and Carlson's fought.

The sheep were becoming more hopelessly mingled through this commotion
on their flank. Mackenzie was beating the enraged dogs apart when Swan
Carlson came running around the point of the hill.

Swan immediately took part in the melee of gnashing, rolling, rearing
dogs, laying about among them with impartial hand, quickly subduing
them to obedience. He stood looking stonily at Mackenzie, unmoved by
anger, unflushed by exertion. In that way he stood silent a little
while, his face untroubled by any passion that rolled in his breast.

"You're runnin' your sheep over on my grass--what?" said Swan.

"You're a mile over my range," Mackenzie accused.

"You've been crowdin' over on me for a month," Swan said, "and I
didn't say nothing. But when a man tries to run his sheep over amongst
mine and drive 'em off, I take a hand."

"If anybody's tryin' such a game as that, it's you," Mackenzie told
him. "Get 'em out of here, and keep 'em out."

"I got fifteen hundred in that band--you'll have to help me cut 'em
out," said Swan.

"You had about seven hundred," Mackenzie returned, dispassionately,
although it broke on him suddenly what the big flockmaster was trying
to put through.

Counting on Mackenzie's greenness, and perhaps on the simplicity of
his nature as they had read it in the sheep country, Swan had prepared
this trap days ahead. He had run a small band of the same breed as
Sullivan's sheep--for that matter but one breed was extensively grown
on the range--over to the border of Tim's lease with the intention of
mingling them and driving home more than he had brought. Mackenzie
never had heard of the trick being worked on a green herder, but he
realized now how simply it could be done, opportunity such as this
presenting.

But it was one thing to bring the sheep over and another thing to take
them away. One thing Mackenzie was sure of, and that was the judgment
of his eyes in numbering sheep. That had been Dad Frazer's first
lesson, and the old man had kept him at it until he could come within
a few head among hundreds at a glance.

"I'll help you cut out as many as you had," Mackenzie said, running
his eyes over the mingled flocks, "they're all alike, one as good as
another, I guess. It looks like you got your stock from this ranch,
anyhow, but you'll not take more than seven hundred this trip."

"My dogs can cut mine out, they know 'em by the smell," Swan said. "I
had fifteen hundred,