now he had always gone to the Packard side; when a boy he had
regarded the rival section with high contempt, looking upon it as
inferior, sneering at it as a thoroughbred might lift lip at an
unworthy mongrel. The prejudice was old and deep-rooted; he felt a
subtle sense of shame as though the eyes of the world were upon him,
watching to see him turn toward the "low-down skunks an' varmints"
which his grandfather had named these denizens of the defamed section.

The hesitation was brief; he reined his horse impatiently to the left,
riding straight toward the flaunting sign upon the lofty false front of
the Old Trusty saloon. But short as was his indecision it had not
ended before he had glimpsed at the far end of the street the
incongruous lines of an automobile--red racing type.

"Boyd-Merril. Twin Eight," thought Packard. "So we'll meet on the
same side after all, Miss Terry Pert!"

There were seeds of content in the thought. If it were to be range war
between him and his grandfather, then since obviously the Temples had
already been drawn into contention with the old man Packard, it was
just as well the fates decreed that he and Terry should be on the same
side of the fence, the same side of the fight, the same side of Red
Creek.

He tickled his horse with a light spur; despite the manner of their
last encounter he could look forward with something akin to eagerness
to another meeting. For, he told himself carelessly, she amused him
vastly.

But the meeting was not just yet. He saw Terry, jauntily, even saucily
dressed, as she came out of the store and jumped into her car, marked
how the bright sunlight winked from her high boots, how it flamed upon
her gay red scarf, how it glinted from a burnished steel buckle in her
hat band. As bright as a sunbeam herself, loving gay colors about her,
across the distance she fairly shone and twinkled.

There was a faint shadow of regret in his eyes as she let in the clutch
and whizzed away. She was headed down the street, her back to him,
driving toward the remote railroad station. Off to the north he saw a
growing plume of black smoke.

"Going away?" he wondered. "Or just meeting some one?"

But he had come into Red Creek on a business in no way connected with
Terry Temple.

He had figured it out that Blenham, if it had been Blenham who had
chanced on Bill Royce's secret and no longer ago than last Saturday
night, would have wasted no time in acquiring the