the cattle. From the
motion of his hand she knew that he was telling her to get back to the
car. But the girl saw no reason for obeying the orders of a
range-rider she had never seen before and never expected to see again.
Nobody had ever told her that a rider is fairly safe among the wildest
hill cattle, but a man on foot is liable to attack at any time when a
herd is excited.

She turned her shoulder a little more definitely to the man who had
warned her and looked across the _parada_ grounds to the hills swimming
in a haze of violet velvet. Her heart throbbed to a keen delight in
them, as it might have done at the touch of a dear friend's hand long
absent. For she had been born in the Rockies. They belonged to her
and she to them. Long years in New York had left her still an alien.

A shout of warning startled her. Above the bellowing of the herd she
heard another yell.

"Hi-yi-ya-a!"

A red-eyed steer, tail up, was crashing through the small brush toward
the branders. There was a wild scurry for safety. The men dropped
iron and ropes and fled to their saddles. Deflected by pursuers, the
animal turned. By chance it thundered straight for the girl on the
sand spit.

She stood paralyzed for a moment.

Out of the gathering darkness a voice came to her sharp and clear.
"Don't move!" It rang so vibrant with crisp command that the girl,
poised for flight, stood still and waited in white terror while the
huge steer lumbered toward her.

A cowpony, wheeled as on a dollar, jumped to an instant gallop. The
man riding it was the one who had warned her back to the car. Horse
and _ladino_ pounded over the ground toward her. Each stride brought
them closer to each other as they converged toward the sand spit. It
came to her with a gust of panicky despair that they would collide on
the very spot where she stood. Yet she did not run.

The rider, lifting his bronco forward at full speed, won by a fraction
of a second. He guided in such a way as to bring his horse between her
and the steer. The girl noticed that he dropped his bridle rein and
crouched in the saddle, his eyes steadily upon her. Without slackening
his pace in the least as he swept past, the man stooped low, caught the
girl beneath the armpits, and swung her in front of him to the back of
the horse. The steer pounded past so close behind that one of its
horns grazed the tail of the cowpony.

It was a superb piece of horsemanship, perfect