sun slipped around and
shone through a window on Belle's head, so that her yellow hair
glistened like fine threads of gold. Mary Hope watched it dreamily and
wondered how a Jezebel could be so beautiful and so good.

"You'd better run along home now, honey," Belle said at last when she
had finished her eighth song. "I'd love to have you stay all
night--but I reckon there'd be trouble. Your dad ain't any too mild,
I've heard. But I hope you won't wait until your horse runs away with
you again. I want you to come real soon. And come early so you can
stay longer. I'll teach you to play the piano, honey. You ought to
learn, seeing you love it so."

That night Mary Hope dreamed of playing strange, complex compositions
on a piano which Lance Lorrigan had given her. The next morning and
for many days after she still dreamed of playing entrancing strains
upon a piano, and of Lance Lorrigan who had thrown her a kiss. Belle
had said that Lance always teased a person he liked, and in that one
remark lay the stuff of many dreams.

CHAPTER FOUR

A MATTER OF BRANDS

On the grassy expanse known locally as Injun Creek, fifteen hundred
head of cattle were milling restlessly in a close-held herd over which
gray dust hovered and settled and rose again. Toward it other cattle
came lowing, trotting now and then when the riders pressed close,
essaying a retreat when the way seemed clear. From Devil's Tooth they
came, and from Lava Bed way, and from the rough sandstone ridges of
Mill Creek. Two by two the riders, mere moving dots at first against a
monotone of the rangeland, took form as they neared the common center.
Red cattle, black cattle, spotted and dingy white, with bandy-legged,
flat-bodied calves keeping close to their mothers, kicking up their
heels in sheer joy of their new life when the pace slowed a little,
seeking a light lunch whenever the cows stopped to cast a wary glance
back at their pursuer. A dozen brands were represented in that
foregathering: The NL brand of Tom Lorrigan on most, with its various
amendments which differentiated the property of other members of the
family, since all of the Lorrigans owned cattle. There was the NL
Block of Belle Lorrigan, the ANL which was Al's brand, the DNL of Duke
and the LNL which belonged to Lance; monograms all of them, deftly
constructed with the fewest possible lines. There was that invitation
to the unlawful artistry of brand-working, the Eleven which Sleek
Douglas