him when, glancing round, she noticed the figure
of a mounted man forced up against the skyline here and there. Hetty,
however, had evidently not seen them.

"I want an answer, please," she said.

"Well," said Larry gravely, "I was cutting down that fence."

"Why were you cutting it down?" persisted Miss Torrance.

"It was in the way."

"Of what?"

Grant turned and pointed to the men, sturdy toilers starved out of bleak
Dakota and axe-men farmers from the forests of Michigan. "Of these, and
the rest who are coming by and by," he said. "Still, I don't want to go
into that; and you seem angry. You haven't offered to shake hands with me,
Hetty."

Miss Torrance sat very still, one hand on the switch, and another on the
bridle, looking at him with a little scornful smile on her lips. Then she
glanced at the prairie beyond the severed fence.

"That land belongs to my friends," she said.

Grant's face grew a trifle wistful, but his voice was grave. "They have
had the use of it, but it belongs to the United States, and other people
have the right to farm there now. Still, that needn't make any trouble
between you and me."

"No?" said the girl, with a curious hardness in her inflection; but her
face softened suddenly. "Larry, while you only talked we didn't mind; but
no one fancied you would have done this. Yes, I'm angry with you. I have
been home 'most a month, and you never rode over to see me; while now you
want to talk politics."

Grant smiled a trifle wearily. "I would sooner talk about anything else;
and if you ask him, your father will tell you why I have not been to the
range. I don't want to make you angry, Hetty."

"Then you will give up this foolishness and make friends with us again,"
said the girl, very graciously. "It can't come to anything, Larry, and you
are one of us. You couldn't want to take away our land and give it to this
rabble?"

Hetty was wholly bewitching, as even Flora Schuyler, who fancied she
understood the grimness in the man's face, felt just then. He, however,
looked away across the prairie, and the movement had its significance to
one of the company, who, having less at stake, was the more observant.
When he turned again, however, he seemed to stand very straight.

"I'm afraid I can't," he said.

"No?" said Hetty, still graciously. "Not even when I ask you?"

Grant shook his head. "They have my word, and you wouldn't like me to go
back upon what I feel is right," he said.