have their committees and executives, and when a
man has to do anything they send a few grains of oats to him. One can't
see much use in it, and we know 'most everything about them; but it makes
the thing kind of impressive, and the rustler fancied our boy was square
when he got them. He was to ride over alone and meet somebody from one of
the other executives at night in a bluff. He went, and found a band of
cattle-boys waiting for him. I believe he hadn't a show at all, for the
man who went up to talk to him grabbed his rifle, but it seems he managed
to damage one or two of them."

"You don't know who he is?" asked Miss Allonby; and Flora Schuyler noticed
a sudden intentness in Hetty's eyes.

"No," said the lad, "but the boys will be here with him by and by, and I'm
glad they made quite sure of him, any way."

Hetty's eyes sparkled. "You can't be proud of them! It wasn't very
American."

"Well, we can't afford to be too particular, considering what we have at
stake; though it might have sounded nicer if they had managed it
differently. You don't sympathize with the homestead boys, Miss
Torrance?"

"Of course not!" said Hetty, with a little impatient gesture. "Still, that
kind of meanness does not appeal to me. Even the men we don't like would
despise it. They rode into the town without a cartridge in their rifles,
and took out their friends in spite of the Sheriff, while the crowd looked
on."

"It was Larry Grant fixed that, and 'tisn't every day you can find a man
like him. It 'most made me sick when I heard he had gone over to the
rabble."

"You were a friend of his?" asked Flora Schuyler.

"Oh, yes;" and a little shadow crept into Allonby's face. "But, that's
over now. When a man goes back on his own folks there's only one way of
treating him, and it's not going to be nice for Larry if we can catch him.
We're in too tight a place to show the man who can hurt us most much
consideration."

Hetty turned her head a moment, and then changed the subject, but not
before Flora Schuyler noticed the little flush in her cheek. The music,
laughter, and gay talk began again, and if anyone remembered that while
they chased their cares away grim men who desired their downfall toiled
and planned, no sign of the fact was visible.

Twenty minutes passed, and then the thud of hoofs once more rose from the
prairie. It swelled into a drumming that jarred harsh and portentous
through the music, and Hetty's attention to the