orral.

"Where's Lance at!" he called to Al, who was riding around to the
little corral.

"You can search me. He quit us when we got the horses into the corral,
and rode off up the Slide trail. If I was to make a guess, I would say
that he went to meet Mary Hope. They been doing that right frequent
ever since she quit coming here. 'Tain't no skin off my nose--but
Lance, he's buildin' himself a mess uh trouble with old Scotty, sure
as you're a foot high."

"Darn fool kid--let the old folks git to scrappin' amongst themselves,
and the young ones start the lovemakin'! I never knowed it to fail;
but you can skin me for a coyote if I know what makes 'em do it."
Grumbling to himself, Tom climbed down and followed Al. "You can
tell Riley I'll be late to dinner," he said, when he had come up
to where Al was pulling the saddle off his horse. "I ain't much
on buttin' into other folks' love affairs, but I reckon it maybe
might be a good idea to throw a scare into them two. I'm plumb sick
of Scotch--wouldn't take it in a highball right now if you was to
shove one under my nose!"

Al laughed, looking over his shoulder at Tom while he loosened the
latigo. "If you can throw a scare into Lance, you sure are a dinger,"
he bantered. "That youth is some heady."

"Looks to me like it runs in the family," Tom retorted. "You're some
heady yourself, if you ever took notice. And I don't give a damn how
heady any of you kids are; you can't run any rannies on your dad, and
you want to put that down in your little red book so you won't forgit
it!"

He led Coaley from the stable, mounted and rode away up the Slide
trail, more than half ashamed of his errand. To interfere in a love
affair went against the grain, but to let a Lorrigan make love to a
Douglas on the heels of the trial was a pill so bitter that he refused
to swallow it.

He urged Coaley up the trail, his eyes somber with resentment whenever
he saw the fresh hoofprints of Lance's horse in the sandy places. Of
the three boys, Lance was his favorite, and it hurt him to think that
Lance had so little of the Lorrigan pride that he would ride a foot
out of his way to speak to any one of the Douglas blood.

Up the Slide went Coaley, his head held proudly erect upon his high,
arched neck, his feet choosing daintily the little rough places in the
rock where long experience had taught him he would not slip. Big as
Tom was, Coaley carried him easily and reached the top without so much