ers'
virtue; she thinks we have no power of forbearance. Can't you help me to
convince her that we often keep from doing wicked things just for the
pure love of being good."

Red, catching the mischievous note in his question, rose to the occasion
manfully.

"Why, yuh ain't thinkin' that bad of us, are yuh?" he said with
sorrowful reproach to Constance. "Indeed, ma'am, we are real gentle by
spells. Why, I mind las' yeah when I was ridin' fences foh thu C Bar I
got to thinkin' haow foolish it were o' me to keep hankerin' after thu
delusions o' thu Alcazah, an' to keep wantin' to go oveh theah
simultaneous an' waste my hawd eahned money on thu see-ductions o' thu
flowin' bowl. So I braces up, an' says to thu devil o' temptation, kinda
contemptuous-like, 'Hit thu back trail, Satan!'

"Every time I feels thu iniquity o' thust comin' on me I jes' swaps the
price o' a drink from my sack to a leetle ole terbacca bag I totes
especial foh thet puppos, and goes an' dips my beak in healthy alkali
wateh like a sensibul, fohbeahing Christian should. It were two bits
every time an' by thu time Chris'mas comes raound thu smoke bag were
plumb full. I suttinly fohboah a heap thet summah."

Genuinely interested at the simple relation, Constance asked
sympathetically: "And what did you do with the money so heroically
saved, may I ask?"

"Well, I had thu price O' nine bottles o' booze in thu bag when I
counted her oveh at Tin Cup on Chrismus eve. Theah's five bottles goes
to a gallon, yuh know, so I rattles thu bones with thu perfessor an' o'
cose I wins thu odd bottle. Then I blows six bits fer a two-gallon jug
an'--"

Constance glared at him severely. Douglass laid his head on the table
and cried.

The greater portion of the next day was spent by Constance in shopping
and resting after her wearisome stage ride. Douglass had some saddlery
matters to attend to and Grace's letter to answer. Red had volunteered
to drive 'Rastus and Lucindy over to the VN ranch with the luggage and
so it happened that Douglass and Mrs. Brevoort rode out together alone
in the pleasant evening to her home-coming.

They jogged along very leisurely, talking only the veriest commonplaces
after they had exhausted the more interesting topics of ranch and mine.
Curiously enough, neither referred once to Grace Carter, her name not
being mentioned throughout the whole journey. Toward the end of their
ride both man and woman grew strangely silent. The white M