to stock a jobbing house. The herd itself had augmented, despite its
annual reduction, until one artesian well was inadequate to supply
water; and fifteen miles north, at the extreme limit of his home-ranch,
Rankin had sunk another well, making a sort of sub-station of that
point. From it an observer with good eyes could see the outlines of the
modern Big B Ranch property, built on the old site, and ostensibly
operated by a long-legged Yankee, Rob Hoyt by name, but in reality
owned, as had been the remnant of stock Tom Blair left behind him, by
saloon-keeper Mick Kennedy.

The ranch force had changed very little. Rankin, stouter by a
quarter-hundred weight, shaggier of eyebrows and with an accentuated
droop in the upper eyelids, and if possible an increased taciturnity,
still lived his daytime life mainly on wheels. The old buckboard had
finally succumbed, but its counterpart, mud-spattered and
weather-bleached, had taken its place. In the kitchen, Ma Graham still
presided, her accumulated avoirdupois seeming to have been gathered at
the expense of her lord, who in equal ratio thinner and more weazened,
danced attendance as of old. Only one of the former cowboys now
remained. That one, strange to say, was Grannis, the "man from nowhere,"
who had apparently taken root at last. Regularly on the last day of each
month he drew his pay, and without a word of explanation or comment
disappeared upon the back of a cow-pony, to reappear, perhaps in ten
hours, perhaps in sixty, dead broke, with a thirst seemingly
unappeasable, but quite non-committal concerning his experience,
apparently satisfied and ready to take up the dull routine of his life
again.

Last of all, Benjamin Blair. Precisely as the boy had given promise, the
youth had developed. He was now mature in size, in poise, in action.
Long of leg, long of arm, long of face, he stood a half head above
Rankin, who had been the tallest man upon the place. Yet he was not
awkward. Physically he was of the type, but magnified, to which all
cowboys belong; and no one would ever call him awkward or uncouth.

There had been less change upon the Baker ranch. Scotty was not an
expansionist. Scarcely a score more horses grazed in his paddock than of
old. The barn, though often repaired, was still of sod and thatch. The
house contained the original number of rooms. The experiment with trees
had never been repeated. If possible, the man himself had altered even
less than his surro