Page:The Cow Jerry (1925).pdf/256

 bought the cattle in, and whether he's done it?" Louise speculated.

"What could he do?" Maud asked with bitter emphasis. "He threw down the strongest hand a man ever held, and I'm here to tell you there ain't anybody around here that would go the limit Jim went to help a man he never saw before. Everything was all set here for a get-away; it couldn't shape up that lucky way once in a thousand times."

"I saw it that way at the time, too, but I seem to get a different slant on it, as the railroad men say, the more I turn it over in my mind. It was all right for Jim to have his men run them over the line, just as Tom said. They didn't belong to him. I expect Tom would have done as much for a friend.

"Yes, he might; I don't say he wouldn't. But there's something wrong with a man that won't take his own away from a thief."

"He did, Maud. You know very well—"

"Oh, that was different."

"It was because he'd be going against the law, and not an individual who had wronged him, that Tom wouldn't drive the cattle on to Texas, Maud."

"That kind of reason, or religion, or whatever it is, passes away high over my head, kid," said Maud, with the unfeeling rudeness of the range that sometimes came into her manner and speech.

"Let it go," said Louise, dismissing Laylander, his troubles, mistakes and morals, with the words.

It was hot and wearisome riding in the uncovered