ther,"
she said.

The grassy road led to a long, one-story, half-log, half-slab house,
which stood on the bank of a small, swift, willow-bordered stream.

"This is our ranch," she explained. "All the meadow in sight belongs to
us."

The young Easterner looked about in astonishment. Not a tree bigger than
his thumb gave shade. The gate of the cattle corral stood but a few feet
from the kitchen door, and rusty beef-bones, bleaching skulls, and scraps
of sun-dried hides littered the ground or hung upon the fence. Exteriorly
the low cabin made a drab, depressing picture; but as he alighted--upon
Berea's invitation--and entered the house, he was met by a sweet-faced,
brown-haired little woman in a neat gown, whose bearing was not in the
least awkward or embarrassed.

"This is Mr. Norcross, the tourist I told you about," explained Berrie.

Mrs. McFarlane extended her small hand with friendly impulse. "I'm very
glad to meet you, sir. Are you going to spend some time at the Mill?"

"I don't know. I have a letter to Mr. Meeker from a friend of mine who
hunted with him last year--a Mr. Sutler."

"Mr. Sutler! Oh, we know him very well. Won't you sit down?"

The interior of the house was not only well kept, but presented many
evidences of refinement. A mechanical piano stood against the log wall,
and books and magazines, dog-eared with use, littered the table; and
Norcross, feeling the force of Nash's half-expressed criticism of his
"superior," listened intently to Mrs. McFarlane's apologies for the
condition of the farmyard.

"Well," said Berea, sharply, "if we're to reach Uncle Joe's for dinner
we'd better be scratching the hills." And to her mother she added: "I'll
pull in about dark."

The mother offered no objection to her daughter's plan, and the young
people rode off together directly toward the high peaks to the east.

"I'm going by way of the cut-off," Berrie explained; and Norcross,
content and unafraid, nodded in acquiescence. "Here is the line," she
called a few minutes later, pointing at a sign nailed to a tree at the
foot of the first wooded hill.

The notice, printed in black ink on a white square of cloth, proclaimed
this to be the boundary of the Bear Tooth National Forest, and pleaded
with all men to be watchful of fires. Its tone was not at all that of a
strong government; it was deprecatory.

The trail, hardly more than a wood road, grew wilder and lonelier as they
climbed. Cattle fed on the hill