one for my daughter puts us
everlastingly in your debt."

"Not worth mentioning. And, to be fair, I think Weaver was going to
bring her home, anyhow."

"The way the story reached me, he didn't mention it until you had the
drop on him," answered Sanderson dryly.

"That's right," nodded the cattleman ironically, from the porch. "You're
the curly-haired hero, Keller, and I'm the red-headed villain of this
play. You want to beware of the miscreant, Miss Sanderson, or he'll sure
do you a meanness."

Tom Dixon eyed him frostily. "I expect you'll not do her any meanness,
Buck Weaver. From now on, you'll go one way and she'll go another.
You'll be strangers."

"You don't say!" Buck answered, looking him over derisively, as he
passed into the house. "You're crowing loud for your size. And don't you
bet heavy on that proposition, my friend."

CHAPTER XI

TOM DIXON

With whoops and a waving of caps boys burst out of one door, while girls
came out of the opposite one more demurely, but with the piping of gay
soprano voices. For school was out, and young America free of restraint
for eighteen hours at least. Resilient youth, like a coiled spring that
has been loosed, was off with a bound. Horses were saddled or put to
harness. The teacher came to the door, hand in hand with six-year-olds,
who clung to her with fond good-bys before they climbed into the waiting
buggies. The last straggler disappeared behind the dip in the road.

The girl teacher turned from waving her fare-wells--to meet the eyes of
a young man fastened upon her. Light-blue eyes they were, set in a
good-looking, boyish face, that had somehow an effect of petulancy. It
was not a strong face, yet it was no weaker than nine out of ten that
one meets daily.

"Got rid of your kiddies, Phyl?" the young man asked, with an air of
cheerful confidence that seemed to be assumed to cover a doubt.

Her eyes narrowed slightly. "They have just gone--all but little Jimmie
Tryon. He rides home with me."

"Hang it! We never seem to be alone any more since you came back,"
complained the man.

"Why should we?" asked the young woman, her gaze apparently as frank and
direct as that of a boy.

But he understood it for a challenge. "You didn't use to talk that way.
You used to be glad enough to see me alone," he flung out.

"Did I? One outgrows childish follies, I suppose," she answered quietly.

"What's the matter with you?" he cried angrily. "It's been this wa