride over with some letters and fetch the mail. I'll
need Gowan for work you can't do. Chuckie was to have gone; but I
can't let her now, until we're more sure about that man who shot at
you."

"I see."

"Well, have you got the nerve, in case the man is loose over that
way?"

Ashton's eyes flashed. "I'll go! Perhaps I'll get another crack at the
scoundrel."

"Keep cool. It's ninety-nine chances in the hundred he's on the run
and'll keep going all week."

"Shall I start now? As we came by a very roundabout way--We went first
in the opposite direction, and then skirted High Mesa down from the
mountains. So, you see, I may have a little difficulty--"

"No you won't. There's our wagon trail. Even if you got off that, all
you'd have to do would be to keep headed for Split Peak. That's right
in line with Stockchute. But you'll not start till morning. I haven't
got all my letters written. That'll give you all day to go and come.
It's only twenty-five miles over there. Chuckie, you show this new
puncher of ours over the place, while I write those letters."

"I'll start teaching him how to throw a rope," volunteered the girl.

She led the way out through a daintily furnished front room, in which
Ashton observed an upright piano and other articles of culture that he
would never have expected to come upon in this remote section. In
passing, the girl picked up a wide-brimmed lacy hat.

Once outside, she first took Ashton for a walk up Plum Creek to where
half a dozen men were at work with a mowing machine and horse rakes
making hay of the rich bunch-grass.

"Daddy feeds all he can in winter," she explained. "The spring when I
first came back from Denver I cried so over the starving cattle that
he promised to always afterwards cut and stack all the hay he could.
And he has found it pays to feed well. We would put a lot of land into
oats, but, as you see, there's not enough water in the creek."

"That's where an irrigation system would come in," remarked Ashton.

"Oh, I hope you don't think it possible to water our mesa!" she cried.
"I told you how it would break up our range."

"I assure you, I