ding and factory. Business was extending its lines, cattle must
retreat before them. Several homesteaders had already appeared in the
country, erecting fences around their claims. One of the homesteaders,
when Trevison had come upon him a few days before, had impertinently
inquired why Trevison did not fence the Diamond K range. Fence in five
thousand acres! It had never been done in this section of the country.
Trevison had permitted himself a cold grin, and had kept his answer to
himself. The incident was not important, but it foreshadowed a day when a
dozen like inquiries would make the building of a range fence imperative.

Trevison already felt the irritation of congestion--the presence of the
homesteaders nettled him. He frowned as he rode. A year ago he would have
sold out--cattle, land and buildings--at the market price. But at that
time he had not known the value of his land. Now--

He kicked Nigger in the ribs and straightened in the saddle, grinning.

"She's not for sale now--eh, Nig?"

Five minutes later he halted the black at the crest of the big railroad
cut and looked over the edge appraisingly. Fifty laborers--directed by a
mammoth personage in dirty blue overalls, boots, woolen shirt, and a
wide-brimmed felt hat, and with a face undeniably Irish--were working
frenziedly to keep pace with the huge steam shovel, whose iron jaws were
biting into the earth with a regularity that must have been discouraging
to its human rivals. A train of flat-cars, almost loaded, was on the track
of the cut, and a dinky engine attached to them wheezed steam from a
safety valve, the engineer and fireman lounging out of the cab window,
lazily watching.

Patrick Carson, the personage--construction boss, good-natured, keen,
observant--was leaning against a boulder at the side of the track, talking
to the engineer at the instant Trevison appeared at the top of the cut. He
glanced up, his eyes lighting.

"There's thot mon, Trevison, ag'in, Murph'," he said to the engineer.
"Bedad, he's a pitcher now, ain't he?"

An imposing figure Trevison certainly was. Horse and rider were outlined
against the sky, and in the dear light every muscle and feature of man and
beast stood but boldly and distinctly. The big black horse was a powerful
brute, tall and rangy, with speed and courage showing plainly in contour,
nostril and eye; and with head and ears erect he stood motionless,
statuesque, heroic. His rider seemed to have been propor