she
remembered that so many men had wished to ride for her brand more than
for another, their reasons in each case the same.

"Because the Three Bar needs a man that has prowled this country and
gathered a few points about what's going on," he returned.

"And that information is for sale to any brand that hires you!" said
the girl. "Is that what you mean?"

"If it was, there would be nothing wrong with a man's schooling himself
to know all points of his job before he asked for it," he said. "But
it happens that wasn't exactly my reason."

A shade of weariness passed over her face. During the two years that
her father had been confined to the house after being caved in by a
horse and in the one year that had elapsed since his death the six
thousand cows that had worn the Three Bar brand on the range had
decreased by almost half under her management.

"I'll put you on," she said. "But you'll probably be insulted at what
I have to offer. The men start out after the horses to-morrow. I want
a man to stay here and do tinkering jobs round the place till they get
back."

"That'll suit me as well as any," he accepted promptly. "I'm a great
little hand at tinkering round."

The clang of the sledge had ceased and a huge, fat man loomed in the
door of the shop and mopped his dripping face with a bandanna.

"I'm glad you've come," he assured the new-comer. "A man that's not
above doing a little fixing up! A cowhand is the most overworked and
underpaid saphead that ever lost three nights' sleep hand running and
worked seventy-two hours on end; sleep in the rain or not at all--to
hold a job at forty per for six months in the year. The other six he's
throwed loose like a range horse to rustle or starve. Hardest work in
the world--but he don't know it, or money wouldn't hire him to lift his
hand. He thinks it's play. Not one out of ten but what prides himself
that he can't be browbeat into doing a tap of work. Ask him to cut a
stick of firewood and he'll arch his back and laugh at you scornful
like. Don't that beat hell?"

"It do," said the stranger.

"I'm the best wagon cook that ever sloshed dishwater over the
tail-gate, and even better than that in a ranch-house kitchen," the
loquacious one modestly assured him. "But I can't do justice to the
meals when I lay out to do all the chores within four miles and run
myself thin collecting scraps and squaw wood to keep the stove het up.
Now since Billie has hire