hot neck with his handkerchief. "I reckon I'd better
go, though. Jacobs always knows why he wants a thing. And he's the finest
man ever came out of Jewey. With him in town and Asher Aydelot on a farm,
no city nor rural communities could be more blessed."

Then he remembered Thomas Smith and a cold shiver seized his big,
perspiring body.

"I wonder why I dread to go," he said, half aloud. "The creek trail will
be cool, but, golly, I'm danged cold right now."

Again his mind ran to Smith's face as he had seen it last. He put on his
hat and started to take his long raincoat off the hook behind the rear
door.

"Reckon I'd better take it. It looks like storming," he muttered. "Hello!
What the devil!"

For Rosie Gimpke, with blazing cheeks and hair dripping with perspiration,
was hidden behind the coat.

"Oh, Mr. Champers, go queek and find Yon Yacob, but don't go the creek
roat. I coom slippin' to tell you to go sure, and I hit when that strange
man coom slippin' in. I hear all you say, an' I see him troo der crack
here, an' he stant out there a long time looking back in here. So I half
to wait an' you go nappin' an' I still wait. I wait to say, hurry, but
don't go oop nor down der creek trail. I do anything for Miss Shirley, an'
I like you for takin' care off her goot name; goot names iss hardt to get
back if dey gets avay. Hurry."

"Heaven bless your good soul!" Champers said heartily. "But why not take
the cool road? I've overslept and I've got to hurry and the storm's
hustling in."

"Don't, please don't take it," Rosie begged.

The next minute she was gone and as Champers closed and locked his doors
he said to himself, "She does her work like a hero and never will have any
credit for it, 'cause she's not a pioneer nor a soldier. But she has saved
more than one poor fellow snared into that joint I winked at for years."

Then, obedient to her urging, he followed the longer, hotter road toward
the Jacobs' stock ranch bordering on Little Wolf Creek.

Meantime, John Jacobs inspected his property, forgetful of the intense
heat and the coming storm, his mind full of a strange foreboding. At the
top of the hill above where the road wound down through deep shadows he
sat a long while on his horse. "I wonder what makes me so lonely this
evening," he mused. "I'm not of a lonely nature, nor morose, thank the
Lord! There's no telling why we do or don't want to do things. I wonder
where Champers is. He ought to be coming