it bent far southward; the hardy sage bowed
reluctantly to the fitful blasts, and the scraggly, ugly yucca
resentfully yielded to the unseen force.

A wide, shallow gully ran northwestward from a point near Red King,
almost in a straight line toward the herd. Lawler urged the big horse
into the gully and rode hard. The distance was several miles, but when
Red King came to the gully end he flashed out of it like a streak of red
flame. He was drawn down, instantly, however, snorting and pawing
impatiently, while Lawler shielded his eyes with his hands and again
scanned the country.

He saw the herd; and as he watched it began to move. There were no men
near the cattle.

They started slowly, seemingly reluctant to leave the level. They moved
sullenly, closely massed, their heads lowered, their tails drooping. The
wind, now beginning to carry a vicious note with its whine, drove a
heavy dust cloud against them, warning them. The wind was icy, giving
the cattle a foretaste of what was to come. And mingling with the dust
were fine, flinty snow particles that came almost horizontally against
their rumps, stinging them, worrying them. They increased their pace,
and soon were running with a swinging, awkward stride, straight toward
the wire fence, several miles distant.

If they saw Lawler they gave no sign, for they went lumbering on,
snorting and bawling their apprehension.

Lawler was about to start Red King toward them, when he noted movement
on the level a little northwestward from the cattle. Peering intently,
he saw two horsemen racing southward, a little distance ahead of the
cattle, parallel with them.

At first Lawler was certain the men were Davies and Harris, and he
smiled, appreciating their devotion to duty. But when he saw them race
past the cattle, not even halting to head them in the right
direction--which would have been slightly eastward, so that they would
enter the valley before reaching the fence--he frowned, wheeled Red King
sharply, and sent him back into the gully from which he had emerged.

"They're strangers, King," he said, shortly to the horse as the latter
fled headlong down the gully toward the point from which he had started;
"Davies and Harris wouldn't leave the herd with that norther coming on."

The big horse made fast time down the gully. He brought Lawler to a
point near the fence where it crossed the gully at about the instant the
two riders were dismounting some distance away.