ll never forgive myself!"

"Shucks, ma'am, you're plumb excited. An' I reckon you was more excited
then, or you'd know better than to say you did it. Me an' Hagar was just
gettin' off our horses here at the door--after comin' from the Flyin' W.
An' I saw Tom Chavis in the cabin. He was facin' the door, ma'am," he
said at a venture, and his eyes gleamed when he saw her start, "an' I saw
what he was up to. An' I perforated him, ma'am. From outside, here. Your
gun went off at the same time. But you ain't learned to shoot extra good
yet, an' your bullet didn't hit him. I'll show you where it's stuck, in
the wall."

He led her inside and showed her the bullet. And for a short space she
leaned her head against the wall and cried softly. And then, her eyes
filled with dread and doubt, she looked up at him.

"Are you sure that is my bullet?" she asked, slowly. She held her breath
while awaiting his answer.

It was accompanied by a short laugh, rich in grave humor:

"I reckon you wouldn't compare your shootin' with _mine_, ma'am. Me
havin' so much experience, an' you not bein' able to hit a soap-box
proper?"

She bowed her head and murmured a fervent:

"Thank God!"

Randerson caught Hagar's gaze and looked significantly from Ruth to the
door. The girl accepted the hint, and coaxed Ruth to accompany her to the
door and thence across the porch to the clearing. Randerson watched them
until, still walking, they vanished among the trees. Then he took Chavis'
body out. Later, when Ruth and Hagar returned, he was sitting on the edge
of the porch, smoking a cigarette.

To Ruth's insistence that Hagar come with her to the house, the girl
shook her head firmly.

"Dad will be back, most any time. He'll feel a heap bad, I reckon. An'
I've got to be here."

A little later, riding back toward the Flying W--when they had reached
the timber-fringed level where, on another day, Masten had received his
thrashing, Ruth halted her pony and faced her escort.

"Randerson," she said, "today Uncle Jepson told me some things that I
never knew--about Masten's plots against you. I don't blame you for
killing those men. And I am sorry that I--I spoke to you as I did--that
day." She held out a hand to him.

He took it, smiling gravely. "Why, I reckoned you never meant it," he
said.

"And," she added, blushing deeply; "you are not going to make it
necessary for me to find another range boss, are you?"

"I'd feel mighty bad if you was to a