s Soapy that lifted
it. "I expaict you'll like Wyoming, Miss Messiter; leastways I hope you
will. There's a right smart of country here." His gaze went out of the
open door to the vast sea of space that swam in the fine sunset light.
"Yes, most folks that ain't plumb spoilt with city ways likes it."

"Sure she'll like it. Y'u want to get a good, easy-riding hawss, Miss
Messiter," advised Slim.

"And a rifle," added Texas, promptly.

It occurred to her that they were all working together to drift the
conversation back to a safe topic. She followed the lead given her,
but she made up her mind to know what it was about her neighbor,
Mr. Bannister, the sheep herder, that needed to be handled with such
wariness and circumspection of speech.

Her chance came half an hour later, when she stood talking to the
landlady on the hotel porch in the mellow twilight that seemed to rest
on the land like a moonlit aura. For the moment they were alone.

"What is it about this man Bannister that makes men afraid to speak of
him?" she demanded, with swift impulse.

Her landlady's startled eyes went alertly round to see that they were
alone. "Hush, child! You mustn't speak of him like that," warned the
older woman.

"Why mustn't I? That's what I want to know."

"Is isn't healthy."

"What do you mean?"

Again that anxious look flashed round in the dusk. "The Bannister outfit
is the worst in the land. Ned Bannister is king of the whole Big Horn
country and beyond that to the Tetons."

"And you mean to tell me that everybody is afraid of him--that men like
Mr. Sothern dare not say their soul is their own?" the newcomer asked,
contemptuously.

"Not so loud, child. He has spies everywhere That's the trouble. You
don't know who is in with him. He's got the whole region terrified."

"Is he so bad?"

"He is a devil. Last year he and his hell riders swept down on Topaz and
killed two bartenders just to see them kick, Ned Bannister said. Folks
allow they knew too much."

"But the law--the Government? Haven't you a sheriff and officers?"

"Bannister has. He elects the sheriff in this county."

"Aren't there more honest people here than villains?"

"Ten times as many, but the trouble is that the honest folks can't trust
each other. You see, if one of them made a mistake and confided in the
wrong man--well, some fine day he would go riding herd and would not
turn up at night. Next week, or next month, maybe, one of his partners
m