coured for the scattered cedars of the foothills, cutting
them for fence posts and piling them in spots accessible to the wagons
to be hauled whenever the mule teams could be spared.

The acreage of plowed ground increased day by day and would continue
till frost claimed the ground. As soon as the brush was burnt the mule
teams pulled heavy log drags across the field, pulverizing the lumps
and leveling inequalities of the surface.

Evans had been sent out as foreman of the beef round-up while Harris
remained behind to direct the operations at the ranch. The details of
the new work were unfamiliar ones for the girl and she was entirely
absorbed in learning the reasons for every move; so much engrossed, in
fact, that she had not left the Three Bar during the month which had
elapsed since the dance at Brill's. A few days before Evans was due
with the beef herd she rode Papoose away from the ranch, intending to
make a long-deferred visit to the Brandons.

After covering two-thirds of the distance along the foot of the hills
to the V L she saw a rider dip over a ridge two miles away. She
unslung Harris's glasses and dismounted to watch for his reappearance.
When he came again into her field of view another man was with him and
they were driving a few head of cows before them. They angled into a
valley that led off to the south, dropping into it some three miles
from her.

She mounted Papoose and headed him on a parallel course, keeping well
out of sight behind the intervening waves of ground. After holding her
direction at a stiff lope till satisfied that she had passed the men
she angled across to intersect their course.

As Papoose topped a low hogback that flanked the valley she saw the men
riding toward her down the bottoms, driving twenty or more head of
cows. One of the horses threw up his head, his ears pricked sharply
toward her, and the swift upward tilt of the rider's hat, as swiftly
lowered, informed her that she had been sighted. The other man did not
look up. They lifted their horses from a walk to a stiff trot and
veered past the cows, then looked up as if just aware of her approach,
and waited for her. The men were Bentley and Carp.

Bentley greeted her cheerily. Carp nodded without a word.

"What are you two doing up here?" she demanded without parley.

"I repped with the Three Bar wagon and Carp worked with you for a spell
so we sort of know the range," Bentley explained. "Slade sent us u