t
eyes, and brimmed over upon the brown cheeks.

"I don't want you to pay for the dogs; I'm glad they're gone." She
brushed back a straggling lock of hair. "It's a horrid sport, and I'll
never have anything to do with it again." A look that set the youth's
heart bounding shot out sideways from beneath the long lashes. "I'm very
glad you did--what you did."

Just then the noisy old buckboard, with Rankin and Scotty clinging to
the seat, drove up and stopped short, with a protest from every joint of
the ancient vehicle.

CHAPTER X

THE DOMINANT ANIMAL

The chance to sell his stock, ostensibly his reason for delaying
departure, came to Scotty Baker much more quickly than he had
anticipated. Within a week after the hunt--in the very first mail he
received, in fact--came an offer from a Minneapolis firm to take every
scrap of horse-flesh he could spare. With much compunction and a doleful
face he read the letter aloud in the family council.

"That means 'go' for sure, I suppose," he commented at its conclusion.

Involuntarily Florence laughed. "You look as though you'd just got word
that the whole herd had stampeded over a ravine, instead of having had a
wave of good fortune," she bantered. "I believe you'd still back out if
you could."

Scotty's face did not lighten. "I know I would," he admitted.

"We'll not give you the chance, though," broke in Mollie, with the first
indication of enthusiasm she had shown in many a day. "Florence and I
will begin packing right away, and you can carry the things along with
you when you drive the horses to town."

Scotty looked at his wife steadily and caught the trace of excitement in
her manner.

"Yes, that is a good suggestion," he replied slowly. "It's liable to
turn cold any time now, and as long as we're going it may as well be
before Winter sets in." He filled a stubby meerschaum pipe with tobacco,
and put on cap and coat preparatory to going out of doors. "I spoke to
Rankin about the place the other day," he added, "and he says he'll take
it and pay cash whenever I'm ready. I'll drive over and see him this
morning."

Rankin was not at home--so Ma Graham told Scotty when he arrived--and
probably he wouldn't return till afternoon; but Ben was around the barn
somewhere, more than likely out among the broncos. He usually was, when
he had nothing else in particular to do.

Following her direction the Englishman loitered out toward the stock
quarters, looked wit