Page:Honore Willsie--Judith of the godless valley.djvu/167

 put up the real show of the day. Be satisfied before you are killed. Sioux is almost crazy."

Frank Day, who was one of the judges, now trotted up. "Doug is right, Jude."

"There's not a bit of danger," cried Jude, "if you men would do what you're told to do! Peter had to stop and look instead of hurrying as I told him."

Her eyes were full of tears. She dismounted slowly and after freeing Sioux from Doug's lariat, she led the uneasy bull before the grandstand and made her bow. Jimmy Day brought her a horse and, mounting, she trotted out of the corral followed by the now half-crazed Sioux.

The three men contestants laughingly refused to put on their exhibitions. There was no hope, they agreed, of competing successfully against Sioux and Judith; so Judith received the prize, a twenty-dollar gold piece.

The day ended with this award. It was some time before Douglas and Judith freed themselves from the crowd. John and Mary, still laughing over Peter's discomfiture, led the postmaster off that Mary might treat his really badly skinned face at the ranch. The ranchers who had come from distant valleys began to scatter toward the Pass. When at last Judith and Douglas, with their string of horses and the still unchastened Sioux, started up the trail toward the post-office, they were held up by a stranger in a smart, high-powered automobile.

"Listen, Miss Spencer," he called, "how about your riding in the rodeo at Mountain City, this fall?"

Doug and Judith both gasped. The rodeo at Mountain City was the ultimate and almost hopeless dream of every young rider.

"How do you know they'd let me in?" asked Judith.

"I'm chairman of the program committee this year,"