Читать книгу Sunset Pass - Zane Grey - Страница 5

Chapter	Three

TRUEMAN ROCK was not one of the cowboy breed who cared only for pitching, biting, kicking horses. He could ride them, when exigency demanded, but he never loved a horse for other than thoroughbred qualities. And sitting on the corral fence watching Leslie’s white favorite, he was bound to confess that he felt emotions of his earliest days on the range.

“Wal, True, did you ever see the beat of that hoss?” asked Sol Winter, for the twentieth time.

Rock shook his head silently.

Leslie, a tall rancher in overalls and boots, stood inside the corral. “Reckon I haven’t had time to take care of him lately. He’s had the run of the range. There hasn’t been a leg thrown over him for a year.”

“I’ll take him, Leslie, and consider the deal a lastin’ favor,” replied Rock.

“Reckon I’m glad. Dabb said yesterday he’d buy him an’ send out today. But you beat Dabb to it. Somehow I didn’t want Dabb to have him.”

“What have you against Dabb?” inquired Rock.

Leslie laughed shortly. “Me? Aw, nothin’.”

“Mrs. Dabb has been wantin’ this hoss, didn’t you tell me, Jim?” asked Winter.

“Wal, I reckon so. She has been out here often. But I don’t think Mrs. Dabb really cared about the horse so much. She just wanted to show off with him. But today there was a girl here who loved him, an’ I’d shore have liked to let her have him.”

“Who was she, Jim?” asked Winter, with a knowing wink up at Rock.

“Thiry Preston. She passed here today with her dad an’ some of the boys. Gage stopped to have a talk with me. All the Prestons are keen on hosses, but they won’t pay much. Hossflesh is plenty cheap out Sunset Pass way.”

“What did Miss Preston do?” queried Rock, casually.

“She just petted the hoss while the other Prestons walked around, talkin’ a lot. Miss Thiry never said a word. But I seen her heart in her eyes.”

“Speaks well for her,” replied Rock, with constraint, as he slid off the fence and approached the animal. If this beautiful white horse had appeared desirable in his eyes upon first sight, what was he now? Rock smoothed the silky mane, thrilling at the thought that Thiry’s gentle hand had rested there. “Leslie, I’ll come out in the mornin’. I want a pack-horse or a mule. ... Here’s your money. Shake on it. What’s one man’s loss is another’s gain.”

“I’ll throw the pack-hoss in to boot,” replied Leslie.

“Sol,” said Rock, thoughtfully, as they retraced their steps toward town, “I’ll hardly have time to look up folks I used to know. Reckon it doesn’t matter. I can leave that till I hit town again.... Do the Prestons come in often?”

“Some of them every Saturday, shore as it rolls round. Thiry comes in about twice a month.”

“Pretty long ride in from Sunset. Sixty miles by trail.”

“There’s a new road, part way. Longer but better travelin’. Goes by Tanner’s Well.”

“Reckon the Prestons make a one-night stop at some ranch?”

“No. They’re not much on that sort of travel. They camp it, makin’ Cedar Creek, where they turn off into a flat. Good grass an’ water. There’s an old cabin. It belonged to a homesteader. Preston owns it now. Thiry was tellin’ me they’d fixed it up. When they’re comin’ to town, she an’ the other womenfolks sleep there, an’ the men throw beds outside.”

“Queer how all about these Prestons interests me so,” said Rock, half to himself.

“Not so queer. Leavin’ Thiry aside, they’re a mighty interestin’ outfit,” returned Winter. “You’ll find that so pronto.”

“Reckon I’ll find out a lot pronto,” said Trueman. “Never could keep things from comin’ my way, particularly trouble. But, Sol, in all my life no adventure I ever rode down on could touch this one. I’m soberin’ a little and realize how crazy it seems to you.”

“Not crazy, son,” replied Winter, earnestly. “It’s wild, perhaps, to let yourself go over this girl all in a minute. But then, wild or no it might turn out good for Thiry Preston.”

“Sol, why is her face so sad?” queried Rock, stirred by his friend’s implication.

“I don’t know. I’ve asked her why she looks sad—which you can see when she’s not speakin’, but she always makes herself smile an’ laugh then. Says she can’t help her face an’ she’s sorry I don’t like it. Rock, it hurts Thiry, sort of startles her, to mention that. It makes her think of somethin’ unhappy.”

“It’s for me to find out,” said Rock.

“You bet. I’ve always been puzzled an’ troubled over Thiry. My wife, too. An’ True, it’ll please you that she took kindly to your sudden case over Thiry. She says, ‘If Trueman Rock stops his drinkin’ an’ gun-throwin’ an’ settles down to real ranchin’ he could give that girl what she needs.’ ... She didn’t say what Thiry needs. So we can only guess.”

“Sol, I’ll sure have to get away from you. Else you’ll have me locoed.”

“True, I may be wrong thinkin’ you’ve growed to be a man.... But one last word. This here has been stickin’ in my craw. These Prestons have heard all about you, naturally, an’ when you ride out on the range it’ll all come fresh again. No cowboy ever had a finer reputation than you—for bein’ keen an’ honest an’ clean, an’ a wonder at your work. You never drank much, compared to most cowboys.... But your gun record was bad—forgive me, son, I don’t want to offend. Remember I’m your friend. Every old-timer here knows you never went around lookin’ for trouble. It’s not that kind of a bad reputation. It’s this kind. You’ve spilled blood on this range, often, an’ more’n once fatal. That made you loved by a few, feared an’ misunderstood by many, an’ a mark for every fame-huntin’ sheriff, gambler, an’ cowpuncher in the country. Now you’re back again, after some years, an’ all you ever done here will come up. An’ your Texas doin’s, whatever they were, will follow you.... Now the point I want to make is this: Preston knows most of this or will know it soon, an’ if he keeps you in his outfit it will be pretty strong proof that these queer dark hints from the range are without justification.”

“Sol, it would seem so,” replied Rock, meditatively.

“Wal, it’ll be good if you find it that way. For Thiry’s sake first, an’ then for everybody concerned. Then these hints against Preston will be little different from those concernin’ other ranchers. Most outfits have cowboys who brand calves an’ kill beeves they oughtn’t to. That’s common, an’ it don’t count, because they about all do it.”

Rock regarded his anxious friend a thoughtful moment. “Winter, you’ve made a point you weren’t calculatin’ on. You’re hopin’ I’ll find Preston one of the common run of ranchers. But you’re afraid I won’t.”

It was nearly noon the following day when Rock had his pack outfit ready for travel. Leslie came up presently with the white horse.

“Black leather an’ silver trimmings,” said the rancher, admiringly. “Never seen him so dressed up. An’ the son-of-a-gun is smart enough to know he looks grand.”

“He’s smart, all right,” agreed Rock, with shining eyes. “Now we’ll see if he’ll hang me on the fence.”

“Reckon you can ride ’most anythin’,” observed Leslie, his appreciative glance running over Rock.

The white horse took Rock’s mount easily, pranced and champed a little, and tossed his head.

“Good day and good luck, rancher,” said Rock, lifting the halter of the pack animal off a post.

“Same to you, cowboy,” replied Leslie, heartily. “Reckon you don’t need any advice about them hard nuts down in the Pass.”

“Need it all right, but can’t wait. When you see Sol tell him I’m off fine and dandy,” rejoined Rock.

With that he headed down the road which the Prestons had taken the preceding day. Before Rock was far out of town he had ascertained his horse was a fast walker and had an easy trot. For speed and endurance, Leslie had committed himself to the claim that no horse in the country could approach him.

“I’ve hit the trail,” sang out Rock, explosively, though it was a broad, well-trodden road that he was traveling.

As many times as he had ridden out from Wagontongue and other towns, and from the innumerable range camps all over the West, not one of them had ever been like this venture. He laughed at himself. His boyhood had returned. There was nothing but good and joy in the world. The hot June sun pleasantly burned through his shirt sleeves; the dust tasted sweet; the wind, coming in puffs, brought the fragrant odors of the desert, spiced by a hint of sage; the hills slumbered in blue haze.

Out of town a little way he caught up with a young rider who had evidently seen him.

“Howdy, cowboy!” he greeted Rock.

“Howdy, yourself!” returned Rock, genially.

“I seen you was up on Leslie’s white hoss, so I waited.”

“You know the horse?”

“Shore do. I ride for Spangler out here an’ we often had Leslie’s stock to pasture.... Reckon you own the white now. You kinda have thet look.”

“Yes, I went broke buyin’ a horse to go with this saddle.”

“Wal, you shore got two thet fit. You-all make a flash outfit.... Where you ridin’, cowboy?”

“I’m aimin’ for Sunset Pass.”

“Got a job with Preston?”

“Nope, not yet. I hope to land one.”

“Easy, if you will stand long hours an’ poor wages. Preston pays less than any rancher hereabouts.”

“How much?” queried Rock, as if it was important.

“Forty, with promise of more. But no puncher ever sticks long enough to get more.”

“What you mean by easy?”

“Preston is always hard up fer riders. Reckon he’s only got a couple beside his sons. He asked me yestidday if I wanted a job.”

“What’s the reason no cowboy ever rides long for Preston?”

“I knowed you was a stranger round Wagontongue,” said the other, grinning.

“Sure I am, lately. But I was here years ago.”

“Before my time, shore. ’Cause I’d remembered you. What’s your handle?”

“Trueman Rock, late of Texas.”

“ ’Pears to me I’ve heerd that name, somewheres. Wal, I’m glad to meet you. I’m Hal Roberts. An’ if you don’t tie up with Preston, come back an’ try Spangler.”

Rock thanked him and asked questions about the range. Soon afterward the cowboy bade him good-by and turned off. Back from the road Rock espied a new ranch house and corrals that had not been there in his day. Then as he passed on he drew away from the dry-farming levels and the wastes of cut-over land, to get out into the desert proper. It waved away to the southward, gray and yellow, with spots of green cedars and dotted groups of cattle, on and on to a beckoning horizon line. Familiar landmarks stared at him, and grew in number and power to stir him, as he went on. His quick eye made especial note of improvements along the road. Stone culverts had been put in at some of the deeper washes.

Rock kept looking for a cabin where he had stopped many a time. He could not recall the name of the homesteader who had located there. Coming to the top of a low rise of ground, he saw a little valley beyond, with a fringe of green. Then he found the cabin. It had been long deserted; the roof had fallen in, and the outside chimney of yellow stone had partly crumbled away. What had become of the homesteader and his hard-working wife and tousle-headed youngsters?

Rock rode on. Further along he saw a dam of red earth that had been built in a depression, where in the rainy season water ran. A red, sun-baked, hoof-marked hollow glared there now. Cattle were few and far between. But this was barren desert. Some miles on, over the summit of this long slope, conditions would improve.

In due time he reached the top and there halted the horses to spend a few moments in reveling in the well-remembered country.

A thirty-mile gulf yawned wide and shallow, a yellow-green sea of desert grass and sage, which sloped into ridge on ridge of cedar and white grass. The length of the valley both east and west extended beyond the limit of vision, and here began the vast cattle range that made the town of Wagontongue possible. Rock’s trained eye saw cattle everywhere, though not in large herds. It was a beautiful scene for any rider. Rock feasted his eyes, long used to the barrens of the Texas Panhandle. The rough country commenced some fifteen miles or more farther on. Sunset Pass and its environs were not in view, nor even the mountain ranges that were visible from the town.

The valley smoked with the thick amber light of the warm June day. Lonely land! Rock’s heart swelled. He was coming back to the valleys and hills that he now discovered he had loved.

An hour’s ride down the slow incline brought Rock into a verdant swale of fifty acres, fresh with its varied shades of green, surrounding a pretty ranch house. Here Adam Pringle had lived. If he were still there, he had verified his oft-repeated claims to Rock that here had been the making of a prosperous farm and cattle ranch.

The barn and corrals were closer to the road than the house. Rock saw a boy leading a horse, then a man at work under an open shed. The big gate leading in was shut. Rock halloed. Whereupon the farmer started out leisurely, then quickened his steps. It was Adam—stalwart, middle-aged, weatherbeaten settler.

“True Rock, or I’m a born sinner!” shouted Pringle, before he was even near Rock.

“Howdy, Adam! How’s the old-timer?” returned Rock.

“I knowed that hoss. An’ I shore knowed you jest from the way you straddled him. How air you? This is plumb a surprise. Get down an’ come in.”

“Haven’t time, Adam. I’m rustlin’ along to make camp below.... Adam, you’re lookin’ good. I see you’ve made this homestead go.”

“Never seen you look any better, if I remember. Thet’s a hoss an’ saddle you’re ridin’. You always was hell on them. Whar you been?”

“Texas.”

“Reckon you heerd aboot Cass Seward bein’ popped off, an’ you ride back to the old stampin’-grounds?”

“Adam, I didn’t know Cass was dead till I got to Wagontongue. Guess I was homesick.”

“Whar you goin’?”

“Sunset Pass.”

“Cowboy, if you want work, pile right off heah.”

“Thanks, Adam, but I’ve got a hankerin’ for wilder country. I’ll try Preston. Think he’ll take me on?”

“Shore. But don’t ask him.”

“Why not?”

“I’m advisin’ you—not talkin’,” returned the rancher, with a sharp gleam in his eye. “You know me, True.”

“Used to, pretty well, Adam. And I’m sort of flustered at your advisin’ me that way,” replied Rock, keenly searching the other’s face.

“Stay away from Sunset Pass.”

“Adam, I just never could take advice,” drawled Rock. “Much obliged, though.”

“Cowboy, you may need a job bad, an’ you shore always hankered for wild range. But it ain’t that.”

“What you aimin’ at, Adam?” asked Rock, with a laugh.

“I ain’t aimin’, True. I’m tellin’ you. It’s thet tow-headed lass of Preston’s.”

“Well, considerin’ we’re old friends, I won’t take offense,” drawled Rock. “How you doin’?”

“Been on my feet these two years,” returned Pringle, with satisfaction. “Been raisin’ turnips an’ potatoes an’ some corn. Got three thousand haid of stock. An’ sellin’ eight hundred haid this fall.”

“Bully! I’m sure tickled. Losin’ much stock?”

“Some. But not enough to rave aboot. Though I’m agreed with cattlemen who know the range that there’s more rustlin’ than for some years past.”

“Is that so?”

“Queer rustlin’, too. You lose a few haid of steers an’ then you never hear of anyone seein’ hide nor hair of them again.”

“Nothin’ queer about that, Adam. Rustled cattle are seldom seen again,” returned Adam, for the sake of argument. But there was something unusual about it. Pringle, however, did not press the point.

“Many new cattlemen?” went on Rock.

“Not too many. The range is healthy an’ improvin’.”

“How’s Jess Slagle? I used to ride for Jess, and want to see him.”

“Humph! Didn’t nobody tell you aboot Slagle?”

“Nope. And I forgot to ask. You see, I only got to town yesterday.”

“Jess Slagle couldn’t make it go in Sunset Pass after the Prestons come.”

“Why not? It’s sure big enough country for ten outfits.”

“Wal, there’s only one left, an’ thet’s Preston’s. Ask Slagle?”

“I sure will. Is he still located in the Pass?”

“No. He’s ten miles this side. Stone cabin. You’ll remember it.”

“If I do, that’s no ranch for Jess Slagle. Marshland, what there was of it fit to graze cattle, salty water, mostly rocks and cedars.”

“Your memory’s good, Rock. Drop in to see Slagle. An’ don’t miss callin’ heah when you come out.”

“Which you’re thinkin’ won’t be so very long. Huh, Adam?”

“Wal, I’m not thinkin’, but if it was anyone else I’d give him three days—aboot,” replied Pringle, with a guffaw.

Rock’s misgivings grew in proportion to the increasing warmth and pleasure of this ride toward old haunts. The fact that nothing was spoken openly detrimental to the Prestons was a singular feature that he had encountered once or twice before. The real Westerner, such as Leslie or Pringle, was a man of few words. This reticence sprang from a consciousness that he was not wholly free from blame himself, and that to be loose with the tongue entailed considerable risk. Rock could not prevent his growing curiosity and interest, but he succeeded in inhibiting any suspicions. He wanted to believe that Thiry’s people, including the redoubtable Ash, were the very salt of the earth.

Toward sundown he reached the south slope of the valley and entered the zone of the cedars. These gray-sheathed trees, fragrant, with their massed green foliage and grotesque dead branches, seemed as much a part of a cowboy’s life as grass or rocks or cactus. Rock halted for camp near a rugged little creek, where clear water ran trickling over the stones. He went off the road and threw his pack in a clump of cedars where he could not readily be seen. How long since he had camped in the open, as in his earlier days on the range!

Then he unsaddled the white, and hobbled both horses, and watched them thump out in search of grass. He unrolled his tarp under a low-branching cedar, and opened his pack, conscious of pleasurable sensations. It had been years since he had done this sort of thing. In Texas he had ridden out from a comfortable house, and back again, sooner or later, as he liked. But this was the real life for a rider. When the dead cedar branches burst into a crackling fire he seemed magically to find his old dexterity at camp tasks. And the hour flew by.

After sunset, sky and cloud and valley were illumined by a golden ethereal light. Twilight stole from some invisible source, and night followed, a mellow warm summer night, with hum of insects and croak of frogs, and the melancholy music a cowboy found inseparable from his lonely vigil—the staccato cry of coyotes. Rock lingered beside his dying red cedar fire, listening, feeling, realizing that the years had brought him much until now never divined, and that something as mystical in the future called to his being. Not by chance merely, nor because of a longing to return to this range, nor impelled by the restless wanderlust of a cowboy, had he journeyed hither. Around every thought, almost, seemed to hover the intangible shadow of Thiry Preston. But he would not make of her a deliberate object of conjecture, of reality. That would come later, when he had found her again, and understood himself.

The night darkened, the air cooled, the camp fire flickered out. Rock crawled into his blankets under the widespread cedar. The soft feel of wool, the hard ground, the smell of cedar, the twinkle of a star through the branches, the moan of rising night wind, the lonesome coyote bark, and the silence—how good they were and how they recalled other days!

Rock was awakened at dawn by the thump of hoofs. The white horse had come into camp, which was something horses seldom did.

“You early-risin’ son-of-a-gun,” called Rock, as he rolled out of bed. “Want your oats, huh? I just figured you’d want a snookful of oats, so I fetched some.”

He was on his way before sunrise, and in an hour or so had reached Cedar Creek, with its green banks and clusters of trees, its little flat where stood a cabin new to Rock. It was locked. He could not see in. But in the sand before the door he saw little boot tracks that surely had been made by Thiry Preston. This was the halfway house used by the Prestons, going to and from town.

From there the road circled a ridge to the west, and a well-defined trail led up the slope. Rock knew the trail, and believed that the road would come back to it over the hill. He took the short-cut, and almost it seemed that he had ridden the trail only yesterday.

When he achieved the summit, the sky had become overcast with heavy white and black clouds, darkening the day. From here he gazed over into country that deserved its repute. Wide and far away it flung defiance, menace, and call to the long-absent rider. Below him spread a white-and-green checkerboard of grass and cedar, leading with striking boldness up into leagues and leagues of black timber, mesas with crowned walls of gray limestone, cliffs of red rock, fringed by pine, all mere steps up to the mountain kingdom into which the great gap of Sunset Pass yawned, purple and dim and forbidding.

About noon Rock halted before the stone cabin that he knew must belong to his old friend and employer, Jess Slagle. Rock rode into what was a sorry excuse for a yard, where fences were down and dilapidated wagons, long out of use, stood around amid a litter of stones and wood, and all kinds of débris characteristic of a run-down range. The corral in the back was a makeshift, and the log barn would have shamed a poor homesteader. It amazed and shocked Rock, though he had seen many cattlemen start well and never finish.

Dismounting, Rock went to the door and knocked. He heard steps inside. The door opened half a foot to disclose a red-haired, homely woman, in dirty garb, more like a sack than a dress.

“Does Jess Slagle live here?” asked Rock.

“Yes. He’s out round the barn somewheres,” she replied, with a swift flash of beady eyes that took him in.

As Rock thanked her and turned away he saw that she was barefooted. So Jess Slagle had come to squalor and poverty. Who was the woman? Rock certainly had no remembrance of her. Presently he heard the sound of hammer or ax blows on wood, and he came upon Slagle at work on a pen beside the barn.

“Howdy, Rock! I knew you were in town. Range Preston rode by this mornin’ an’ passed the news.”

This gaunt man was Slagle, changed vastly, no doubt like his fortunes. He showed no surprise or gladness. The grasp of his hand was rough, hard, but lacked warmth or response. Rock remembered him as a heavy, florid Westerner, with clear eyes, breezy manner, smooth of face, and without a gray hair.

“Jess, I’m sure surprised and plumb sorry to find you—your condition so—so different,” began Rock, a little uncertain.

“Reckon that’s natural. Not much like when you rode for me, years ago,” replied Slagle, with the bitterness of the defeated.

“What happened, Jess?”

“About everythin’, I reckon.”

“Sheeped off the range?” went on Rock, hazarding a query.

“Hell no! There’s no sheep on this side, an’ never will be, so long as Preston lives.”

“How’d you lose out?”

“Well, Rock, I had hard luck. Two bad years for water and grass. Then Dabb shut down on me. I held the little end of a deal with him. Next I sold some cattle, put the money in a bank, an’ it busted. Then Preston moved into the country—an’ here I am.”

“How in the devil did you get here?” demanded Rock, bluntly, spreading his hands significantly.

“Right off I made a mistake,” returned Slagle, nodding his head. “Preston was keen about my ranch in the Pass. He made me a good offer. I refused. He kept after me. I had some hard words with his son, Ash, an’ it all led to a breach. They kept edgin’ my stock down out of the Pass an’ I didn’t have the riders to drive it back. That way, then, an’ in others I fell more in debt. No banks would give me credit. An’ as I said before, here I am.”

“It’s a tough story, Jess. I’m sorry. But it doesn’t explain how you lost your ranch in the Pass.”

“I forgot to tell you, I had finally to sell for about nothin’.”

“To Preston?”

“Sure. No one on the lower range would take it as a gift. It was a poor location, if any other outfit rode the Pass.”

“Ahuh! Then as it stands, Preston about ruined you?”

“No, Rock, I couldn’t claim that. My deal with Dabb hurt me most—started me downhill. Gage Preston never did me any dirt that I actually know. When I went to him an’ told him his outfit was drivin’ my stock off grass an’ water, he raised the very old Ned with his sons, in particular Ash Preston, who’s sure rotten enough to taint the whole other twelve Prestons.”

“So this Ash Preston is rotten?” queried Rock, deliberately, glad to find one man not afraid to voice his convictions.

“Rock, I don’t talk behind any cattleman’s back,” returned Slagle, forcefully. “I told Gage Preston this, an’ I told Ash to his face.”

“Then what happened?”

“Well, the old man stalled off a shootin’ match, I reckon.”

“Have you ever met since?”

“Lots of times. But I’ve never had the nerve to draw on Ash. I know he’d kill me. He knows it, too.”

“What you mean by rotten?”

“Mebbe it’s a poor word. But I know what I mean. Did you ever see a slick, cold, shiny rattlesnake, just after sheddin’ his skin, come slippin’ out, no more afraid of you than hell, sure of himself, an’ ready to sting you deep?”

“Reckon I have, Jess.”

“Well, that’s Ash Preston.”

“Ahuh! And that’s all you mean?”

“Reckon it is, Rock. I’ve lost cattle the last five years, some hundreds in all. But so has Preston an’ other ranchers, all the way from Red Butte to the sand. There’s rustlin’, more perhaps than when you helped us clean out the Hartwell outfit. But sure as I am alive I never laid any of it to Ash Preston.”

“I see,” rejoined Rock, studying the other’s mask-like face. “Glad to get your angle. I’m goin’ to ask Preston for a job.”

“I had a hunch you were. I’m wishin’ you luck.”

“Walk out with me and see my horse, Jess,” rejoined Rock, turning. “Do you aim to hang on here?”

“Thank God, I don’t,” replied Slagle, with a first show of feeling. “My wife—she’s my second wife, by the way—has had a little money an’ a farm left her, in Missouri. We’re leavin’ before Winter sets in.”

“Glad to hear you’ve had a windfall, Jess.... Now what do you think of that white horse?”

Rock had been two hours leisurely climbing the imperceptible slope up to the mouth of Sunset Pass. It was mid-afternoon. The clouds had broken somewhat and already there were tinges of gold and purple against the blue sky.

At last he entered the wide portal of the Pass, and had clear view of its magnificent reach and bold wild beauty. The winding Sunset Creek came down like a broken ribbon, bright here and dark there, to crawl at last into a gorge on Rock’s left. The sentinel pines seemed to greet him. They stood as he remembered, first one, isolated and stately, then another, and next two, and again one, and so on that way until at the height of the Pass they grew in numbers, yet apart, lording it over the few cedars on the level bench, and the log cabins strange to Rock, that he knew must be the home of the Prestons.

Many and many a time had he camped there, realizing and loving the beauty of that lovely aloof spot, yet never had he imagined it as a site for a ranch. But it was indeed the most perfect situation of any he had ever seen. And it was Thiry Preston’s home.

Rock was still a mile or more distant. Slowly he approached, holding in the white horse that scented water and grass. The ascent here was gradual, as was the constriction of the Pass. The breath of sage blew strong, sweet, heavy on the breeze that came through from the west. Already the sun hung low, directly in the center of the great V-shaped gap which appeared to split the very heart of the mountain range. And the gold was growing vivid. Preston’s ranch, at least the six cabins, occupied the divide, which hid the lower and the larger end of the Pass from Rock’s eager gaze. He remembered it so well that he could scarcely wait.

Slowly he rode up and entered the beautiful open park. It was just naturally beautiful, level, with white grass surrounding the patches of brown mats of needles under the pines. The road cut through the center and went down the other side. Rock had a glimpse of gardens, corrals, fields, and then the purple pass threaded with winding white.

There were no rocks, no brush, no fallen logs or dead timber. The few cedars and piñons and pines stood far apart, as if distributed by a mighty landscape artist. Some of the cabins were weathered and gray, with more green on the split shingles. They had wide eaves and sturdy gray chimneys built outside, and glass windows. Other cabins were new, especially a little one, far over under the overhanging green slope and near a thin pile of white water falling from mossy rock. The largest of the pines marked this little cabin, and towered over it protectingly. The only living things in sight were two deer, standing with long ears erect, a horse and a colt, and a jack-rabbit, bounding away across the waving grass.

Just then a hound bayed, deep and hollow, no doubt announcing the advent of a stranger in the Pass. Rock, having come abreast of the first cabin, halted his horse.

The door of this cabin opened. A tall, lithe, belted and booted man stalked out, leisurely, his eagle-like head bare, his yellow hair waving in the wind—Ash Preston.