blue of his eyes.

"It's a long time since you told any man he was standing on his foot,"
she ventured slyly.

Billy began to grin sheepishly.

"Aw, that's all right," he said in mock-lordly fashion. "Roy Blanchard
can come. I'll let 'm. All that was a long time ago. Besides, I 'm too
busy to fool with such things."

He urged his horse on at a faster walk, and as soon as the slope
lessened broke into a trot. At Trillium Covert they were galloping.

"You'll have to stop for dinner first," Saxon said, as they neared the
gate of Madrono Ranch.

"You stop," he answered. "I don't want no dinner."

"But I want to go with you," she pleaded. "What is it?"

"I don't dast tell you. You go on in an' get your dinner."

"Not after that," she said. "Nothing can keep me from coming along now."

Half a mile farther on, they left the highway, passed through a patent
gate which Billy had installed, and crossed the fields on a road
which was coated thick with chalky dust. This was the road that led to
Chavon's clay pit. The hundred and forty lay to the west. Two wagons, in
a cloud of dust, came into sight.

"Your teams, Billy," cried Saxon. "Think of it! Just by the use of the
head, earning your money while you're riding around with me."

"Makes me ashamed to think how much cash money each one of them teams is
bringin' me in every day," he acknowledged.

They were turning off from the road toward the bars which gave entrance
to the one hundred and forty, when the driver of the foremost wagon
hallo'd and waved his hand. They drew in their horses and waited.

"The big roan's broke loose," the dryer said, as he stopped beside them.
"Clean crazy loco--bitin', squealin', strikin', kickin'. Kicked clean
out of the harness like it was paper. Bit a chunk out of Baldy the
size of a saucer, an' wound up by breakin' his own hind leg. Liveliest
fifteen minutes I ever seen."

"Sure it's broke?" Billy demanded sharply.

"Sure thing."

"Well, after you unload, drive around by the other barn and get Ben.
He's in the corral. Tell Matthews to be easy with 'm. An' get a gun.
Sammy's got one. You'll have to see to the big roan. I ain't got time
now.--Why couldn't Matthews a-come along with you for Ben? You'd save
time."

"Oh, he's just stickin' around waitin'," the driver answered. "He
reckoned I could get Ben."

"An' lose time, eh? Well, get a move on."

"That's the way of it," Billy growled to Saxon as they rode on. "No
savve. No