ed for it he must have smiled. In
that last remark the worthy Jake had shown his hand. And the latter
saw the smile, and his face darkened with swift-rising anger. But he
had evidently made up his mind not to be drawn, for, with a curt
"S'long," he abruptly strode off, leaving the other to make his way to
the bunkhouse.

The men had not yet come in for their evening meal, but he found
Arizona disconsolately sitting on a roll of blankets just outside the
door of the quarters. He was chewing steadily, with his face turned
prairieward, gazing out over the tawny plains as though nothing else
in the world mattered to him.

He looked up casually as Tresler came along, and edged along the
blankets to make room, contenting himself with a laconic--

"Set."

The two men sat in silence for some moments. The pale-faced cowpuncher
seemed absorbed in deep reflection. Tresler was thinking too; he was
thinking of Jake, whom he clearly understood was in love with his
employer's daughter. It was patent to the veriest simpleton. Not only
that, but he felt that Diane herself knew it. The way the foreman had
desisted from his murderous onslaught upon himself at her coming was
sufficient evidence without the jealousy he had betrayed in his
reference to tea-parties. Now he understood, too, that it was because
the blind man was asleep, and in going up to the house he, Tresler,
would only meet Diane, and probably spend a pleasant afternoon with
her until her father awoke, that Jake's unreasoning jealousy had been
aroused, and he had endeavored to forcibly detain him. He felt glad
that he had learned these things so soon. All such details would be
useful.

At last Arizona turned from his impassive contemplation of the
prairie.

"Wal?" he questioned. And he conveyed a world of interrogation in his
monosyllable.

"Jake says I begin work to-morrow. To-night I sleep in the bunkhouse."

"Yes, I know."

"You know?" Tresler looked around in astonishment.

"Guess Jake's bin 'long. Say, I'll shoot that feller, sure--'less some
interferin' cuss gits along an' does him in fust."

"What's up? Anything fresh?"

For answer Arizona spat forcibly into the little pool of tobacco-juice
on the ground before him. Then, with a vicious clenching of the
teeth--

"He's a swine."

"Which is a libel on hogs," observed the other, with a smile.

"Libel?" cried Arizona, his wild eyes rolling, and his lean nostrils
dilating as his breath came short and