, and I can get down there in no time."

"Oh, can you? Will you? And you are not afraid--alone at night in the
hills? Under any other circumstances I wouldn't think of letting you
do it, child--especially with the horse-thieves about. But, it seems
the only way----"

"Of course it's the only way! And I'm not a bit afraid."

Hurrying to the corral, Patty saddled her horse, and a few moments
later swung into the trail that led down the creek. She glanced at her
watch; it was one o'clock. The moon floated high in the heavens and
the valley was almost as light as day. Urging her horse into a run,
she found a wild exhilaration in riding through the night, splashing
across shallows and shooting across short level stretches to plunge
through the water again.

After what seemed an interminable wait, Pierce himself appeared at the
door in answer to her persistent pounding. Patty thought he eyed her
curiously as he stood aside and motioned her into the kitchen. Very
deliberately he lighted the lamp and listened in silence until she had
finished. Then, coolly, he eyed her from top to toe: "'Pears to me
I've saw you before," he announced. "Over on the trail, a while back.
An' you was a-ridin' with--Monk Bethune."

"Well?" asked the girl, angered by the man's tone.

"Well," mocked Pierce. "So to-night's the night yer figgerin' on
pullin' the raid, is it?"

"I'm figuring on pulling the raid! What do you mean?"

"I mean you, an' Bethune, an' yer gang. You be'n up a-spottin' the
lay, so's to tip 'em off, an' now you come down here an' tell me the
Old Man's worst so's I'll take out to town fer the doc--an' one less
posse-man in the hills. Yer a pretty slick article, Miss, but it
hain't a-goin' to work."

Patty listened, speechless with rage. When the man finished she found
her tongue. "You--you accuse me of being a--a horse-thief?" she
choked.

"Yup," answered the man. "That's it--an' not so fur off, neither.
Don't you s'pose I know that if the Old Man was worst one of his own
boys would of be'n a foggin' it fer town hisself? I'd ort to take an'
lock you up in the root cellar an' turn you over to Vil Holland, but I
guess if we get all the he ones out of yer gang we kin leave you
loose. 'Tain't likely you could run off no horses single-handed."

A woman whose appearance showed an evident hasty toilet had stepped
from an inner room, and stood listening to the man. Patty was about to
appeal to her when, from the outside came