ms?"

"Then both properties would have been split between the two of you, the
same as if you'd carried them out," he said. "You didn't go and think
now, Pet, that them two wise old heads was going to leave the
youngsters in the lurch! They was planning the best they knew. Your
dad told me to keep an eye on the general lay. And Judge Colton sent
me that copy to have on hand to sort of iron things out when I thought
best. I'm telling you because I know you wouldn't quit the Three Bar
as long as there's two cows left."

"Does Cal know?" she asked.

"Not a word," Waddles asserted. "He's likely considerable puzzled
himself. But he's of a optimistic turn of mind, Cal is, and white
folks too. He surmises things will break right some day, knowing his
own dad and havin' visited round a day or two with yours. 'I don't
know what they're at,' he says to me. 'But they was both square
shooters, those old boys, and whatever it was they didn't aim to cook
up any misery for either the little girl or me, so what's the use to
fret?' You drop the Judge a line, girl, and turn Harris loose to rip
up the Three Bar flat and seed it down to hay."

She nodded and slipped from the end-gate of the wagon, taking the paper
with her. Harris was soaking a flannel shirt in the little stream,
flattening it in a riffle and weighting it down with rocks. She went
straight to him and sat on the bank, motioning him to a seat by her
side. He dried his hands and took the paper she held out to him.

"What's in the wind?" he asked.

She nodded to indicate the document and he sat down to look over it.
His quizzical expression was erased as he saw his father's name and the
girl watched his face for some evidence of resentment as he read on.
Their status was now reversed, for Bill Harris's holdings had been
easily double those of her own parent. She saw the sun wrinkles deepen
at the corners of his eyes as he grasped the text of it and he looked
up at her and laughed.

"Now we're resting easy," he said. "An even trade."

"Uneven," she dissented. "Of course you know that I'll not take
advantage of that."

"Accounts are all squared off between us now," he said. "And of course
you'll do just what it says." He held up his hand as she started to
dissent. "Don't you!" he reproved. "Let's let that end of it
slide--rest for a while. Maybe some day we'll lump both into one and
the two of us boss the whole job."

She rested a hand on his ar