sie, her eyes flashing.

"And not be ruined! There's where the fun's going to come in, Miss
Jessie. S'pose you go to work now to try to prove malicious mischief
on the part of Horton in driving his cattle into your fields, for
that's what he's deliberately done, no doubt of that, why all he's got
to do is to take his stand on the law and say that you had no
business to sow grain on the range and expect cattle to keep out of
it; you've no title to this place, and your grain fields are not even
fenced. Horton's got the law on his side, you may be sure of that, but
he hasn't got the right, and some day he'll find it out; he'll find it
out to his cost, no matter what the law says, now you mark my words!"

"There hasn't been a year since we've been here that Mr. Horton's
cattle--always Mr. Horton's cattle--haven't destroyed our crops,"
Jessie said, her voice trembling.

"And it has always been an 'accident,'" I added, "but I did think that
maybe there would be no such accident this year; it couldn't have
occurred at a time when it would be more effective."

"No, you may count on that; that's just the reason why it hasn't taken
place before this. Now, the rest of us folks around here don't propose
to see you two girls and that purty little orphan boy drove off of
this place that you've tried so hard and so bravely to keep, but
we've all got to sing low until you get your title. Then, Mr. Man, let
that--well, I won't call names--just let Mr. Horton try his little
games and he'll find that there are laws that will fit his case. The
reasons that that man hasn't landed in the penitentiary before this
are, first, that the Lord was mighty lenient toward him when he went a
courtin' and induced that good woman to become his wife; second, he's
so sly. There's never been a time yet when a body could produce
direct, damaging evidence against him. It's all 'accident.'"

I thought of that small shining object that I had picked up in the
rubbish the morning after the fire was set under our window. It would
have been hard, indeed, to produce more damaging or convincing
evidence than that, but Mr. Wilson had just been enjoining a strict
silence in regard to Mr. Horton and his works upon us, so I kept the
thought to myself.

"Your father was a good man," Mr. Wilson continued. "He had one big
advantage over Horton from the start--he was able to hold both his
tongue and his temper even when Horton, by his acts, kept him so
short-handed t