ey, why he must know at once that Last's was no friend of his,
now or ever.

He caught the drift of her thought in part.

"For no outfit, Miss Last," he said with a gentle dignity. "I am in
the employ of the United States Government."

A swift change came over Tharon's face.

Government!

That was no word to conjure by in Lost Valley. Steptoe Service prated
of Gov'ment. It was a farce, a synonym for juggled duty, a word to
suggest the one-man law of the place, for even Courtrey, who made the
sheriffs--and unmade them--did it under the grandiloquent name of
Government. She looked at him keenly, and there was a sudden hardening
in her young eyes.

"Then I reckon, Mister," she said coolly, "that you an' me can't be
friends."

"What?"

"No, sir."

"Are you in earnest?"

"Certainly am," said Tharon. "I ain't on good terms at present with
anything that has t' do with law."

David Kenset leaned forward and looked into her face with his deep,
compelling eyes.

"I guessed as much from my first knowledge of you the other day," he
answered, "but we are on unfamiliar ground. You have a wrong
conception of Government, a perverted idea of law and what it stands
for."

"All right, Mister," said the girl rising. "We won't argy. I asked you
t' dinner, but I take it back. I ask ye t' forgive me my manners, but
th' sooner we part th' better. Then we won't be a-hurtin' each other's
feelin's. I'm fer law, too, but it ain't your kind, an' we ain't
likely to agree."

She picked up his hat from where it lay on the melodeon and fingered
it a bit, smiling at him in the ingenuous manner that was utterly
disarming.

A slow dark flush spread over the man's face. He laughed, however, and
in reaching for the hat, caught two of her fingers, whether purposely
or not, Tharon could not tell.

"Admirable hospitality in the last frontier," he said. "But perhaps I
should not have expected anything different."

"You make me ashamed," said Tharon straightly, "but Last's ain't
takin' chances these days. You may belong to Government, an' you may
belong to Courtrey, an' I'm against 'em both."

She walked with him to the door, stepped out, as if with some thought
to soften her unprecedented treatment of the stranger under her roof.
She noted the trim figure of him in its peculiar garb, the proud
carriage, the even and easy comportment under insult.

From his saddle he untied a package wrapped in paper.

"Will you please take this?" h