moved from the scene of action. Instead, he selected
a shack stumbling with age on the west slope of the Eagle Mountains.
From his door many a time, with his glass, he picked out the shining
form of Alcatraz and the mares in the distance; he had even been able
to follow the maneuvers of the outlaw on several occasions when Hervey
and his men pursued with relays of horses, and on the whole he felt
that the site was such a position as a good general must prefer, being
behind the lines but with a view which enabled him to survey the whole
action. His quarters consisted of a single room while a shed leaned
against the back wall with one space for a horse, the other portion of
the shed being used as a mow for hay and grain.

It was the beginning of the long, still time of the mountain twilight
when Red Perris climbed to the clearing in which the cabin stood.
Ordinarily he would have set about preparing supper before the coming
of the dark, but now he watered and saddled his cowpony, a durable
little buckskin, and with a touch of the spurs sent him at a pitching
gallop down the slope.

It was not a kindly thing to do but Red Perris was not a kindly man
with horses and though he knew that it is hard on the shoulders of
even a mustang to be ridden downhill rapidly, he kept on with unabated
speed until he broke onto the well-established trail which led to the
Jordan house. Then a second touch of the spurs brought the pony close
to a full gallop. In fact, Perris was riding against time, for he
guessed that Lew Hervey, after quitting the trail of Alcatraz, would
veer straight towards the home place and there lay before Marianne
an account of how the chosen hunter had allowed the stallion to slip
through his hands. This, together with the fact that his week was up
was enough to bring about his discharge, for he had seen sufficient of
the girl to guess her fiery temper and he knew that she must have been
harshly tried during the last weeks by his lack of success and by the
continual sneers and mockery which the foreman and his followers had
directed at the imported horse-catcher. Before sunset of that day he
would have welcomed his discharge; now it loomed before him as the
greatest of all possible catastrophes.

Soon he was swinging down an easy road with the tilled lands on one
side, the pastures and broad ranges on the other, and even in the dim
light he guessed the wealth which the estate was capable of producing.
Even the de