looked-for race. It
grew more so when Joel's infatuation for Lucy became known. There were
fewer riders who believed Lucy might elope with Joel than there were
who believed Joel might steal his father's horses. But all the riders
who loved horses and all the women who loved gossip were united in at
least one thing, and that was that something like a race or a romance
would soon disrupt the peaceful, sleepy tenor of Bostil's Ford.

In addition to Bostil's growing hatred for the Creeches, he had a great
fear of Cordts, the horse-thief. A fear ever restless, ever watchful.
Cordts hid back in the untrodden ways. He had secret friends among the
riders of the ranges, faithful followers back in the canyon camps, gold
for the digging, cattle by the thousand, and fast horses. He had always
gotten what he wanted--except one thing. That was a certain horse. And
the horse was Sage King.

Cordts was a bad man, a product of the early gold-fields of California
and Idaho, an outcast from that evil wave of wanderers retreating back
over the trails so madly traveled westward. He became a lord over the
free ranges. But more than all else he was a rider. He knew a horse. He
was as much horse as Bostil. Cordts rode into this wild free-range
country, where he had been heard to say that a horse-thief was meaner
than a poisoned coyote. Nevertheless, he became a horse-thief. The
passion he had conceived for the Sage King was the passion of a man for
an unattainable woman. Cordts swore that he would never rest, that he
would not die, till he owned the King. So there was reason for Bostil's
great fear.

CHAPTER II

Bostil went toward the house with his daughter, turning at the door to
call a last word to his riders about the care of his horses.

The house was a low, flat, wide structure, with a corridor running
through the middle, from which doors led into the adobe-walled rooms.
The windows were small openings high up, evidently intended for defense
as well as light, and they had rude wooden shutters. The floor was
clay, covered everywhere by Indian blankets. A pioneer's home it was,
simple and crude, yet comfortable, and having the rare quality peculiar
to desert homes it was cool in summer and warm in winter.

As Bostil entered with his arm round Lucy a big hound rose from the
hearth. This room was immense, running the length of the house, and it
contained a huge stone fireplace, where a kettle smoked fragrantly, and
rude home-made