he
surface seems to ripple an' throw back flashes of sunshine. An' there's
other times, too. They can look at you hard an' grey--like a man's eyes.
An' they can get black an' stormy--with lightnin' flashes instead of
sunshine. There's a woman for some man--an' believe me, he better be
_some man_! He'd have to be to get her." The man dreamed a jumbled, rosy
dream for a mile or more. "An' she can ride, an' shoot, leastwise she
packs a gun--an' I bet she can use it. I've seen these ridin', shootin'
kind--lots of 'em--an' mostly, they don't sort of stack up to what a man
would want to marry--makes you kind of wonder if they wouldn't expect
the man to rock the cradle--but not her--she's different--she's all
girl. After Win's wife--I never expected to see another one--but,
shucks--she said there was more--an' she was right--partly--there's one
more. I'm goin' to hunt a job over on this side--" his train of thought
halted abruptly, and involuntarily, his gaze fastened upon the
blue-black peaks of the Judith range to the southward across the river.
His gloved hand smote his leather chaps with a crack that made the blue
roan jump sidewise: "I'll be damned if I do!" he exclaimed aloud, "I'll
go straight back to Dad Colston! I'll tell him the whole thing--he'll
know--he'll understand an' if he'll give me my job back I'll--I'll buy
me a mile of cable an' rig up Long Bill's ferry right plumb across to
the mouth of Red Sand! I don't want her till I've earnt her--but there
ain't no one else goin' to come snoopin' around--not onless he's a
better man than I am--an' if he is, he ought to win."

At the edge of the bad lands the Texan pulled up in the shelter of a
twisted bull pine that grew from the top of a narrow ridge, and
banishing all thought of the girl from his mind, concentrated upon the
work at hand. He knew Purdy for just what he was. Knew his base
brutishness of soul--knew his insatiable greed--and it was upon this
latter trait that he based his hope. Carefully he weighed the chances.
He knew how Purdy must hate the pilgrim for the shooting back at Wolf
River. He knew that the man's unreasoning hate would extend to the girl
herself. He knew that Purdy hated him, and that if he found out through
Long Bill that he had been with her, the man's hate would be redoubled.
And he knew that even in the absence of any hatred on the part of Purdy,
no woman would be safe in his hands. To offset unreasoning hate and
bestial desire was only