ion of the scene of the shooting in Lazette. And
when she considered her father's distant manner toward her and Ben
Doubler's grave prediction of trouble, it seemed that perhaps Duncan was
right. Yet in spite of the shooting of Blanca and the evil light which was
now thrown on Dakota through Duncan's deductions, she felt confident that
Dakota would not become a party to a plot in which the murder of a man was
deliberately planned. He had wronged her and he had killed a man, but at
the quicksand crossing that day--despite the rage which had been in her
heart against him--she had studied him and had become convinced that
behind his recklessness, back of the questionable impulses that seemed at
times to move him, there lurked qualities which were wholly admirable, and
which could be felt by anyone who came in contact with him. Certainly
those qualities which she had seen had not been undiscovered by
Duncan--and others.

She remembered now that on a former occasion the manager had practically
admitted his fear of Dakota, and then there was his conduct on that day
when she had asked him to return Dakota's pony. Duncan's manner then had
seemed to indicate that he feared Dakota--at the least did not like him.
Ben Doubler had given her a different version of the trouble between
Dakota and Duncan; how Duncan had accused Dakota of stealing the Double R
calves, and how in the presence of Duncan's own men Dakota had forced him
to apologize. Taken altogether, it seemed that Duncan's present suspicions
were the result of his dislike, or fear, of Dakota. Convinced of this, her
eyes flashed with contempt when she looked at the manager.

"I believe you are lying," she said coldly. "You don't like Dakota. But I
have faith in him--in his manhood. I don't believe that any man who has
the courage to force another man to apologize to him in the face of great
odds, would, or could, be so entirely base as to plan to murder a poor,
unoffending old man in cold blood. Perhaps you are not lying," she
concluded with straight lips, "but the very least that can be said for you
is that you have a lurid imagination!"

In Duncan's gleaming, shifting eyes, in the lips which were tensed over
his teeth in a snarl, she could see the bitterness that was in his heart
over the incident to which she had just referred.

"Wait," he said smiling evilly. "You'll know more about Dakota before
long."

Sheila rose and walked to her pony, mounting the animal and ri