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 take a shot at one of them, they'd send you over the road."

"That's only a bluff. They haven't got any more rights inside the fence than they have outside."

"I don't know," shaking her head doubtfully. "They make everybody think they have, anyhow. Are you from the land office?"

"No; I'm a stranger here."

"Well, I'm darn glad you happened along, anyhow." She breathed out a big sigh of relief, looking at him gratefully. "We'd better go away from here—that fence-rider'll double back if he meets another one, and from the way he started off I think he had hopes. What are you going to do with his gun?"

"Leave it here. I don't want it."

"I think you'd better hold on to it till we leave the fence. You can stand it against a post, he'll find it."

She led her horse through the fence, refusing his offer to help her to the saddle, saying she would walk along with him if he was going her way. If that way led over to the settlements on the creek, he said. Sure; their ranch was the first one, about two miles east. She'd be glad to have him stop for dinner.

As they walked along the fence she explained her reason for coming to that spot to make a breach in the wire.

"I generally cut it along here, because I can see this hill from a good ways off when I'm comin' back. If there's anybody snoopin' around I come in below here and cut my way out in another place. That man's laid for me a long time, but he never caught me before to-day. I guess I'll have to go around after this."