ther would catch him talking to one of the herders,"
laughed the girl.

"The vaquero Corlees he afraid of not even the bear, I think, Senorita."

Eleanor Loring laughed. "Don't you let father catch you calling him a
bear!" she cautioned, provoking the old herder to immediate apology and
a picturesque explanation of the fact that he had referred not to the
patron, but the grizzly.

"All right, Fernando. I'll not forget to tell the patron that you
called him a bear."

The old herder grinned and waved farewell as she mounted and rode down
the trail. Practical in everyday affairs, he untied his bandanna and
neatly folded and replaced it among his effects. As he came out of the
tent he picked up his hat. He was no longer the cavalier, but a
stoop-shouldered, shriveled little Mexican herder. He slouched out
toward the flock and called his son to dinner. No, it was not so many
years--was not the Senorita but twenty years old?--since he had wooed
the Senora Loring, then a slim dark girl of the people, his people, but
now the wealthy Senora, wife of his patron. Ah, yes! It was good that
she should have the comfortable home and the beautiful daughter. He
had nothing but his beloved sheep, but did they not belong to his
Senorita?

At the ford the girl took the trail to the uplands, deciding to visit
the farthest camp first, and then, if she had time, to call at one or
two other camps on her way back to the rancho. As the trail grew
steeper, she curbed the impatient Challenge to a steadier pace and rode
leisurely to the level of the timber. On the park-like level,
clean-swept between the boles of the great pines, she again put
Challenge to a lope until she came to the edge on the upper mesa. Then
she drew up suddenly and held the horse in.

Far out on the mesa was the figure of a man, on foot. Toward him came
a horse without bridle or saddle. She recognized the figure as that of
John Corliss, and she wondered why he was on foot and evidently trying
to coax a stray horse toward him. Presently she saw Corliss reach out
slowly and give the horse something from his hand. Still she was
puzzled, and urging Challenge forward, drew nearer. The stray, seeing
her horse, pricked up its ears, swung round stiffly, and galloped off.
Corliss turned and held up his hand, palm toward her. It was their old
greeting; a greeting that they had exchanged as boy and girl long
before David Loring had become recognized as a powe