"

"What did he say?"

"Nothin'. That is, not much. About the horse first. My man told him it
ain't no use tryin' to ketch him, an' it's foolish to try to cross
Thunder Mountain. Murray's been here ten years, an' ain't gone much
further'n the edge of it. Storms allus drove him back. An' what's the
use, when he's got wife an' childer to look after? Of course
Haig----"

"What did he say then?"

"He says he c'n cross if Sunnysides can, an' if they can't they'll
fight it out up there. My man asks why he didn't go 'round a safe way
an' wait for Sunnysides in the San Luis, if he thinks the horse's
goin' back home. Haig says he'd made up his mind to cross Thunder
Mountain some time, an' now's as good a time as any. But it's----" She
was checked at last by the look of anguish on Marion's face. "But you
just come in. It's supper time, almost, an' you must be right hungry.
Murray'll be here soon, an' he'll put up your horse."

In the cabin there was to be seen at first just one big room, with two
beds at one end, a table surrounded by chairs in the middle, and a
stove in the midst of kettles and pans and tubs at the other. But
presently Marion noticed a kind of balcony above the beds, and she
learned later that this was the "spare bedroom" in which she would be
stowed away for the night.

"He was hungry too," Mrs. Murray went on, being careful, however, to
confine herself to the material side of the subject. "He ate some
dinner, an' then, after we give up tryin' to stop him, Murray said
he'd got to take somethin' with him to eat, an' some blankets. He
hadn't a thing, mind you, an' didn't want to take nothin', but he did
take a good-sized strip o' bacon and some bread--I'd just did the
bakin'--an' a fryin'-pan an' matches an' a knife. Murray done 'em up
in a pair o' blankets, an' stuck in a leather coat with sheepskin
inside, an' hung a hatchet on his saddle. He'll need 'em--if he gits
across into the Black Lake country, which's worse some ways than
Thunder Mountain--forest't ain't never been touched, an' bad lands,
an'----"

Murray's entrance interrupted this speech, which was becoming painful
to her guest, in spite of the good woman's resolution to say nothing
discouraging. Murray, a bearded, rough fellow in whose face shone
good nature and contentment with the living he made out of his cows
and chickens and few head of stock feeding in the mountain meadows,
received a whispered hint, and obediently talked of other thi