Page:BM Bower - Her Prairie Knight.djvu/142

 "All right, then. I didn't think you'd go back on a fellow. And I tell you straight up, Sir Redmond Hayes, I'm not out touching matches to range land—not if it belonged to the devil himself. I've got some feeling for the dumb brutes that would have to suffer. You can get right to work hunting evidence, and be damned! You're dead welcome to all you can find; and in this part of the country you won't be able to buy much! You know very well you deserve to get your rope crossed, or you wouldn't be on the lookout for trouble. Come, boys; let's hit the trail. So long, Dick!"

Beatrice watched them troop off to their horses, heard them mount and go tearing off across the burned coulee bottom toward home. Dick came slowly over to her.

"I expect you're good and tired, sis. You've made a hand, all right, and helped us a whole lot, I can tell you. I'll drive now, and we'll hit the high places."

Beatrice smiled wanly. Not one of her Eastern acquaintances would have recognized Beatrice Lansell, the society beauty, in this remarkable-looking young woman, attired in a most haphazard fashion, with a face grimed like a chimney sweep, red 138