e front of the ranch
house.

"That feller Larkin," remarked Bissell, terminating a long pause. "Kind of
a dude or something back East, wasn't he?"

"That's what the punchers would call him, father," returned the girl
gravely. "But he was never anything but a gentleman in his treatment of
me."

"I don't know what you mean exactly by that word 'gentleman,' Julie, but I
allow that no real man ever went into raisin' sheep."

"Perhaps not, dear," she said, taking his rough, ungainly hand in both of
hers, "but I think there is bound to be money in it. Mr. Larkin himself
says that in the end the cattle will have to give way before the sheep."

"An' he thought he was tellin' you something new when he said it, too,
didn't he? Well, I've knowed that fact for the last five years. That's the
main reason I won't let his animals through my range. Once they get a
foothold, there's no stoppin' 'em. Judas! I'm tired of fightin' for
things!"

"Poor father," and the girl's voice was full of tenderness. "You're not
discouraged, are you, dear?"

"No, Prairie Bell, but I reckon I'm gettin' old, an' I can't get up the
fight I used to. I thought I had my hands full with the rustlers, but now
with the sheep comin'--well, between you and me, little girl, I wish I had
somebody to stand up and take the licks."

"There's Mike; he certainly can give and take a few."

"Yes, of course I've got Mike, but, when you're all done, he's only a
foreman, an' his interest don't go much beyond his seventy-five a month
an' grub. Yet--by George!" He sat suddenly erect and slapped his thigh
with his disengaged hand.

"What is it?"

"Oh, nothin'." They talked on in the affectionate, intimate way that had
always characterized their relations since Julie had been a girl just big
enough to listen to involved harangues about cattle without actually going
to sleep. In the course of an hour Bissell suddenly asked:

"Did you ever think of marryin', Prairie Bell?"

"If thinking ever helped any, I would have been a Mormon by this time."

"Well, you are growed up, ain't you?" and Bissell spoke in the wondering
tone of a man who has just realized a self-evident fact "Fancy my little
girl old enough to marry! How old are you, anyhow? 'Bout eighteen?"

"Twenty-five, you dear, old goose. Eighteen! The idea."

"Well, twenty-five, then. Of course, Julie, when I die I will leave this
place to you, and that's what made me think about your marryin'. I want a
good,