She was Brit Hunter's girl, and she had told
them at the Sawtooth that she had spent the night at Rock City. He
wondered how much else she had told; how much she remembered of what
she had told him.

He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a round leather purse
with a chain handle. It was soiled and shrunken with its wetting, and
the clasp had flecks of rust upon it. What it contained Lone did not
know. Virginia had taught him that a man must not be curious about the
personal belongings of a woman. Now he turned the purse over, tried to
rub out the stiffness of the leather, and smiled a little as he dropped
it back into his pocket.

"I've got my calling card," he said softly to John Doe. "I reckon I
had the right hunch when I didn't turn it over to Mrs Hawkins. I'll
ask her again about that grip she said she hid under a bush. I never
heard about any of the boys finding it."

His thoughts returned to Al Woodruff and stopped there. Determined
still to attend strictly to his own affairs, his thoughts persisted in
playing truant and in straying to a subject he much preferred not to
think of at all. Why should Al Woodruff be interested in the exact
spot where Brit Hunter's daughter had spent the night of the storm?
Why should Lone instinctively discount her statement and lie
whole-heartedly about it?

"Now if Al catches me up in that, he'll think I know a lot I don't
know, or else----" He halted his thoughts there, for that, too, was a
forbidden subject.

Forbidden subjects are like other forbidden things: they have a way of
making themselves very conspicuous. Lone was heading for the Quirt
ranch by the most direct route, fearing, perhaps, that if he waited he
would lose his nerve and would not go at all. Yet it was important
that he should go; he must return the girl's purse!

The most direct route to the Quirt took him down Juniper Ridge and
across Granite Creek near the Thurman ranch. Indeed, if he followed
the trail up Granite Creek and across the hilly country to Quirt Creek,
he must pass within fifty yards of the Thurman cabin. Lone's time was
limited, yet he took the direct route rather reluctantly. He did not
want to be reminded too sharply of Fred Thurman as a man who had lived
his life in his own way and had died so horribly.

"Well, he didn't have it coming to him--but it's done and over with
now, so it's no use thinking about it," he reflected, when the roofs of
the Thurman ranch