at rope
settled about the defiant neck.

"For we'll get Lightfoot first, Bill," he said eagerly. "Little
Saxon'll have to go some when I've got Lady Lightfoot under me. And
then we'll take the three year old in and begin breaking him."

Big Bill chuckled joyously. And as Garth had said before him he
muttered that Wayne Shandon hadn't changed much.

As they rode the valley widened for a little before them, the steep
wall of cliffs and crags drawing back upon the right, lifting their
crests ever higher, topped by few scattering pines, firs and tamaracks.
Here and there a giant cedar flourished in isolated majesty, lifting
its delicately formed cones a hundred and fifty feet above its ancient,
gnarled roots. The valley itself was for the most part clear of timber
and scrub. The herds had not yet come up here this year, and would not
come until the lower end had been thoroughly fed off. For here there
would be grazing land in abundance until the winter came and all herds
must be moved to the pastures far down the mountains where the snow
fall was never more than a few thawing inches.

Conversation between the two men died down as they pushed deeper into
the solitudes. When they had ridden a couple of miles, the valley
narrowed again, the timber line crept in closer at every yard, the
mountains drew in abruptly and rose more precipitously in sheer,
frowning, dominant majesty, the river shot hissing down its rocky
course, a wild thing plunging madly toward freedom and an open world.

So with few words, each man's thoughts wandering as chance and the
river and mountains directed them, Shandon and Big Bill rode slowly.
That trail brought them at last down close to the edge of the stream as
the banks on either hand drew closer together until finally the water
choked and fumed and thundered through a narrow pass. Here they must
turn away from its course, climbing a steep shoulder of the mountain,
making a difficult way along a seldom used trail, until they came to
the crest of the ridge which shot down from the right. Another fifty
yards, almost level going, a steep descent and suddenly the fury of the
river was but a faint rumbling in their ears, the stillness of the
mountains crept down on them and they were at the margin of Laughter
Lake.

With a sigh long, deep, lung filling, Wayne Shandon curbed his horse to
a standstill. Big Bill turned his head away and a little hurriedly
sought for his "makings." For Big