e in his experience Bostil found that horse-trading
palled upon him. This trip to Durango was a failure. Something was
wrong. There was a voice constantly calling into his inner ear--a voice
to which he refused to listen. And during the five days of the return
trip the strange mood grew upon him.

The last day he and his riders covered over fifty miles and reached the
Ford late at night. No one expected them, and only the men on duty at
the corrals knew of the return. Bostil, much relieved to get home, went
to bed and at once fell asleep.

He awakened at a late hour for him. When he dressed and went out to the
kitchen he found that his sister had learned of his return and had
breakfast waiting.

"Where's the girl?" asked Bostil.

"Not up yet," replied Aunt Jane.

"What!"

"Lucy and I had a tiff last night and she went to her room in a temper."

"Nothin' new about thet."

"Holley and I have had our troubles holding her in. Don't you forget
that."

Bostil laughed. "Wal, call her an' tell her I'm home."

Aunt Jane did as she was bidden. Bostil finished his breakfast. But
Lucy did not come.

Bostil began to feel something strange, and, going to Lucy's door, he
knocked. There was no reply. Bostil pushed open the door. Lucy was not
in evidence, and her room was not as tidy as usual. He saw her white
dress thrown upon the bed she had not slept in. Bostil gazed around
with a queer contraction of the heart. That sense of something amiss
grew stronger. Then he saw a chair before the open window. That window
was rather high, and Lucy had placed a chair before it so that she
could look out or get out. Bostil stretched his neck, looked out, and
in the red earth beneath the window he saw fresh tracks of Lucy's
boots. Then he roared for Jane.

She came running, and between Bostil's furious questions and her own
excited answers there was nothing arrived at. But presently she spied
the white dress, and then she ran to Lucy's closet. From there she
turned a white face to Bostil.

"She put on her riding-clothes!" gasped Aunt Jane.

"Supposin' she did! Where is she?" demanded Bostil.

"SHE'S RUN OFF WITH SLONE!"

Bostil could not have been shocked or hurt any more acutely by a
knife-thrust. He glared at his sister.

"A-huh! So thet's the way you watch her!"

"Watch her? It wasn't possible. She's--well, she's as smart as you
are.... Oh, I knew she'd do it! She was wild in love with him!"

Bostil strode out of the r