ringly, with Mack still asleep on the seat.
From the south--from the direction of the distant river--a rider came
galloping up the trail.

"Why!" murmured Frances. "It's Ratty M'Gill!"

The ex-cowboy of the Bar-T swung around upon the trail, as though headed
east, and grinned at the ranchman's daughter. His face was very red and
his eyes were blurred, and Frances feared he had been drinking.

"Hi, lady!" he drawled. "Are ye mad with me?"

"I don't like you, M'Gill," the girl said, frankly. "You don't expect me
to, do you?"

"Aw, why be fussy?" asked the cowboy, gaily. "It's too pretty a world to
hold grudges. Let's be friends, Frances."

Frances grew restive under his leering smile and forced gaiety. She
searched M'Gill sharply with her look.

"You didn't gallop out of your way to tell me this," she said. "What do
you want of me?"

"Oh, just to say how-de-do!" declared the fellow, still with his leering
smile. "And to wish you a good journey."

"What do you know about my journey?" asked Frances, quickly.

But Ratty M'Gill was not so much intoxicated that he could be easily
coaxed to divulge any secret. He shook his head, still grinning.

"Heard 'em say you were going to Amarillo, before I went to Jackleg," he
drawled. "Mighty lonesome journey for a gal to take."

"Mack is with me," said Frances, shortly. "I am not lonely."

"Whew! I bet that hurt me," chuckled Ratty M'Gill. "My room's better
than my comp'ny, eh?"

"It certainly is," said the girl, frankly.

"Now, you wouldn't say that if you knowed something that I know,"
declared the fellow, grinning slily.

"I don't know that anything you may say would interest me," the girl
replied, sharply, and turned Molly's head.

"Aw, hold on!" cried Ratty. "Don't be so abrupt. What I gotter say to
you may help a lot."

But Frances did not look back. She pushed Molly for the now distant
wagon. In a moment she knew that Ratty was thundering after her. What
did he mean by such conduct? To tell the truth, the ranchman's daughter
was troubled.

Surely, the reckless fellow did not propose to attack Mack and herself
on the open trail and in broad daylight? She opened her lips to shout
for the sleeping wagon-driver, when a cloud of dust ahead of the mules
came into her view.

She heard the clatter of many hoofs. Quite a cavalcade was coming along
the trail from the east. Out of the dust appeared a figure that Frances
had learned to know well; and to tell the tr