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 tell of Cattle Kate?" He looked up with polite interest. The girl's lips tightened against an answer. Her eyes were alert against the unguessed objective of Original's attack.

"Well," he drawled in a voice that was musical in its odd cachinnations—"well, Cattle Kate was the only woman hung in the Big Country—up to date. She was hung for a hoss thief 'long with Old Man Averill."

Hilma started despite herself, then the angry flush deepened on her cheeks. She made an impatient gesture with her shoulders as if to challenge the man to do his worst, now that he had her prisoner.

"What have I to do with all this talk—Cattle Kate and Cattle Kate's country?" she defied. The man's face suddenly fell into serious lines, which a faint flickering of humor around the eyes almost belied.

"That 's my hoss you 're ridin', an' out in this country it 's always been a sort of custom that when somebody takes somebody else's hoss without saying so much as thank you there 's bound to be misunderstandings—sometimes misunderstandings right serious. Leastwise, that 's the law for men; we 've only had one woman hoss thief, like I was sayin'."