th a lack of breath, made the other dumb.

"Drop your gun," bade Lounsbury.

Matthews' right hand loosed its hold. His revolver fell, and slid,
spinning, to the bottom of the drift.

"Now I know all you want to say," said Lounsbury. "That this claim is
yours, that your six months ain't up, that Lancaster's jumped it, and so
on. But that won't excuse what you've tried to do--break into this house
while these young women are alone. Besides, you haven't the ghost of a
right to this land. So you'll oblige me by keeping off it from now on."

Matthews found his tongue. "Who in hell are you?" he demanded coolly.

"Who am I?" repeated the storekeeper, smiling down the revolver barrel.
"Why, I'm St. George, and you're the dragon." He raised his voice.
"Miss Lancaster!" he called. "Miss Lancaster!"

A face appeared at a window, then a second. There were more cries, but
not of fear. The sash was pushed open. Dallas and Marylyn, the younger
girl still clinging to the elder, looked out.

"It's all right," said the storekeeper, not taking his eyes from the
enemy. "I'm here."

Dallas could not answer. But Marylyn, though exhausted, was fully alive
to their rescue. Her eyes, wide and tearful, were fixed upon Lounsbury.

"Oh, we're afraid!" she cried plaintively; "pa's gone, and we're
afraid!"

"You needn't be, any more," he said reassuringly.

Matthews, under his breath, was cursing the self-contained man in the
saddle. Enraged at the storekeeper's interference, hot with
disappointment, he saw himself stood up like a tenderfoot. But his
caution prevailed. A certain expression in Lounsbury's eyes, a certain
square set to his jaw--the very cues that guided the cattle-camp--made
him cautious.

"Look a-here," he said to Lounsbury, assuming a conciliatory manner.
"Let's talk as one gent to another. These ladies is your friends. So
far, so good. But I has my rights, and I can prove that I slep' on this
quarter-section three times and----"

Lounsbury's face darkened. He was lightly ironical no longer. He urged
his mount forward. "Don't argue with me, you infernal blackguard," he
said. "You can prove anything you want to by a lot of perjuring,
thieving land-grabbers. Don't I know 'em! If you filed on this claim you
were hired to do it. You hadn't an idea of settling, or building a
home. You did it for speculating purposes--nothing else. And the law, I
happen to know, is dead against that. You're a shark. But your game
won't wor