delong. "If you didn't look just like the old man," he
said, "I'd think yuh were a fake; the Ragged H is the brand your ranch is
known by--the Bay State outfit. And it isn't healthy to travel King's
Highway, because there's a large-sized feud between your father and old
King. How does it happen yuh aren't wise to the family history?"

"Dad never unbosomed himself to me, that's why," I told him. "He has
labored for twenty-five years under the impression that I was a kid just
able to toddle alone. He didn't think he needed to tell me things; I know
we've got a place called the Bay State Ranch somewhere in this part of the
world, and I have reason to think I'm headed for it. That's about the
extent of my knowledge of our interest here. I never heard of the White
Divide before, or of this particular King. I'm thirsting for information."

"Well, it strikes me you've got it coming," said Frosty. "I always had
your father sized up as being closed-mouthed, but I didn't think he made
such a thorough job of it as all that. Old King has sure got it in for the
Ragged H--or Bay State, if yuh'd rather call us that; and the Ragged H
boys don't sit up nights thinking kind and loving thoughts about him,
either. Thirty years ago your father and old King started jangling over
water-rights, and I guess they burned powder a-plenty; King goes lame to
this day from a bullet your old man planted in his left leg."

I dropped the flag and started him off again. "It's news to me," I put in,
"and you can't tell me too much about it."

"Well," he said, "your old man was in the right of it; he owns all the
land along Honey Creek, right up to White Divide, where it heads; uh
course, he overlooked a bet there; he should have got a cinch on that
pass, and on the head uh the creek. But he let her slide, and first he
knew old King had come in and staked a claim and built him a shack right
in our end of the pass, and camped down to stay. Your dad wasn't joyful.
The Bay State had used that pass to trail herds through and as the easiest
and shortest trail to the railroad; and then old King takes it up, strings
a five-wired fence across at both ends of his place, and warns us off.
I've heard Potter tell what warm times there were. Your father stayed
right here and had it out with him. The Bay State was all he had, then,
and he ran it himself. Perry Potter worked for him, and knows all about
it. Neither old King nor your dad was married, and it's a wonder th