! Maybe the albino's
layout rustles an odd bunch on and off. But Slade is the man that's
out to wreck your brand." The big cook heaved a sigh as he reached a
decision on a matter which had been troubling him for days. "That's
what Cal Warren was afraid of--Slade's branching out our way like he
had already toward the south. And that's one reason he left things
tied up the way he did."

He tapped the much-thumbed document on his knee and handed it to the
girl.

"You and Young Cal have been sort of half-hostile," he said. "Cast an
eye over that and maybe it'll help you two youngsters to get along."

Three times the girl read every word of the paper while Waddles smoked
his pipe in silence. Then she sat on the gate of the wagon and gazed
off across the sage; and she was picturing again the long trail of the
Three Bar cows; but this time she was reconstructing the scene at the
end of it. Instead of one man scheming to trick an old friend at the
last crossing of their trails she now visioned two old men regretting
that the life-long hope of a partnership had never been fulfilled and
planning to cement that arrangement in the next generation. For old
Bill Harris had left her a full half-interest in everything he owned on
earth with the single stipulation that she retain her half of the Three
Bar for five years after her father's death.

"But why?" she asked presently. "Why did he do that for me? He'd
never seen me since I was three years old."

"He did it for the girl of old Cal Warren, the best friend he had
topside of ground," Waddles said. "Your dad and Bill Harris had been
pals since they was hatched."

"But why didn't they let us know?" she insisted. "Instead of tangling
it up in this round-about way?"

"Bill Harris had a soft spot in his heart for the old Three Bar the
same as your daddy had," Waddles said. "They knew there was hard times
and changes ahead and both hated to think of the old brand going under
or changing hands. They was afraid that if both you and the boy knew
your path was going to be carpeted soft in any event that you might
sell out if things got to breaking wrong. This way it looked like
you'd be sure to stick. But they both knew too that when old folks go
mixing into young folks' affairs without consulting them, things are
liable to get all snarled. So they hedged it for both of you."

"How?" she asked. "What if either or both of us should have refused to
abide by the ter