n his little old jail damn' soon, or he'll have a
bunch of wild men in his hair. And he knows it. Now we can get our crop
planted and things will be ripe for him to gather in in eleven days."

"Let's go inside." Pollard turned toward the front door. "I want to see
Winifred. I want to see how she looks before she gets through thinking
about Thornton."

And Winifred Waverly, who, after her stunned hesitation when she had
seen Thornton and Broderick standing side by side in the doorway, and
who had hurried out through the back door, hoping to find Thornton
before he had gone, got to her feet in the black shadow where she had
crouched by the school house wall, her face dead white, her eyes wide
and staring, her heart pounding wildly.

CHAPTER XXI

THE GIRL AND THE GAME

She did not fully understand, she could not grasp everything yet, she
was filled with doubts and suspicions and a growing terror. What had her
uncle said to Thornton, what had the cowboy "swallowed whole"? What was
the whole scheme which connected the two men, which envolved Thornton
and the sheriff, which seemed clear in one moment only to be a tangle in
the next?

One thing only was perfectly clear now to the girl. And seeing it, she
gathered up her skirts in her two hands and ran, ran back along the
wall, keeping in the shadows, drawing close about her the dark cloak she
had thrown about her white dress. She must get into the house before
they came in, she must let her face show nothing, she must have time to
think before she spoke with them. So she came to the back door, paused a
brief moment, commanding her nerves to be steady, then slipped in,
letting the cloak fall from her shoulders. She saw Bud King standing
with his back to the wall watching the dancers, and going swiftly to
him, putting her hand lightly upon his arm, she summoned a smile into
her eyes as she cried breathlessly:

"Will you dance this with me?"

Young King looked at her in quick surprise, startled at the nearness of
the girl for whom his eyes had been seeking, and a little flush ran up
into his cheeks, a sparkle of gladness into his eyes.

"Sure," he grinned happily. "I been looking for you, Miss Waverly."

He ran his arm about her, she bent her head a little so that he could
not see the whiteness of her face, and they caught the beat of the
music. She lost the step, purposely that she might have a little more
time before they pass down the room toward Pollard an