der
an obligation to y'u I can't repay. Y'u saved my life," he finished
gravely.

"Nonsense."

"Fact."

"It isn't a personal matter at all," she assured him, with a touch of
impatient hauteur.

"It 's a heap personal to me."

In spite of her healthy young resentment she laughed at the way in which
he drawled this out, and with a swift sweep her boyish eyes took in
again his compelling devil-may-care charm. She was a tenderfoot, but
intuition as well as experience taught her that he was unusual enough to
be one of ten thousand. No young Greek god's head could have risen
more superbly above the brick-tanned column of the neck than this
close-cropped curly one. Gray eyes, deep and unwavering and masterful,
looked out of a face as brown as Wyoming. He was got up with no thought
of effect, but the tigerish litheness, the picturesque competency of
him, spake louder than costuming.

"Aren't you really hurt worse than you pretend? I'm sure your ankle
ought to be attended to as soon as possible."

"Don't tell me you're a lady doctor, ma'am," he burlesqued his alarm.

"Can you tell me where the nearest ranch house is?" she asked, ignoring
his diversion.

"The Lazy D is the nearest, I reckon."

"Which direction?"

"North by east, ma'am."

"Then I'll take the most direct road to it.

"In that case I'll thank y'u for my ride and get out here."

"But--why?"

He waved a jaunty hand toward the recent battlefield. "The Lazy D lies
right back of that hill. I expect, mebbe, those wolves might howl again
if we went back."

"Where, then, shall I take you?"

"I hate to trouble y'u to go out of your way.

"I dare say, but I'm going just the same," she told him, dryly.

"If you're right determined--" He interrupted himself to point to the
south. "Do y'u see that camel-back peak over there?"

"The one with the sunshine on its lower edge?"

"That's it, Miss Messiter. They call those two humps the Antelope Peaks.
If y'u can drop me somewhere near there I think I'll manage all right."

"I'm not going to leave you till we reach a house," she informed him
promptly. "You're not fit to walk fifty yards."

"That's right kind of y'u, but I could not think of asking so much. My
friends will find me if y'u leave me where I can work a heliograph."

"Or your enemies," she cut in.

"I hope not. I'd not likely have the luck to get another invitation
right then to go riding with a friendly young lady."

She gave him direct,