eed of a blaze or a
glow of a coal to guide anybody that might be prowling around to drop
a bullet into him. That surly rascal who bore Hector Hall's body away
might come back to do it, but the man who stood first in his thoughts
and caution was Earl Reid, out there somewhere in the closing night
with a gun on him and an itch in his hand to use it.

CHAPTER XXVII

A SUMMONS IN THE NIGHT

Somebody was calling on the hill behind the sheep-wagon. Mackenzie sat
up, a chill in his bones, for he had fallen asleep on watch beside the
ashes of his supper fire. He listened, the rack of sleep clearing from
his brain in a breath.

It was Dad Frazer, and the hour was past the turn of night. Mackenzie
answered, the sound of a horse under way immediately following. Dad
came riding down the hill with loose shale running ahead of him, in
such a hurry that he took the sharp incline straight.

"What's the matter?" Mackenzie inquired, hurrying out to meet him.

"I don't know," said Dad, panting from excitement as if he had run the
distance between the camps on foot. "Mary come over on her horse a
little while ago and rousted me out. She said somebody just passed her
camp, and one of 'em was Joan."

"Joan? What would she--what does Mary----?"

"That's what I said," Dad told him, sliding to the ground. "I said
Joan wouldn't be trapsin' around this time of night with nobody, but
if she did happen to be she could take care of herself. But Mary said
she sounded like she was fussin' and she thought something must be
wrong, and for me to hop her horse and come hell-for-leather and tell
you."

"How many--which way were they going?"

"Two horses, Mary said, from the sound, but she didn't hear nobody's
voice but Joan's. She got Charley up, and they run out and hollered,
but she didn't hear nothing more of Joan. The poor kid's scared out of
her 'leven senses."

"Which way did they go--did Mary say?"

"Towards Swan Carlson's ranch, she said."

Mackenzie swung into the saddle and galloped off, leaving Dad
listening to the sound of his going.

"Nutty, like the rest of 'em," said Dad.

Carlson's house was not more than eight miles from the range where
Mackenzie was running his sheep. He held his course in that direction
as he rode break-neck up hill and down. He had little belief that it
could have been Joan who passed Mary's camp, yet he was disturbed by
an anxiety that made his throat dry, and a fear that clung to him like