named Andrews, began to bestow heavy and brutal kicks upon the body of
the little burro. These kicks sounded deep, hollow, almost like the boom
of a drum.

The burro uttered the strangest sound I ever heard issue from any beast
and it dropped in its tracks with jerking legs that told any horseman
what had happened. Steele saw the last swings of Andrews' heavy boot. He
yelled. It was a sharp yell that would have made anyone start. But it
came too late, for the burro had dropped.

Steele knocked over several of the jeering men to get to Andrews. He
kicked the fellow's feet from under him, sending him hard to the ground.

Then Steele picked up the end of the halter and began to swing it
powerfully. Resounding smacks mingled with hoarse bellows of fury and
pain. Andrews flopped here and there, trying to arise, but every time
the heavy knotted halter beat him down.

Presently Steele stopped. Andrews rose right in front of the Ranger, and
there, like the madman he was, he went for his gun.

But it scarcely leaped from its holster when Steele's swift hand
intercepted it. Steele clutched Andrews' arm.

Then came a wrench, a cracking of bones, a scream of agony.

The gun dropped into the dust; and in a moment of wrestling fury
Andrews, broken, beaten down, just able to moan, lay beside it.

Steele, so cool and dark for a man who had acted with such passionate
swiftness, faced the others as if to dare them to move. They neither
moved nor spoke, and then he strode away.

Miss Sampson did not speak a word while we were riding the rest of the
way home, but she was strangely white of face and dark of eye. Sally
could not speak fast enough to say all she felt.

And I, of course, had my measure of feelings. One of them was that as
sure as the sun rose and set it was written that Diane Sampson was to
love Vaughn Steele.

I could not read her mind, but I had a mind of my own.

How could any woman, seeing this maligned and menaced Ranger, whose
life was in danger every moment he spent on the streets, in the light of
his action on behalf of a poor little beast, help but wonder and brood
over the magnificent height he might reach if he had love--passion--a
woman for his inspiration?

It was the day after this incident that, as Sally, Diane, and I were
riding homeward on the road from Sampson, I caught sight of a group of
dark horses and riders swiftly catching up with us.

We were on the main road, in plain sight of town a