as known.

"I wish Merry would hurry," he thought, as he finally advanced to the
fence, drawn there by his intense desire to be near to Winnie. "I'll
speak to him before he goes in, and ask him to come right out as soon as
possible with the news."

As he stood thus by the fence, a light step sounded, and, looking over,
he recognized in the dim light the form of Winnie Lee. He was by her
side at a bound.

"You must not stand by that note!" he pleadingly began. "I allow that
you will see, when you think of it, that it isn't right by me!"

He did not attempt to touch her or stoop toward her. She had, in writing
that letter, forbidden familiarities. Their relations toward each other
were unchanged. He remembered the ring in his pocket.

"Buck! you silly fellow! Don't you know that I didn't mean to cast you
off?"

"But the note?" he gasped. "It was in your handwriting? And the ring?
You sent back the ring!"

"Yes, I wrote the letter because father commanded me to write it, and I
sent back the ring for the same reason. You ought to have known that!"

The change in his feelings was so great and sudden that he could hardly
repress a shout.

"I reckon I'm the biggest idiot unhung!" he confessed, as he took her in
his arms. "But when I saw that the writing was yours, I fancied your
father had by threats, or in some way, induced you to change your mind,
and that you really thought, in duty to him, you ought not to see me any
more. Say, I'm too happy to think! I'm----"

"You are just a silly fellow!"

"You never shot straighter! I'm a roaring idiot!"

He kissed her and held her face toward the light in a rather vain effort
to see its outline.

"I've been crazier since I got that note than any locoed cowboy that
ever tore up the ranges. I've simply been wild!"

"I am very sorry, Buck. Yet I think I must have suffered as much. Last
night father obtained from me a confession that I had met you in the
grounds here. He asked me if I had met you, and my confused looks made
my denials useless. Then he ordered me to write that note and to send
back the ring. He mailed them himself. And he made me promise that I
wouldn't meet you again. But when I made it, I realized that I couldn't
keep it."

"You're an angel!"

"I never heard that angels were disobedient."

"Some of them."

"And they were punished for it. Oh, Buck, I hope we will never regret
this--that there will be no punishment for this!"

"There won't be!" he