his saddle pony,
Talpers rode for hours across the plains. Seemingly he paid no attention
to the changes in the landscape, yet his keen eyes, buried deeply
beneath black brows, took in everything. He saw the cloud masses come
tumbling over the mountains, but, like Lowell, he knew that the drought
was not yet to be ended. The country became more broken, and the grade
so pronounced that the horses were compelled to slacken their pace. The
pleasant green hills gave place to imprisoning mesas, with red sides
that looked like battlements. Beyond these lay the foothills--so close
that they covered the final slopes of the mountains.

It was a lonely country, innocent of fences. The cattle that ran here
were as wild as deer and almost as fleet as antelope. Twice a year the
Indians rounded up their range possessions, but many of these cattle had
escaped the far-flung circles of riders. They had become renegades and
had grown old and clever. At the sight of a human being they would
gallop away in the sage and greasewood.

Once Talpers saw the gleam of a wagon-top which indicated the presence
of a wolf hunter in the employ of the leasers who were running cattle on
the reservations and who suffered much from the depredations of
predatory animals. By working carefully around a hill, the trader
continued on his way without having been seen.

Passing the flanking line of mesas, Bill pushed his way up a watercourse
between two foothills. The going became rougher, and all semblance of a
trail was lost, yet the trader went on unhesitatingly. The slopes
leading to the creek became steeper and were covered with pine and
quaking aspen, instead of the bushy growths of the plains. The stream
foamed over rocks, and its noise drowned the sound of the horses' hoofs
as the animals scrambled over the occasional stretches of loose shale.
With the dexterity of the born trailsman, Talpers wormed his way along
the stream when it seemed as if further progress would be impossible. In
a tiny glade, with the mountain walls rising precipitously for hundreds
of feet, Talpers halted and gave three shrill whistles. An answer came
from the other end of the glade, and in a few minutes Talpers was
removing pack and saddle in Jim McFann's camp.

Since his escape from jail the half-breed had been hiding in this
mountain fastness. Talpers had supplied him with "grub" and weapons. He
had moved camp once in a while for safety's sake, but had felt little
fear of