eed and her heart leaped again.

She recalled the day she had asked Jack Masters if Bolt could run like
El Rey.

"How do I know?" he had answered. "I know it was speed, an' that is
all." True enough. It was Bolt, coming like his namesake, down along
the sloping stretches.

But a great wave of exultation swept over her. She rose in her
stirrups, shook an insulting hand above her, dropped on El Rey's neck,
swerved him east and swept away toward the lifting skirts of the
wooded hills. She heard a yell behind her, glanced back and saw that
the three Ironwoods were sweeping behind her, closing in together. It
was to be a race at last!

At last the whispered comparisons that had stirred under the speech of
the Valley concerning the Ironwoods and the Finger Marks was to have
justification. For the first and only time, in her knowledge, they
were to run.

"All right!" cried Tharon aloud. "Come on, you bastards! It's the king
you come against an' Jim Last's blood! You'll never put a hand on
either."

She struck her heels into El Rey's flanks, leaned over her pommel,
wished she was on the king's bare back, reached her hands far out
along the reins and began to call in his ear.

"Yeeoo! Yeeoo! Yeeoo!" she cried, a high, exciting note that keened in
the singing wind. And El Rey, ever keen to run for no reason, finding
himself called upon, stretched out his great body, dropped low to
earth and began to run. The wind cut by Tharon's face like a knife in
the first few leaps.

It shut her eyes in a dozen. She rode and laughed with a half sob in
her throat. The thunder of the king's iron-shod hoofs was in her ears
like the roar of the spring freshets when the empty canyons poured
their temporary torrents down the Rockface into the Valley.

She knew he was running as she had never ridden before. She had never
called upon him before. It was like being adrift upon the wind. She
heard the note of his speed rising in her ears. It was as it had ever
been, save that it was a higher note, thinner, sharper. There was
scarce a sense of touch beneath her, a lack of jar, of vibration, so
evenly and smoothly did the shining hoofs take the grassy plain.

Tears were in her eyes. Laughter was on her lips. This was speed
indeed! She had a sick longing that Jim Last might see his two loved
ones go!

Then she gathered herself to turn her head across her leaning shoulder
and look back.

As her eyes swept into focus behind, the laughter sli