into the deepening haze of the coming evening, riding
tall and rigid, with never a look behind to show her that he cared.

Standing in the doorway of the house, the girl watched him, both hands at
her breast, her eyes wide, her lips parted, her cheeks flushed, until the
somber shadows of twilight came down and swallowed him. Then, oppressed
with a sudden sense of the emptiness of the world, she went into the
house.

CHAPTER XXI

ONE TOO MANY

To no man in the outfit did Randerson whisper a word concerning the
result of his visit to the ranchhouse--that he would cease to be the
Flying W range boss just as soon as Ruth Harkness could find a man to
replace him. He went his way, thoughtful, silent, grave, filled with
somber thoughts and dark passions that sometimes flashed in his eyes, but
taking no man into his confidence. And yet they knew that all was not
well with him. For in other days his dry humor, his love of wholesome
fun, had shortened many an hour for them, and his serenity, in ordinary
difficulties, had become a byword to them. And so they knew that the
thing which was troubling him now was not ordinary.

They thought they knew what was troubling him. Kelso had been hired to
take his life. Kelso had lost his own in the effort. That might have
seemed to end it. But it had become known that Kelso had been a mere tool
in the hands of an unscrupulous plotter, and until the plotter had been
sent on the way that Kelso had gone there could be no end. Already there
were whispers over the country because of Randerson's delay.

Of course, they would wait a reasonable time; they would give him his
"chance." But they did not know what was holding him back--that deep in
his heart lurked a hope that one day he might still make his dreams come
true, and that if he killed Masten, Ruth's abhorrence of him and his
deeds, already strong, could never be driven from her. If he lost this
hope, Masten was doomed.

And during the second week following his latest talk with Ruth, the girl
unconsciously killed it. He met her in the open, miles from the
ranchhouse, and he rode toward her, deeply repentant, resolved to brave
public scorn by allowing Masten to live.

He smiled gravely at her when he came close--she waiting for him, looking
at him, unmoved. For she had determined to show him that she had meant
what she had said to him.

"Have you found a new range