Del Oro against Fendrick's
sheepherders, and his weekly supply of provisions had to be taken to him.
Since she wanted to see with her own eyes how things were getting along at
the canyon, she was taking the supplies in person.

It was a beautiful morning, even for Arizona. The soft air was at its
winiest best. The spring rains had carpeted the hills with an unusually
fine grass, and the summer suns had not yet burnt this to the crisp brown
of August. Her young heart expanded with the very joy of life. Oh, how
good it was to be alive in a world of warm sunshine, of blue, unflecked
sky, and of cool, light breezes. Swifts basked on the rocks or darted like
arrows for safety, and lay palpitating with suspense. The clear call of
the quails sounded to right and left of her. To her eager consciousness it
was as if some bath of splendor had poured down overnight upon the old
earth.

She rode from sunlight into shadow and from shadow to sunlight again,
winding along the hill trail that took her toward the Del Oro. After hours
of travel she came to the saddle from which one looked down to the gap in
the canyon walls that had been the common watering place of all men's
cattle, but now was homesteaded by her father. Far below her it lay, a
dwarfed picture with detail blurred to a vague impressionistic map. She
could see the hut, the fence line running parallel to the stream on the
other side, some grazing cattle, Sweeney's horse in the corral.

The piteous bleating of a lamb floated to her. Kate dismounted and made
her way toward the sound. A pathetic little huddle of frightened life
tried to struggle free at her approach. The slim leg of the lamb had
become wedged at the intersection of several rocks in such a way that it
could not be withdrawn.

Kate pulled the boulder away, and released the prisoner. It looked at her
and bleated without attempting to move. She took the soft, woolly creature
in her arms, and examined the wounded limb, all torn and raw from its
efforts to escape. A wound, she recalled, ought to be washed with cold
water and bound. Returning to her horse, she put the little animal in
front of the saddle and continued on the trail that led down to the
river.

Sweeney came out from the cabin and hailed her. He was a squat,
weather-beaten man, who had ridden for her father ever since she could
remember.

"What in Mexico you got there?" he asked in surprise.

She explained the circumstances under which she had