had seen
you before to-night!" He dropped the bridle reins and laid a hand on
either shoulder, holding her at arms' length. "Your eyes are like stars!
And your mouth looks so--sweet! And your hair is so soft and pretty when
the wind blows it across your forehead and face like that! I wish you
could see yourself. You're beautiful in the moonlight, Kate!"

"Beautiful?" incredulously. Then she laughed happily, "Why, I'm not even
pretty, Hughie."

"And what's more," he declared, "you're a wonderful girl--different--a
fellow never gets tired of being with you."

"You are making up to me for what happened to-night! I nearly forget it
when you tell me things like that."

"I didn't know how much I did care until they hurt you. I could have
killed somebody if it wouldn't have made things worse for you."

"As much as that?" She looked at him wistfully. "You care as much as
that? You see," she added slowly, "nobody's ever taken my part except
Uncle Joe--not even my mother; and it seems--queer to think that anybody
else likes me well enough to fight for me."

The unconscious pathos went straight to the boy's chivalrous heart.

"Oh, Honey!" he cried impulsively, and taking her hand in both of his he
held it tight against his breast.

Her eyes grew luminous at the word and the caress.

"Honey!" she repeated in a wondering whisper. "I like that."

Her lids lowered before the new and strange expression in his face.

"You've always seemed so independent and self-reliant, like another
fellow, somehow. I didn't know you were so sweet. I'm just finding you
out."

She looked at him before replying, but he trembled before the soft light
shining in her eyes.

He stood for a moment uncertainly, fighting for his self-control, then,
casting off restraint, he threw his arms about her, crying passionately:

"I love you! I love you, Katie! There's nobody like you in the whole
world. Kiss me--Sweet!"

She drew back startled, looking into his eyes. Her own seemed to melt
under what she saw there, and she slowly lifted her lips. When she could
speak--

"You'll love me for always, Hughie?"

"For always," huskily. "For ever and ever, Katie."

CHAPTER VI

THE WOLF SCRATCHES

Mormon Joe had underestimated Jasper Toomey's capacity for extravagance
and mismanagement when he had given him five years to "go broke" in, as
he had accomplished it in four most effectively--so completely, in fact,
that they had moved into town wi