She stood up, listening. From the distance came the low rumble of a wagon. The men were returning. For some time she kept her face from him, in attitude intent upon the distant rumble. She was thinking hard. She could not be rude to Livingston, she could not very well explain, yet she dared not allow him to accompany her back to Harris' ranch. What should she do? Naturally he would insist, yet how could she tell him that she feared for his safety? That would sound idiotic without a complete explanation, for she was almost a total stranger to him. She was concerned, that was the worst of it; but not without reason. To-night the men were in a fever of revenge. If he were seen that would settle it. To-morrow not one of them but would hesitate a long time before committing such a crime; so, she argued, she had a right to be concerned. But, after all, how foolish of her! Surely he was not a baby that he could not protect himself! Did she expect to worry about him during the whole summer? As she stood there gazing into the darkness, he watched her, speechless, something that was not sorrow piercing his heart with a greater pain. In her moment of tenderness she had become to him a woman divine. He not only loved her, and knew it, but felt the hopelessness of ever winning her. It was not exactly new, only revealed to him, for it had come upon him gradually since the evening that she had given him the water at the spring. He had cursed himself that night for thinking of an Indian girl, he, a man with a name to sustain—a name which counted little in this new country of the West. He tried to imagine her as married to Carter. The thought sickened him. Carter might be all right,—he had met him when he first came into the country; he undoubtedly was all right,—but married to this girl! As he thought, bitterly, forgetting even the dead young German at his feet, Hope was alternately calling herself a fool and wondering what she could do to prevent him from taking her home. But her fertile brain could not solve it. She turned toward him with manner constrained and frigid. It was shyness, nothing less, yet it affected him unpleasantly.

"The wagon is coming." Relief sounded in her tone, giving the lie to her moment of tenderness. "You can hear it quite plainly. These corrals should not be so far from the house. It must be nearly a mile. I suppose you've not been in the business very long or you wouldn't have put it here, on the edge of this cut-bank."

"You are right, Miss Hathaway, I have not been long in the business nor in your country. This is quite new to me. Any place seemed good enough for a corral, to my ignorant mind. Are you interested in the sheep industry?" He spoke pleasantly. She threw back her head as she always did when angered or excited.

"Interested in the sheep industry? Well, I should say not! It never occurred to me before as an industry, only as a nuisance. I hate sheep. They ruin our range. One band can eat off miles and miles in a season, and spoil all the water in the country. I would go miles out of my way to avoid a band of them."

He began slowly to comprehend. "Your people have cattle, I understand. Everyone up here seems to have cattle, too. I have heard that a strong feeling of antagonism existed between sheep and cattle owners, but thought nothing about it. I see that the feeling is not confined to the men only. Does that explain this—outrage here to-night?"

She shrugged her shoulders slightly and turned away.

"You can draw your own conclusions. Why do you ask me? I am neither a cattle-man nor a sheep-man, yet I could advise that you look about the place and see, if you can, what is meant by it all—what damage has been done. The wagon is still some distance away." Her shyness was fast disappearing. The ground she trod now was her own. He smiled down at her, finding her more natural, more prepossessing in that mood.

"I should have thought of that myself before this. After what you have told me of your dislike for the animals, I can hardly ask you to go with me, but I do not like to leave you here alone in the dark, for I must take the lantern; however, I can wait until the men get here."

"You don't need to wait at all," she said quickly. "I'll go with you, for I am curious to see what has been done—the cause of all this."

"Then come on," said the man briefly, turning toward the corral. She kept near him, her eyes following the bright rays of the lantern that swung in his hand. She feared that the boys had aimed too low, and was nervously anxious to see just what mischief had been done. Almost anything, she thought, would have been better than permitting those thousands of sheep to be piled up at the bottom of the cut-bank and the brutes of men to ride away satisfied with their dirty work.

Livingston examined the sheep while Hope, with a glance here and there about the enclosure, went to one side and looked at the panels carefully, discovering many bullet holes which told that her brave scouts, more bloodthirsty than she suspected, had aimed too low.

"I think this one is dead," said Livingston, dragging out a sheep from the midst of a number huddled in one corner. "Judging from the blood, I should say it is shot. A few are piled up over there from fright, but so many are sleeping that it will be impossible to determine the loss until morning. The loss is small; probably a hundred piled up and hurt, not more, from the looks of the band. I heard considerable firing, which lasted about a minute. I wonder if my friends about here thought they could kill off a band of sheep so easily."

Hope had not been searching for sheep, but for dead or wounded men, and finding none breathed easier. She thought of the man whose hand she had marked and who fell in such a panic among the sheep. It struck her as being a very funny incident, and laughed a little. Livingston heard the laugh and looked around in wonderment. He could see nothing amusing. This Western girl was totally different from any girl that he had known, English or American. She must possess a sense of humor out of all proportion with anything of his conception. He thought a few minutes before that he loved her, but she seemed far removed now—an absolute stranger. The boyish laugh annoyed him. His manner as he turned to her was quite as formally polite as ever her own had been. She resented it, naturally.

"Step outside, please, until I drive in the ones near the gate, so that I may close it."

Instinctively she obeyed, with a defiant look which was lost in the dimness of the night, and hurrying past him never stopped until she drew back with a shudder at the blanket-covered form of the dead herder. A deep roar of thunder startled her into a half-suppressed scream. In the lantern's light she had not noticed the steadily increasing darkness, or the flashes of lightning. She felt herself shaking with a nervous excitement which was half fear.

Thunderstorms often made her nervous, yet she would not have acknowledged that she feared them, or any other thing. But her nervousness was only the culmination of the night, every moment of which had been a strain upon her. Another peal of thunder followed the first, fairly weakening her. She ran to her horse and, mounting, rode up near the corral. At the same instant the wagon came up, and Livingston, having placed the panel in position, turned toward it. He was close beside the girl before he saw her, and she, for an instant at a loss, sat there speechless; but as he held up the lantern, looking at her by its light, she blurted out, in a tone that she had little intention of using: "I'm going. Hope you will get along all right. Good-night."

"Wait!" he exclaimed. "I will accompany you. My horse is here now. Just a moment——"

"You don't need to go with me. Someone is waiting for me down there. I think I hear a whistle."

"Then I will go along with you until you meet the person whose whistle you hear. You do not imagine that I will allow you to go alone?"

She leaned toward him impulsively, placing her hand down upon his shoulder.

"Listen," she said softly, "I heard no whistle. There is no one waiting for me. A moment ago it seemed easy to lie to you, to make you believe things that were not absolutely true, but I can't do it now, nor again—ever. You think I am heartless, a creature of stone—indifferent. It isn't so. My heart has held a little place for aching all these years. Think of me as half-witted,—idiotic,—but not that. Listen to me. You have such a heart—such tenderness—you are good and kind. You will understand me—or try to, and not be offended. I want to go home by myself. I must go back alone. There is a reason which I will tell you—sometime. I ask as a favor—as a friend to a friend, that you will stay behind."

"But are you not afraid?"

She interrupted him. "Afraid? Not I! Why, I was born here, and am a part of it, and it of me! Ask your men there, they know. I want to ride like the wind—alone—ahead of the storm, to get there soon. I am tired." Her low, quick speech bewildered him. Her words were too inconsistent, too hurried, to convey any real meaning.

"Will you ride with one of my men?" he asked.

"Oh, why can't you let me do as I wish!" she cried impatiently. "I want to go alone."

"It seems quite evident that you do not want my company, but one of the men must go and take a lantern. It's too dark to see the road." His tone was decisive.

She leaned toward him again. This time her words fell harshly.

"You are a man of your word?"

"I hope so; but that is not the issue just now."

"Then promise you will not go with me to-night."

"No need of that. I have decided to send one of my men—and I think," he added briefly, "that there is no necessity of prolonging this conversation. Good-evening."

"Then you will not come!" she exclaimed, relieved. "And never mind telling your man, for I shall ride like the wind, and will be halfway home before he can get on his horse." She turned like a flash. The quick beats of her horse's hoofs echoed back until the sound was lost in the distance.

Livingston stood silent, listening, until he could no longer hear the dull notes on the dry earth—his thoughts perturbed as the night.