ifth was from Judge
Colton, her father's old friend, to whose hands all his affairs had
been entrusted. After scanning this she read again the other four.
Ever since her last visit to the Coltons, just prior to her father's
death, the arrival of these letters had been as regular as the
recurrence of Sunday, one for each week, and in moments of despondency
over the affairs of the Three Bar she drew strength from them. Very
soon now, in the course of a few months at the outside, she and the
writer would meet away from his native environment and in the midst of
her own. Always before this had been reversed and her association with
Carlos Deane had held a background of his own setting,--a setting in
startling contrast to her log house, nestling in a desert of sage. The
Deane house was a wonderful old-fashioned mansion set in a grove of
century-old elms and oaks. She knew his life and now he would see her
in her natural surroundings.

Perhaps it was her very difference from other girls that had first
interested Carlos Deane, and the fact that he stood out from others,
even among his own intimates, that had drawn her interest to him.
Deane had been an athlete of renown and a popular idol at school and
his energy had been brought to bear in business as successfully as in
play. In a hazy sort of way she felt that some day she would listen to
the plea that, in some fashion or other, was woven into every letter;
but not till the Three Bar was booming and no longer required her
supervision. Everything else in the world was secondary to her love
for her father's brand and the anxiety of the past two years of its
decline eclipsed all other issues.

Her reflections were interrupted by Harris's voice just outside her
teepee.

"Asleep, Billie?" he asked softly.

"No," she said. "What is it?"

"I've thrown your saddle on Papoose," he said. "Let's have a look
around."

She assented and they rode off up the left-hand slope of the valley. A
mile or so from the wagon Harris dismounted on a high point.

"Let's have a medicine chat," he offered. "I've got considerable on my
mind."

She leaned against a rock and he sat cross-legged on the ground, facing
her and twisting a cigarette as an aid to thought. Her head was tilted
back against the rock, her eyes half-closed.

"They say folks get disappointed in love and go right on living," he
observed. "I wonder now. I've met quite a scattering of girls and
maybe there were