n't exactly a pauper, either.
I've got my two hands, an' I've got a contract with Old Man Samuelson
to winter his cattle. I didn't want to do it first, but the figure he
named was about twice what I thought the job was worth. I told him so
right out, an' he kind of laughed an' said maybe I'd need it all, an'
anyhow, them cattle was all grade Herefords, an' was worth more to
winter than common dogies. So, you see, we could winter through, all
right, an' next summer, we could prospect together. The gold's here,
somewhere--your dad knew it--an' I know it."

Receiving no answering pat, the buckskin left off his nuzzling of the
man's sleeve, and turned from the doorway. As he did so the brown
leather jug scraped lightly against the jamb. The girl's eyes flew to
the jug, and swiftly back to the man who stood framed in the doorway.
She loved him! For days and days she had known that she loved him, and
for days and nights her thoughts had been mostly of him--this
unsmiling knight of the saddle--her "guardian devil of the hills."
Without exception, the people whose regard was worth having respected
him, and liked him, even though they deplored his refusal to accept
steady work. They're just like the people back home, she thought. They
have no imagination. To their minds the cowpuncher who draws his forty
dollars a month, year in and year out, is in some manner more
dependable than the man whose imagination and love of the boundless
open lead him to stake his time against millions. What do they know of
the joys and the despairs of uncertainty? In a measure they, too, love
the plains and the hills--but their love of the open is inextricably
interwoven with their preconceived ideas of conduct. But, Vil Holland
is bound by no such convention; his "outfit," a pack horse to carry
it, and his home--all outdoors! Her father had imagination, and year
after year, in the face of the taunts and jibes of his small town
neighbors, he had steadfastly allowed his imagination full sway, and
at last--he had won. She had adored her father from whom she had
inherited her love of the wild. But--there was the jug! Always her
thoughts of Vil Holland had led up to that brown leather jug until she
had come to hate it with an unreasoning hatred.

"I see you have not forgotten your jug."

"No, I got it filled in town." The man's reply was casual, as he would
have mentioned his gloves, or his hat.

"You said you had never run up against anything you co