get my orders about this feud?" she interrupted crisply.

"Yes, ma'am, but--"

"Then you may call for your time. When I give my men orders I expect
them to obey."

"I wouldn't 'a' shot if I'd knowed y'u was so near him. Y'u was behind
that summer kitchen," he explained lamely.

"You only expect to obey orders when I'm in sight. Is that it?" she
asked hotly, and without waiting for an answer delivered her ultimatum.
"Well, I won't have it. I run this ranch as long as I am its owner. Do
you understand?"

"Yes, ma'am. I hadn't ought to have did it, but when I seen Bannister it
come over me I owed him a pill for the one he sent me last week down in
the coulee. So I up and grabbed the rifle and let him have it."

"Then you may up and grab your trunk for Medicine Hill. Shorty will
drive you tomorrow."

When she returned to her unexpected guest, Helen found him in
conversation with McWilliams. The latter's gun had found again its
holster, but his brown, graceful hand hovered close to its butt.

"Seems like a long time since the Lazy D has been honored by a visit
from Mr. Bannister," he was saying, with gentle irony.

"That's right. So I have come to make up for lost time," came
Bannister's quiet retort.

Miss Messiter did not know much about Wyoming human nature in the raw,
but she had learned enough to be sure that the soft courtesy of these
two youths covered a stark courage that might leap to life any moment.
Wherefore she interposed.

"We'll be pleased to show you over the place, Mr. Bannister. As it
happens, we are close to the hospital. Shall we begin there?"

Her cool, silken defiance earned a smile from the visitor. "All your
cases doing well, ma'am?"

"It's very kind of you to ask. I suppose you take an interest because
they are YOUR cases, too, in a way of speaking?"

"Mine? Indeed!"

"Yes. If it were not for you I'm afraid our hospital would be empty."

"It must be right pleasant to be nursed by Miss Messiter. I reckon the
boys are grateful to me for scattering my lead so promiscuous."

"I heard one say he would like to lam your haid tenderly," murmured
McWilliams.

"With a two-by-four, I suppose," laughed Bannister.

"Shouldn't wonder. But, looking y'u over casual, it occurs to me
he might get sick of his job befo' he turned y'u loose," McWilliams
admitted, with a glance of admiration at the clean power showing in the
other's supple lines.

Nor could either the foreman or his mistress deny