boss, ma'am?" he said gently. He had hoped
that she might answer lightly, and then he would have known that she
would forgive him, in time.

But her chin went up and she looked coldly at him. "You will be able to
leave the Flying W shortly, Randerson," she said. "I am going to leave
such matters for Mr. Masten to look after."

She urged her pony away and left him, staring somberly after her.

Two hours later he was riding down the declivity toward Chavis' shack, in
the basin. He had ridden first to the outfit, and had talked with Owen.
And his appearance had been such that when he left the foreman the latter
sought out Blair.

"If I don't miss my reckonin', Masten's goin' to get his'n today."

Randerson rode, straight as Patches could carry him, to the door of
Chavis' shack. No one appeared to greet him, but he had seen horses,
saddled, hitched to the corral fence, and he knew that some one was
about. Chavis, Kester, and Hilton were inside the shack, and when they
heard him ride up, they came to the door, curious. And when they saw him
they stiffened and stood rigid, with not a finger moving, for they had
seen men, before, meditating violence, and they saw the signs in
Randerson's chilled and narrowed eyes, and in the grim set of his lips.

His lips moved; his teeth hardly parted to allow the words to come
through them. They writhed through:

"Where's Masten?"

Three pairs of lungs sighed audibly in process of deflation.

It was Chavis who answered; the other two looked at him when the question
came, silently. Chavis would have lied, but the light in Randerson's eyes
warned him not to trifle, and the truth came from his lips:

"Masten's gone to the Flyin' W ranchhouse."

"I reckon that's all," said Randerson shortly. "I'm thankin' you."

He rode away, grinning coldly back at them, still watchful, for he knew
Chavis, guiding his pony toward the declivity on the other side of the
basin. The three men watched him until the pony had climbed to the mesa.
Then Chavis turned to the others.

"I reckon he's goin' to see Masten about that Kelso deal," he said.
"Somebody ought to put Masten wise."

Kester grinned. "It's bound to come," he commented. "Let's finish our
game; it is your deal."

On the mesa, Randerson urged Patches along the edge, over the trail that
Ruth had taken when, months before, she had come upon Chavis and Kester
at the declivity.

"Nothin' would have happened, if it hadn't been for Masten,"