gone riding--alone--about
noon, and had not returned. Randerson also discovered that the girl had
questioned a puncher who had ridden in--asking him about Chavis' shack
and the basin. Randerson's face, red from the blows that had landed on
it, paled quickly.

"I reckon she's takin' her time about comin' in," he said. "Mebbe her
cayuse has broke a leg--or somethin'." He grinned at Uncle Jepson. "I
expect there ain't nothin' to worry about. I'll go look for her."

He climbed slowly into the saddle, and with a wave of the hand to the
elderly couple rode his pony down past the bunkhouse at a pace that was
little faster than a walk. He urged Patches to slightly greater speed as
he skirted the corral fence, but once out on the plains he loosened the
reins, spoke sharply to the pony and began to ride in earnest.

Patches responded nobly to the grim note in his master's voice. With
stretching neck and flying hoofs he swooped with long, smooth undulations
that sent him, looking like a splotched streak, splitting the night. He
ran at his own will, his rider tall and loose in the saddle, speaking no
further word, but thinking thoughts that narrowed his eyes, made them
glint with steely hardness whenever the moonlight struck them, and caused
his lips to part, showing the clenched teeth between them, and shoved his
chin forward with the queer set that marks the fighting man.

For he did not believe that Ruth's pony had broken a leg. She had gone to
see Chavis' shack, and Chavis--

One mile, two, three, four; Patches covered them in a mad riot of
recklessness. Into depressions, over rises, leaping rocks and crashing
through chaparral clumps, scaring rattlers, scorpions, toads, and other
denizens to wild flight, he went, with not a thought for his own or his
rider's safety, knowing from the ring in his master's voice that speed,
and speed alone, was wanted from him.

After a five mile run he was pulled down. He felt the effects of the
effort, but he was well warmed to his work now and he loped, though with
many a snort of impatience and toss of the head, by which he tried to
convey to his master his eagerness to be allowed to have his will.

On the crest of a hill he was drawn to a halt, while Randerson scanned
the country around him. Then, when the word came again to go, he was off
with a rush and a snort of delight, as wildly reckless as he had been
when he had discovered what was expected of him.

They flashed by the ford