"About as much as I stay anywhere."

Dorothy pouted. She had thought that the Blue Mesa and the timberlands
were more beautiful than ever that spring, but to think that the
neighboring cabin would be vacant all summer! No cheery whistling and no
wood smoke curling from the chimney and no blithe voice talking to the
ponies. No jolly "Good-mornin', miss, and the day is sure startin' out
proud to see you." Well, Dorothy had considered Mr. Shoop a friend. She
would have a very serious talk with Mr. Shoop when she saw him.

She had read of Waring's fight in the desert and of his slow recovery,
and that Waring was Lorry's father; matters that she could not speak of
to Lorry, but the knowledge of them lent a kind of romance to her ranger
man. At times she studied Lorry, endeavoring to find in him some trace
of his father's qualities. She had not met Waring, but she imagined much
from what she had heard and read. And could Lorry, who had such kind
gray eyes and such a pleasant face, deliberately go out and kill men as
his father had done? Why should men kill each other? The world was so
beautiful, and there was so much to live for.

Although the trail across the great forest terraces below was open clear
up to the Blue Mesa, the trails on the northern side of the range were
still impassable. The lookout man would not occupy his lonely cabin on
Mount Baldy for several weeks to come, and Lorry's work kept him within
a moderate radius of the home camp.

Several times Dorothy and her father rode with Lorry, spending the day
searching for new vistas while he mended trail or repaired the telephone
line that ran from Mount Baldy to the main office. Frequently they would
have their evening meal in Bronson's camp, after which Lorry always
asked them to his cabin, where Dorothy would play for them while they
smoked contentedly in front of the log fire. To Dorothy it seemed that
they had always lived in a cabin on the Blue Mesa and that Lorry had
always been their neighbor, whom it was a joy to tease because he never
showed impatience, and whose attitude toward her was that of a brother.

And without realizing it, Lorry grew to love the sprightly, slender
Dorothy with a wholesome, boyish affection. When she was well, he was
happy. When she became over-tired, and was obliged to stay in her room,
he was miserable, blaming himself for suggesting some expedition that
had been too much for her strength, so often buoyed above its natural
le