30,000 on the Hoof

by

Zane Grey

CHAPTER ONE

General Crook and his regiment of the Western Division of the U.S. Army were cutting a road through the timber on the rim of the Mogollon Mesa above the Tonto Basin. They had as captives a number of Apache Indians, braves, squaws, and children, whom they were taking to be placed under guard on the reservation.

At sunset they made camp at the head of one of the canyons running away from the rim. It was a park-like oval, a little way down from the edge, rich with silver grass and watered by a crystal brook that wound under the giant pines. The noisy advent of the soldiers and their horses and pack-mules disturbed a troop of deer that trotted down the canyon to stop and look back, long ears erect.

Crook's campaign was about over and the soldiers were jubilant. They joked with the sombre-eyed Apaches, who sat huddled in a group under guard. Packs and saddles plopped to the grass, the ring of axes echoed through the forest, blue smoke curled up into sunset-flushed pines.

The general, never a stickler for customs of the service, sat with his captain and a sergeant, resting after the hard day, and waiting for supper.

"Wonder how old Geronimo is going to take this?" mused Crook.

"We haven't heard the last of thet redskin," replied Willis, emphatically. "He'll break out sooner or later, and then there'll be hell to pay."

"I'm glad we didn't have to kill any of these Apaches."

"We were lucky, General. I'll bet McKinney will burn powder before he stops thet Matazel an' his braves. Bad youngsters."

"Do you know Matazel, sergeant?" inquired Crook.

"I've seen him. Strappin' young buck. Only Indian I ever saw with grey eyes. He's said to be one of Geronimo's sons."

"Wal, McKinney won't stand any monkey business from thet outfit," added Willis. "He's collared them by this time. Huett knows the country. He'll track them to some hole in the woods."

"Good scout, Logan Huett, for so young a man. He has been invaluable in this campaign. I shall recommend him to my successor."

"Huett is through with army scout service after this campaign. He'll be missed if old Geronimo breaks out an' goes on the warpath. Fine woodsman. Best rifle-shot I ever saw."

"What is Huett going to do?"

"Told me he wanted to go home to Missouri for a while. He's got a girl, I reckon. But he's hipped on the West, an' will soon be back."

"He surely will," added the other officer. "Logan Huett was cut out for a pioneer."

"The West needs such men more than the Army... Hello, I hear shouts from above."

"Bet thet's McKinney now," said Willis, rising.

"Sure enough. I see horses an' army blue through the trees," added the sergeant.

Presently a squad of soldiers rode down into the glade. They had three mounted Indians with them and another on foot, a tall, lithe brave, straight as an arrow, whose bearing was proud. These captives were herded with the others. Sergeant McKinney reported to General Crook that he had secured Matazel and three of his companions. The others got away on foot.

"Any shooting?" queried the general.

"Yes, sir. We couldn't surprise them an' they showed fight. We have two men wounded, not serious."

"I hope you didn't kill any Indians."

"We didn't, to our knowledge."

"Send Huett to me."

The scout approached. He was a young man about twenty-three years old, dark of face. In fact he bore somewhat of a resemblance to Matazel, and he was so stalwart and powerfully built that he did not look tall.

"What's your report, Huett?"

"General, we made sure of getting Matazel alive," replied the scout, "otherwise none of them would have escaped...I guessed where Matazel's bunch was headed for. We cut in behind them, chased them into a box canyon, where we cornered them. They had but little ammunition, or we'd had a different story to tell."

"Don't dodge the main point, as McKinney did. Were there any Indians killed?"

"We couldn't find any dead ones."

"Willis, fetch this Apache to me."

In a few moments Matazel stood before the general, his arms crossed over his ragged buckskin shirt, his sombre eyes steady and inscrutable.

"You understand white man talk?" queried General Crook.

"No savvy," replied Matazel, sullenly.

"General, he can understand you an' speak a little English," spoke up the sergeant who knew Matazel.

"Did my soldiers kill any of your people?"

The Apache shook his head.

"But you would have killed us," said the general, severely. Matazel made a magnificent gesture that embraced the forest and the surrounding wilderness.

"White man steal red man's land," he said, loudly. "Pen Indian up. No horse. No gun. No hunt."

General Crook had no ready answer for that retort.

"You Indians will be taken care of," he said presently. "It's better for you to stay peaceably on the reservation with plenty to eat."

"No!" thundered the Apache. "Geronimo say better fight--better die!"

"Take him away," ordered the general, his face red. "Captain Willis, according to this Apache, it sounds as if old Geronimo will break out all right. You had it figured."

Before the sergeant led Matazel away the Indian bent a piercing glance upon the scout, Logan Huett, and stretching out a lean red hand he tapped Huett on the breast.

"You no friend Apache."

"What do you want, redskin?" demanded Huett, surprised and nettled. "I could have shot you. But I didn't. I obeyed orders, though I think the only good Indian is a dead one."

"You track Apache like wolf," said the Indian, bitterly. His eagle eyes burned with a superb and piercing fire. "Matazel live get even!"!

It was autumn before Logan Huett was released from his military duties, once more free to ride where he chose. Leaving the reservation with light pack behind his saddle, he crossed the Cibeque and headed up out of the manzanita, scrub oak and juniper to the cedars and pinons of the Tonto Rim.

The trail climbed gradually. That same day he reached the pines and the road General Crook had cut along the ragged edge of the great basin. Huett renewed his strong interest in this mesa. From the rim, its highest point some eight thousand feet above sea-level, it sloped back sixty miles to the desert. A singular feature about this cliff was, that it sheered abruptly down into the black Tonto Basin on the south, while the canyons that headed within a stone's throw of the crest all ran north. A few miles from their source there were deep grassy valleys with heavily timbered slopes. The ridges between the canyons bore a growth of pine and spruce, and the open parks and hollow swales had groves of aspen and thickets of maple. The region was a paradise for game. It had been the hunting-grounds of the Apache, and they had burned the grass and brush every year, making the forest open.

Back towards the Cibeque several cattle combines, notably the Hashknife outfit, ran herds of doubtful numbers on the lower slopes. At Pleasant Valley sheepmen and cattlemen were at odds over the grazing. Sooner or later they would clash.

Huett left that country far behind to the east. He travelled leisurely, camping in pretty spots, and on the third night, reached the canyon-head where he had brought Matazel and his Apache comrades to General Crook, which service practically ended the campaign.

He found where the soldiers had built their camp-fires, little heaps of white and lilac ashes in the grass. He thought of the sombre-eyed Matazel and remembered his threat.

At this lonely camp Huett fell back wholly into the content of his pondering dream. He had not enjoyed the military service. The range life he had led before his campaign suited him better. But he had long dreamed of being a cowboy for himself. The hard riding, the camp fare, the perilous work and adventure were much to his liking, but he had revolted against the noisy, bottle-loving, improvident louts with whom he had to ride.

He broiled turkey over the red coals of his dying aspen-wood fire. With salt, a hard biscuit, and a cup of coffee he thought he fared sumptuously. In that still autumn close of day, in the whispering forest, Logan Huett found himself: He might have been aware of the surpassing beauty of the glade, of the giant pines and silver spruce, of the white-and-gold aspen grove on the slope, of the spot of scarlet maple higher up, but he did not think of it that way. He was alone again. Slowly the pondering thought of his long-cherished plan faded into sensorial perceptions. The gusto with which he ate the hot turkey meat, the smell of the wood-smoke, the changing of the coloured shadows all about him, the tinkle of the little stream, the crack of deer or elk horns on a dead branch up the canyon, the whisper in the tips of the spruce, the watching, listening sense of his loneliness--these he felt with singularly sweet and growing vividness, but he did not think of them. He did not know that they accounted for his content. He never established any relation between them and the life of his ancestors or the primitive heritage they had left him.

He slept in his clothes, between his saddle-blankets, with his saddle for a pillow. When the fire burned down, the cold awakened him and he had to get up to replenish it. At dawn crackling white frost covered the grass. Going out to procure firewood, he saw bear-tracks in an open place. These had been made by a cinnamon, as he could tell by the narrow heel. A cinnamon bear was not the most welcome visitor a camper could have in those hills.

Huett made an early start and headed north down the canyon. Deer, elk, coyotes melted up the slopes at his approach. The tips of the pines high on the western ridge-crest turned gold, and gradually that bright hue descended. Not until the sun was on the grass in the canyon did he see any turkeys. After that he came upon flock after flock, one in particular being composed of huge old bronze-and-white gobblers, with red heads and long beards, wild from age and experience.

All this continual sight of game quickened his interest and speculation in a canyon he knew and which he was going to visit. For three years this canyon had been a subject of intensive thought.

He was not certain he could reach it that day, for he had much travel up and down the ridges which lay between. When he had journeyed perhaps a score of miles down from the rim and the canyon was widening and growing shallow, he took to the slope and headed west. Travel then was slow, up through brush and across ridge, around windfalls and down into another canyon. He kept this up for hours. Most of the larger canyons had seldom-ridden trails along the brooks that traversed them.

When the giant silver spruce trees that flourished only at high altitude began to fail Huett knew he was getting down country and perhaps too far north. He swerved more to the west. Dusk found him entering one of the endless little grassy parks. He camped, and found the night appreciably warmer. Next morning he was off at dawn.

About noon, in the full light of sun, Huett came out upon the edge of the canyon that he had run across while hunting three years before and had passed twice since, once in early winter. Compared with many of the great valleys he had crossed, this one was insignificant. But it had peculiar features, no doubt known only to himself, and which made it of extreme interest.

He had never ridden completely around this canyon or from end to end. This part that he had hit upon happened to be towards the south, and it was impossible to ride down into it from where he worked along the rim. He came at length to the great basin with which he was familiar. It had no outlet. The sparkling stream, shining like a ribbon, disappeared in the rocks under the south wall. Huett circumnavigated the basin, which, as far as he could determine, was the largest open pasture in the Mogollon forest. It was oblong in shape, of varying width, and miles long. All around the top ran a rim of grey or yellow limestone, an insignificant wall of rock crumbling, of no particular height, and certainly something few men would have looked at twice.

But for Logan Huett that band of rock possessed marvellous interest. It was a natural fence. Cattle could not climb out of this canyon. Here was a range large enough to run twenty, probably thirty thousand head of stock, without the need of riders. This canyon had haunted Logan Huett. Here his passion to be a cattleman could be realized, and without any particular capital he could build up a fortune.

Huett rode around the south side and up along the west, finding a few breaks that would have to be fenced. Heavy pine forest covered this western slope. Scarcely a mile back in the woods ran the road from. Flagstaff into the little hamlet of Payson, through the rough brakes of the Tonto, down to the Four Peak Range, and out to Phoenix. Settlers looking for ranges to homestead passed that point every summer; never dreaming of what Huett now saw--the most wonderful range in Arizona.

Apaches had once used this beautiful site for a hunting-camp. Huett had found arrow-heads there and bits of flint where some old savage had chipped his points. The brook made several turns between the gradually levelling slopes. Scattered pines trooped down to the deep blue pools. The bench on the east side had waited for ages for the homesteader to throw up his log cabin there. It was a level bit oft ground, above the swift bend of the stream, and marked by a few splendid pine trees. A magnificent spring gushed from the foot of the slope. Deer and elk trails led up through a wide break in the rock wall. This opening, and a larger one at the head of the canyon, were the only breaks in the upper half of the natural fence.

"I'll come back," soliloquized Huett, with finality. For so momentous a decision he showed neither passion nor romance. He had a life work set out before him. This was the place. He wasted no more time there, but rode across the flat below the bench, and climbed the west slope. At the summit he turned for one last look. His glance caught the white and bronze of the great sycamore tree shining among the pines. In honour of that tree Huett named his ranch Sycamore Canyon.

The early afternoon hour gave him hope that he could make Mormon Lake before night. The dusty road held to the levels of the dense pine forest, and Huett did not know the country well enough to try a short cut. Trotting his horse, with intervals of restful walk, he made good time.

A new factor suddenly engaged Logan's mind. He wanted a wife. The life of a lonely ranchman in the wilderness appealed strongly to him, but a capable woman would add immeasurably to his chances of success without interfering with his love of solitude. While he was employing the daylight hours with his labours and his hunting, she would be busy at household tasks and the garden.

Lucinda Baker would be his first choice. She had been sixteen years old when he left Independence, a robust, blooming girl, sensible and clever, and not too pretty. She had told him that she liked him better than any of her other friends. On the strength of that Logan had written her a few times during his absence, and had been promptly answered. Not for six months or more now, however, had he heard from Lucinda. She was teaching school, according to her last letter, and helping her ailing mother with the children. It crossed Logan's mind that she might have married someone else, or might refuse him; but it never occurred to him that if she accepted him he would be dooming her to a lonely existence in the wilderness.

Thinking of Lucinda Baker reminded Logan that he had not been much in the company of women. However, she had always seemed to understand him. As he rode along through the shady, silent forest, he remembered Lucinda with a warmth of pleasure.

By sunset that day Huett reached the far end of Mormon Lake, a muddy body of surface water, surrounded by stony, wooded bluffs. On the west and north sides there were extensive ranges of grass running arm-like into the forest. The Mormon settler who had given the lake its name had sold out to an Arizonian and his partner from Kansas.

"Wal, we got a good thing hyar," said the Westerner Holbert. "But what with the timber wolves an' hard winters we have tough sleddin'. You see, it's open range an' pretty high."

"Any neighbours?" asked Huett.

"None between hyar an' the Tonto. Jackson runs one of Babbitt's outfits down on Clear Creek. Thet heads in above Long Valley. Then there's Jeff an' Bill Warner, out on the desert. They run a lot of cattle between Clear Creek an' the Little Colorado. Towards Flagg my nearest neighbour is Dwight Collin. He has a big ranch ten miles in. An' next is Tim Mooney. Beyond St. Mary's Lake the settlers thicken up a bit."

"Any rustlers?"

"Wal, not any out-an'-out rustlers," replied Holbert evasively. "Rustler gangs have yet to settle in this section of Arizona."

"Wolves take toll of your calves, eh?"

"Cost me half a hundred head last winter. Did you ever hear of Killer Gray?"

"Not that I remember."

"Wal, you'd remember thet lofer, if you ever seen him. Big grey timber-wolf with a black ruff. He's got a small band an' he ranges this whole country."

"Why don't you kill him?"

"Huh! He's too smart for us. Jest natural cumin', for a young wolf."

"I like this Arizona timber-land," declared Huett, frankly, "And I'm set on a ranch somewhere south of the lake."

"Wal now, thet's interestin'. What did you say yore name was?"

"Logan Huett. I rode for several cattle outfits before I worked as scout and hunter for Crook in his Apache campaign."

"I kinda reckoned you was a soldier," returned Holbert genially. "Wal, Huett, you're as welcome out hyar as May flowers. I hope you don't locate too far south of us. It's shore lonely, an' in winter we're snowed in some seasons for weeks."

"Thanks. I'll pick me out a range down in the woods where it's not so cold...Would you be able to sell me a few cows and heifers, and a bull?"

"I shore would. An' dirt cheap, too, 'cause thet'd save me from makin' a drive to town before winter comes."

"Much obliged, Holbert. I've saved my wages. But they won't last long. I'll pick up the cattle on my way back."

"Good. An' how soon, Huett?"

"Before the snow flies."

All the way into Flagg next day Logan's practical mind resolved a daring query. Why not wire Lucinda to come West to marry him? He resisted this idea, repudiated it, but it returned all the stronger. Logan's mother had not long survived his father. He had a brother and sister living somewhere in Illinois. Therefore since he had no kindred ties, he did not see why it would not be politic to save the time and expense that it would take to get him to Missouri. He had already bought cattle. He was eager to buy horses, oxen, wagon, tools, guns, and hurry back to Sycamore Canyon. The more time he had in Flagg the better bargains he could find.

Flagg was a cattle and lumber town, important since the advent of the railroad some half-dozen years previously. It had grown since Huett's last visit. The main block presented a solid front of saloons and gambling-halls--places Logan resolved to give a wide berth. He was no longer a cowboy. Some man directed him to a livery-stable, where he turned over his horse. Next he left his pack at a lodging-house and hunted up a barber-shop. It was dusk when he left there. The first restaurant he encountered was run by a Chinaman and evidently a rendezvous for cowboys, of which the town appeared full. Logan ate and listened.

After supper he strolled down to the railroad station, a rude frame structure in the centre of a square facing the main street. Evidently a train was expected. The station and platform presented a lively scene with cowboys, cattle-men, railroad men, Indians, and Mexicans moving about, Logan's walk became a lagging one, and ended short of the station-house. It seemed to him that there might be something amiss in telegraphing Lucinda such a blunt and hurried proposal. But he drove this thought away, besides calling upon impatience to bolster up his courage. It could do no harm. If Lucinda refused he would just have to go East after her. Logan bolted into the station and sent Lucinda a telegram asking her to come West to marry him.

When the deed was done irrevocably, Logan felt appalled. He strode up town and tried to forget his brazen audacity in the excitement of the gambling-games. He suppressed a strong inclination towards drink. Liquor had never meant much to Logan, but it was omnipresent here in this hustling, loud cow town, and he felt its influence. Finally he went back to the lodging-house and to bed. He felt tired--something unusual for him--and his mind whirled.

The soft bed was conducive to a long, restful sleep. Logan awoke late, arose leisurely, and dressed for the business of the day. Presently he recalled with a little shock just how important a day it was to be in his life. But he did not rush to the telegraph office. He ate a hearty breakfast, made the acquaintance of a droll Arizona cowboy, and then reluctantly and fearfully went to see if there was any reply to his telegram. The operator grinned at Logan and drawled as he handed out a yellow envelope: "Logan Huett. There shore is a heap of a message for you."

Logan took the envelope eagerly, as abashed as a schoolboy, and the big brown hands that could hold a rifle steady as a rock shook perceptibly as he tore it open and read the brief message. He gulped and read it again: "Yes! If you come after me--Lucinda."

An unfamiliar sensation assailed him, as he moved away to a seat. Then he felt immensely grateful to Lucinda. He read her message again. The big thing about the moment seemed the certainty that he was to have a wife--provided he went back to Missouri after her. That he would do. But it flashed across his mind that as Lucinda had accepted him upon such short blunt notice, she really must care a good deal for him, and if she did she would come West to marry him. Under the impulse of the inspiration he went to the window and began a long telegram to Lucinda, warm with gratitude at her acceptance and stressing the value of time, that winter was not far away, the need of economy; the splendid opportunity he had, ending with an earnest appeal for her to come West at once. Logan did not even read the message over, but sent it rushed up town.

"I've a hunch--she'll come--and I'm dog-gone lucky," he panted.

That day he spent in making a list of the many things he would need and the few he would be able to buy. Rifles, shells, axes, blankets, food supplies and cooking utensils, a wagon and horses, or mules, he had to have. Then he hurried from his lodging-house to make these imperative purchases. Prices were reasonable, which fact encouraged him. During the day he met and made friends with a blacksmith from Missouri named Hardy. Hardy had tried farming, and had fallen back upon his trade. He offered Logan a wagon, a yoke of oxen, some farming tools, and miscellaneous hardware for what Huett thought was a sacrifice. That bargain ended a day that had passed along swiftly.

"My luck's in," exulted Logan, and on the strength of that belief he hurried to the railroad station. Again there was a telegram for him. Before he opened it he knew Lucinda would come. Her brief reply was: "Leave to-morrow. Arrive Tuesday. Love. Lucinda."

"Now, there's a girl!" ejaculated Huett, in great relief and satisfaction. Then he stared at the word "love." He had forgotten to include that in either of his telegrams. As a matter of fact the sentiment love had not occurred to him. But still, he reflected, a man would have to be all sorts of a stick not to respond to one such as Lucinda Baker. Logan recalled with strong satisfaction that she had not been very popular with certain boys because she would not spoon. He had liked her for that. All at once his satisfaction and gladness glowed into something strange and perturbing. The fact of her coming to marry him grew real; he must try to think of that as well as the numberless things important towards the future of his ranch.

The next day, Saturday, saw Huett labour strenuous hours between daylight and dark. Sunday at the blacksmith's he packed and helped his friend rig a canvas cover over the wagon. This would keep the contents dry and serve as a place to sleep during the way down. Monday, finding he still had a couple of hundred dollars left, Logan bought horse and saddle, some tinned goods, and dried fruits, a small medicine-case, some smoking tobacco, and last a large box of candy for his prospective bride.

This present bought him to the very necessary consideration of how and where he could be married. Here the blacksmith again came to his assistance. There was a parson in town who would "hitch you up pronto for a five-dollar gold piece!"

Two overland trains rolled in from the East every day, the first arriving at eight-thirty in the morning, and the second at ten in the evening.. On board one of these to-day would be Lucinda Baker.

"Hope she comes on the early one," said Logan aloud, when he presented himself at the station far ahead of time. "We can get the 'hitch pronto,' as Hardy calls it, and be off to-day."

It did not take Logan long to discover that the most important daily event in Flagg was the arrival of this morning train. The platform might have been a promenade, to the annoyance of the railroad men. Logan leaned against the hitching-rail and waited. Obstreperous cowboys clanked along with their awkward stride, ogling the girls. Mexicans, with blanketed shoulders, lounged about, their sloe-black eyes watchful, while handsome Navajo braves, with colourful bands around their heads, padded to and fro with their moccasined tread. Lucinda would be much impressed by them, thought Logan.

The train whistled from around the pine-forested bend. Logan felt a queer palpitation that he excused as unusual eagerness and gladness. Small wonder--a fellow's bride came only once!

Presently Logan saw the dusty brown train, like a long, scaly snake coiling behind a puffing black head, come into sight to straighten out and rapidly draw near. The engine passed with a steaming roar. Logan counted the cars. Then with a grinding of steel on steel the train come to a halt.

CHAPTER TWO

Lucinda Baker's dreams of romance and adventure had been secrets no one had ever guessed; but none of them had ever transcended this actual journey of hers to the far West to become the wife of her girlhood sweetheart. Yet it seemed she had been preparing for some incredible adventure ever since Logan had left Independence. How else could she account for having become a school teacher at sixteen, working through the long vacations, her strong application to household duties? She had always known that Logan Huett would never return home again, and that the great unknown West had claimed him. For this reason, if any, she had been training herself to become a pioneer's wife.

She was thrillingly happy. She had left her family well and comfortable. She was inexpressibly glad to be away from persistent suitors. She was free to be herself--the half-savage, yearning creature she knew under her skin. Steady, plodding, dutiful, unsentimental Lucinda Baker was relegated to the past.

Kansas in autumn was one vast, seared, rolling prairie, dotted with hamlets and towns along the steel highway. Lucinda grew tired watching the endless roll and stretch of barren land. She interested herself in her fellow-passengers and their children, all simple middle-class people like herself, journeying West to take up that beckoning life of the ranges. But what she saw of Colorado before dark, the grey, swelling slopes towards the heave and bulk of dim mountains, gave her an uneasy, awesome premonition of a fearful wildness and ruggedness of Nature much different from the pictures she-had imagined. She awoke in New Mexico, to gaze in rapture at its silver valleys, its dark forests, its sharp peaks white against the blue.

But Arizona, the next day, crowned Lucinda's magnified expectations. During the night the train had traversed nearly half of this strange, glorious wilderness of purple land. Sunshine, Canyon Diablo were but wayside stations. Were there no towns in this tremendous country? Her query to the porter brought the information that Flagg was the next stop, two hours later. Yet still Lucinda feasted her gaze and tried not to think of Logan. Would he disappoint her? She had loved him since she was a little girl when he had rescued her from some beastly boys who had dragged her into a mud puddle. But not forgetting Logan's few and practical, letters, she argued that his proposal of marriage was conclusive.

What changes would this hard country have wrought in Logan Huett? What would it do to her? Lucinda gazed with awe and fear out across this purple land, monotonous for leagues on leagues, then startling with magnificent red walls, towering and steep, that wandered away into the dim, mystic blue, and again shooting spear-pointed, black-belted peaks skyward; and once the vista was bisected by a deep, narrow yellow gorge, dreadful to gaze down into and justifying its diabolic name.

After long deliberation Lucinda reasoned that Logan probably would not have changed much from the serious, practical boy to whom action was almost as necessary as breathing. He would own a ranch somewhere close to a town, perhaps near Flagg, and he would have friends among these westerners. In this loyal way Lucinda subdued her qualms and shut her eyes so she could not see the dense, monotonous forest the train had entered. Surrendering to thought of Logan then, she found less concern in how she would react to him than how he would discover her. Lucinda knew that she had grown and changed more after fifteen than was usual in girls. What her friends and family had said about her improvement, and especially the boys who had courted her, was far more flattering than justified, she felt. But perhaps it might be enough to make Logan fail to recognize her.

A shrill whistle disrupted Lucinda's meditation. The train was now clattering down-grade and emerging from the green into a clearing. A trainman opened the coach-door to call out in sing-song voice: "Flagg. Stop five minutes."

Lucinda's eyes dimmed. She wiped them so that she could see out. The forest had given place to a ghastly area of bleached and burned stumps of trees. That led to a huge, hideous structure with blue smoke belching from a great boiler-like chimney. Around it and beyond were piles of yellow lumber as high as houses. This was a sawmill. Lucinda preferred the forest to this crude and raw evidence of man's labours. Beyond were scattered little cabins made of slabs and shacks, all dreary and drab, unrelieved by any green.

As the train slowed down with a grind of wheels there was a noisy bustle in the coach. Many passengers were getting off here. Lucinda marked several young girls, one of them pretty with snapping eyes, who were excited beyond due. What would they have shown had they Lucinda's cue for feeling? She felt a growing tumult within, but outwardly she was composed.

When the train jarred to a stop, Lucinda lifted her two grips on to the seat and crossed the aisle to look out on that side. She saw up above the track a long block of queer, high, board-fronted buildings all adjoining. They fitted her first impression of Flagg. Above the town block loomed a grand mountain, black and white in its magnificent aloof distance. Lucinda gasped at the grandeur of it. Then the moving and colourful throng on the platform claimed her quick attention.

First she saw Indians of a different type, slender, lithe, with cord bands around their black hair. They had lean, clear-cut faces, sombre as masks. Mexicans in huge sombreros lolled in the background.

Then Lucinda's swift gaze alighted upon a broad-shouldered, powerfully built young man, in his shirt sleeves and with his blue jeans tucked in high boots. Logan! She sustained a combined shock and thrill. She would have known that strong, tanned face anywhere. He stood bareheaded, with piercing eyes on the alighting passengers. Lucinda felt a rush of pride. The boy she knew had grown into a man, hard, stern, even in that expectant moment. But he was more than merely handsome. There appeared to be something proven about him.

Lucinda suddenly realized she must follow the porter, who took her grips, out of the coach. She could not resist a pat to her hair and a readjustment of her hat. Then she went out.

The porter was not quick enough to help her down the steep steps. That act was performed gallantly by a strange, youthful individual, no less than Lucinda's first cowboy, red-haired, keen-faced, with a blue dancing devil in his eyes. He squeezed her arm.

"Lady, air yu meetin' anyone?" he queried, as if his life depended on her answer.

Lucinda looked over his head as if he had not been there. But she liked him. Leaving her grips where the porter had set them, she walked up the platform, passing less than ten feet from Logan. He did not recognize her. That failure both delighted and frightened her. She would return and give him another chance.

She walked a few rods up the platform, and when she turned back she was revelling in the situation. Logan Huett had sent for his bride, and did not know her when she looked point-blank at him. He had left his post at the rail. She located him coming up the platform. A moment later she found herself an object of undisguised speculation by three cowboys, one of whom was the red-head.

Lucinda slowed her pace. It would be fun to accost Logan before these bold westerners. This was an unfortunate impulse, as through it she heard remarks that made her neck and face burn.

Logan had halted just beyond the red-haired cowboy. His grey glance took Lucinda in from head to foot and back again--a swift, questioning, baffled look. Then Lucinda swept by the cowboys and spoke:

"Logan, don't you know me?"

"Ah!--no, you can't be her," he blurted out. "Lucinda! It is you!"

"Yes, Logan. I knew you from the train."

He made a lunge for her, eager and clumsy, and kissed her heartily, missing her lips. "To think I didn't know my old sweetheart!" His grey eyes, that had been like bits of ice glistening in the sun, shaded and softened with a warm, glad light that satisfied Lucinda's yearning heart.

"Have I changed so much?" she asked, happily, and that nameless dread broke and vanished in the released tumult within her breast.

"Well, I should smile you have," he said. "Yet, somehow you're coming back...Lucinda, the fact is I didn't expect so--so strapping and handsome a girl."

"That's a doubtful compliment, Logan," she replied with a laugh. "But I hope you like me."

"I'm afraid I do--powerful much," he admitted. "But I'm sort of taken back to see you grown up into a lady, stylish and dignified."

"Wouldn't you expect that from a school teacher?"

"I'm afraid I don't know what to expect. But in a way, out here, your school teaching may come in handy."

"We have to get acquainted and find out all about each other," she said, naively.

"I should smile--and get married in the bargain, all in one day."

"All to-day?"

"Lucinda, I'm in a hurry to go," he replied, anxiously. "I've bought my outfit and we'll leave town--soon as we get it over."

"Well...of course we must be married at once. But to rush away...It isn't far--is it--your ranch? I hope near town."

"Pretty far," he rejoined. "Four days, maybe five with oxen and cattle."

"Is it out there--in the--the...? she asked, faintly, with a slight gesture towards the range.

"South sixty miles. Nice drive most of the way, after we leave town."

"Forest--like that the train came through?"

"Most of the way. But there are lakes, sage flats, desert. Wonderful country."

"Logan, of course you're located--near a town?" she faltered.

"Flagg is the closest," he answered, patiently, as if she were a child.

Lucinda bit her lips to hold back an exclamation of dismay. Her strong, capable hands trembled slightly as she opened her pocket-book. "Here are my checks. I brought a trunk and a chest. My hand-baggage is there."

"Trunk and chest! Golly, where'll I put them? We'll have a wagon-load," he exclaimed, and taking the checks he hailed an express-man outside the rail. He gave him instructions, pointing out the two bags on the platform, then returned to Lucinda.

"Dear! You're quite pale," he said anxiously. "Tired from the long ride?"

"I'm afraid so. But I'll be--all right...Take me somewhere."

"That I will. To Babbitts', where you can buy anything from a needle to a piano. You'll be surprised to see a bigger store than there is in Kansas City."

"I want to get some things I hadn't time for."

"Fine. After we buy the wedding-ring. The parson told me not to forget that."

Lucinda kept pace with his stride up town. But on the moment she did not evince her former interest in cowboys and westerners in general, nor the huge, barnlike store he dragged her into. She picked out a plain wedding-ring and left it on her finger as if she was afraid to remove it. Logan's earnest face touched her. For his sake she fought the poignant and sickening sensations that seemed to daze her.

"Give me an hour here--then come after me," she said.

"So long! Why, for goodness' sake?"

"I have to buy a lot of woman's things."

"Lucinda, my money's about gone," he said, perturbed. "It just melted away. I put aside some to pay Holbert for cattle I bought at Mormon Lake."

"I have plenty, Logan. I saved my salary," she returned, smilingly. But she did not mention the five hundred dollars her uncle had given her for a wedding-present. Lucinda had a premonition she would need that money.

"Good! Lucinda, you always were a saving girl...Come, let's get married pronto. Then you come back here while I repack that wagon." He slipped his arm under hers and hustled her along. How powerful he was, and what great strides he took! Lucinda wanted to cry out for a little time to adjust herself to this astounding situation. But he hurried her out of the store and up the street, talking earnestly. "Here's a list of the stuff I bought for our new home. Doesn't that sound good? Aw, I'm just tickled...Read it over. Maybe you'll think of things I couldn't. You see, we'll camp out while we're throwing up our log cabin. We'll live in my big canvas-covered wagon--a regular prairie-schooner--till we get the cabin up. We'll have to hustle, too, to get that done before the snow flies...It's going to be fun--and heaps of work--this start of mine at ranching. Oh, but I'm glad you're such a strapping girl!...Lucinda, I'm lucky. I mustn't forget to tell you how happy you've made me. I'll work for you. Some day I'll be able to give you all your heart could desire."

"So we spend our honeymoon in a prairie-schooner!" she exclaimed, with a weak laugh.

"Honeymoon?--So we do. I never thought of that. But many a pioneer girl has done so...Lucinda, if I remember right, you used to drive horses. Your Dad's team?"

"Logan, I drove the buggy," she rejoined, aghast at what she divined was coming.

"Same thing. You drove me home from church once. And I put my arm around you. Remember?"

"I must--since I am here."

"You can watch me drive the oxen, and learn on the way to Mormon Lake. There I have to take to the saddle and rustle my cattle through. You'll handle the wagon."

"What!--Drive a yoke of oxen? Me!"

"Sure. Lucinda, you might as well start right in. You'll be my partner. And I've a hunch no pioneer ever had a better one. We've got the wonderfullest range in Arizona. Wait till you see it! Some day we'll run thirty thousand head of cattle there...Ah, here's the parson's house. I darn near overrode it. Come, Lucinda. If you don't back out pronto it'll be too late."

"Logan--I'll never--back out," she whispered, huskily. She felt herself drawn into the presence of kindly people who made much over her, and before she could realize what was actually happening she was made the wife of Logan Huett. Then Logan, accompanied by the black-bearded blacksmith Hardy, dragged her away to see her prairie-schooner home. Lucinda recovered somewhat on the way. There would not have been any sense in rebelling even if she wanted to. Logan's grave elation kept her from complete collapse. There was no denying his looks and actions of pride in his possession of her.

At sight of the canvas-covered wagon Lucinda shrieked with hysterical laughter, which Logan took for mirth. It looked like a collapsed circus-tent hooped over a long box on wheels. When she tiptoed to peep into the wagon a wave of strongly contrasted feeling flooded over her. The look, the smell of the jumbled wagon-load brought Lucinda rudely and thrillingly to the other side of the question. That wagon reeked with an atmosphere of pioneer enterprise, of adventure, of struggle with the soil and the elements.

"How perfectly wonderful!" she cried, surrendering to that other self. "But Logan, after you pack my baggage in here--where will we sleep?"

"Doggone it! We'll sure be loaded, 'specially if you buy a lot more. But I'll manage some way till we get into camp. Oh, I tell you, wife, nothing can stump me!...I'll make room for you in there, and I'll sleep on the ground."

"Haw! haw!" roared the black-bearded giant. "Thet's the pioneer spirit."

"Logan, I daresay you'll arrange it comfortably for me, at least," said Lucinda, blushing. "I'll run back to the store now. Will you pick me up there? You must give me plenty of time and be prepared to pack a lot more."

"Better send it out here," replied Logan scratching his chin thoughtfully.

"Mrs. Huett, you'll change your clothes before you go?" inquired the blacksmith's comely wife. "That dress won't do for campin' oot on this desert. You'll spoil its an' freeze in the bargain."

"You bet she'll change," interposed Logan, with a grin. "I'd never forget that...Lucinda, dig out your old clothes before I pack these bags."

"I didn't bring any old clothes," retorted Lucinda.

"And you going to drive oxen, cook over a wood fire, sleep on hay, and a thousand other pioneer jobs?...Well, while you're at that buying don't forget jeans and socks and boots--a flannel shirt and heavy coat--and a sombrero to protect your pretty white face from the sun. And heavy gloves, my dear, and a silk scarf to keep the dust from choking you."

"Oh, is that all?" queried Lucinda, soberly. "You may be sure I'll get them."

Hours later Lucinda surveyed herself before Mrs. Hardy's little mirror, and could not believe the evidence of her own eyes. But the blacksmith's good wife expressed pleasure enough to assure Lucinda that from her own point of view she was a sight to behold. Yet when had she ever felt so comfortable as in this cowboy garb?

"How'll I ever go out before those men?" exclaimed Lucinda, in dismay. A little crowd had collected round the prairie-schooner, to the back of which Logan appeared to be haltering his horses.

"My dear child, all women oot heah wear pants an' ride straddle," said Mrs. Hardy, with mild humour. "I'll admit you look more fetchin' than most gurls. But you'll get used to it."

"Fetching?" repeated Lucinda, dubiously. Then she packed away the travelling-dress, wondering if or when she would ever wear it again. The western woman read her mind.

"Settlers oot on the range don't get to town often," she vouchsafed, with a smile. "But they do come, an' like it all the better. Be brave now, an' take your medicine, as we westerners say. Yore man will make a great rancher, so Hardy says. Never forget thet the woman settler does the bigger share of the work, an' never gets the credit due her."

"Thank you, Mrs. Hardy," replied Lucinda, grateful for sympathy anti advice. "I begin to get a glimmering. But I'll go through with it...Good-bye."

Lucinda went out, carrying her bag, and she tried to walk naturally when she had a mad desire to run.

"Whoopee!" yelled Logan.

If they had been alone that startling tribute to her attire would have pleased Lucinda. Anything to rouse enthusiasm or excitement in this strange, serious husband! But to call attention to her before other men, and worse, before some wild, ragged little imps--that was signally embarrassing.

"Hey, lady," piped up one of the boys, "fer cripes' sake, don't ya stoop over in them pants!"

That sally elicited a yell of mirth from Logan. The other men turned their backs with hasty and suspicious convulsions. Lucinda hurried on with burning face.

"Jiminy, she'll make a hot tenderfoot cowgirl," called out another youngster.

Lucinda gained the wagon without loss of dignity, except for her blush, which she hoped the wide-brimmed sombrero would hide. She stowed her bag under the seat and stepped up on the hub of the wheel. When she essayed another hasty step, from the hub to the high rim of the wheel, she failed and nearly fell. Her blue jeans were too tight. Then Logan gave her a tremendous boost. She landed on the high seat, awkwardly but safely, amid the cheers of the watchers. From this vantage-point Lucinda's adventurous spirit and sense of humour routed her confusion and fury. She looked down upon her glad-eyed husband and the smiling westerners, and then at those devilish little imps.

"You were all tenderfeet once," she said to the men, with a laugh, and then shook her finger at the urchins. "I've spanked many boys as big as you."

Logan climbed up on the other side to seize a short stick, with a long leather thong:

"Hardy, how do you drive these oxen?" called Logan, as if remembering an important item at the last moment.

"Wal, Logan, thar's nothin' to thet but gadep, gee, whoa, an' haw," replied the blacksmith, with a grin. "Easy as pie. They're a fine trained brace."

"Adios, folks. See you next spring," called Logan, and cracked the whip with a yell: "Gidap!"

The oxen swung their huge heads together and moved. The heavy wagon rolled easily. Lucinda waved to the blacksmith's wife, and then at the boys. Their freckled faces expressed glee and excitement. The departure of that wagon meant something they felt but did not understand. One of them cupped his hands round his mouth to shrill a last word to Lucinda.

"All right, lady. Yu can be our schoolmarm an' spank us if you wear them pants!"

Lucinda turned quickly to the front. "Oh, the nerve of that little rascal!...Logan, what's the matter with my blue-jeans--pants--that boys should talk so?"

"Nothing. They're just great. Blue-jeans are as common out here as flapjacks. But I never saw such a--a revealing pair as yours."

The oxen plodded along, the canvas-covered wagon rolled down the side street. It must have been an ordinary sight in Flagg, because the few passers-by did not look twice at it. Lucinda felt relieved at escaping more curiosity and ridicule. What would that trio of cowboys have said? Logan drove across the railroad, on over a rattling wooden bridge, by the cottages and cabins, and at last by the black-and-yellow sawmill.

"Darling, we're off!" exclaimed Logan, quite suddenly, and he placed a powerful hand over hers. With the whip he pointed south beyond the hideous slash of forest, to the dim blur of range beyond. His voice sang deep and rich with emotion. "We're on our way to my ranch--to our home in Sycamore Canyon."

"Yes, Logan. I gathered something of the kind...I'm very happy," she replied, softly, surprised and moved by his term of endearment and the manifestation of strong feeling.

"I've just lived for this. It's what I worked for--saved my money for. Down there hides my canyon--the grandest range for cattle--grass and water--all fenced. And here's my outfit all paid for. And, last and best, the finest little woman who ever came out to help build up the West!"

Lucinda settled back happily. She had misjudged Logan's appreciation of her and her sacrifice, if not his absorption in his passion for the cattle-range. But she could forgive that, respect it, and cleave to him with joy now that she knew he loved her.

The road wound through the denuded forest-land, dry but not dusty, and down-grade enough to make an easy pull for the oxen. A sweet, musty fragrance came on the slight, warm breeze. It grew from pleasant to exhilarating, and Lucinda asked her husband what it was. Dry Arizona, he replied--a mixture of sage, cedar, pinon, and pine. Lucinda liked it, which was all she did like on that six-mile drive out to the forest. Here the cabins and pastures, with their crude fences of poles, appeared to end. Driving into the forest was like entering a green-canopied, brown-pillared tunnel. It was still, shadowed, lighted by golden shafts, and strangely haunting. Lucinda was affected by a peculiar feeling she could not define. It had to do with a strange sense of familiarity when she had never before been in a forest.

Before sunset Logan drove into a wide-open place. "We'll camp on the far side," he said. "Water and grass. And firewood--well, Lucinda, we'll never be in want for firewood."

They halted under great pines that stood out from the wall of forest. Wrecks of trees that Logan called windfalls lay about, some yellow and splintered still, others old and grey, falling to decay. Logan leaped down, and when Lucinda essayed to follow, he lifted her down with a hug. "Now, tenderfoot wife, tight pants and all, you can begin!" he said, gaily. But he did not tell her what to begin, and Lucinda stood there stupidly while he unyoked the oxen, turned them loose, then started to lift bags and boxes out of the wagon. He lifted her trunk down with such ease that Lucinda marvelled, remembering how her father had to have help in moving it.

"That'll go under the wagon," he said. "Don't worry. I'll cover it. But the rains are past, Lucinda. What we get next will be snow. Whew! Does it snow and blow!"

"Logan, I hate wind and I don't like snow."

"I daresay. You'll get over that in Arizona...Now, Lucinda, you watch me and learn." He spread a heavy canvas on the grass. Then from a box he took canvas bags of varying sizes, which he set down side by side. He emptied a burlap sack of jangling things that proved to be funny little iron kettles with lids, coffee-pot, skillet, pans and plates, cups of tin, and other utensils. Then he loosened several buckets that fitted one into the other. These he plunged into the brook, to swing out brimming full of water. All his movements were quick, vigorous, yet deft. It was wonderful to watch him ply an axe. Chips and splinters and billets flew. as if by magic. He built a roaring fire, explaining that it must burn down to a bed of red coals. Next, like a juggler, he produced washbasin, soap, and towel, and thoroughly washed his hands..."Most important of all," he said with a grin. "Now watch me mix sourdough biscuits." She did watch the procedure with intense interest. Here was her husband encroaching on the preserves of a housewife. But she was fascinated. He was efficient, he was really wonderful to a tenderfoot girl. To see that brawny-shouldered young man on his knees before a pan of flour and water, to watch his big brown hands skilfully mix the dough was a revelation to Lucinda. With the further preparation of the meal he was equally skilful. She sat down cross-legged, despite the tight breeches, and most heartily enjoyed her first supper in Arizona. She was famished. Logan had forgotten to take her to lunch. Ham and eggs, biscuits and coffee, with canned peaches for dessert, and finally the big box of candy that Logan produced from somewhere, as an especial present on that day--these certainly satisfied more than hunger for Lucinda.

"Logan, you amaze me. You're a splendid cook," she said. "It's just fine to think I won't have to cook and bake."

"Ha! ha! No you won't at all!" he ejaculated, gaily. "But I'm gad you see I can do it...Now we'll clear up. I'll wash, and you dry."

After these chores were finished Logan went into the woods with an axe, to come forth burdened under an immense load of green, fragrant boughs. This he threw down beside the wagon. Then he unrolled a canvas to take out blankets.

"There's hardly enough room in the wagon for you to sleep, let alone me," he said. "I'll make my bed on the ground. If skunks and coyotes, scorpions, tarantulas, and sidewinders come around, they'll get me first. Ha! ha! But really they're not to be laughed at. I won't take any risk of you being bitten, especially by a hydrophobia skunk. You're too doggone precious. I'd never find another woman like you."

Lucinda said nothing. His words, like his actions, were so natural, so inevitable. Yet he showed fine feeling. She was a bride, and this was her wedding-night. Dusk came trooping out of the forest. She heard a sough of wind in the pines, an uneasy, breathing, melancholy sound. How lonely! She shivered a little. Logan's observations were keen. He fetched her heavy coat. Then he threw a bundle of the green pine foliage into the wagon, and some blankets, and climbed in the door after them. Lucinda heard him rummaging around at a great rate. Presently he leaped out, his hair rumpled.

"There! All you got to do is use your coat for a pillow, take off your boots, crawl under the blankets, and you'll be jake...Well, the day is done. Our first day!...Now for a smoke. Lucinda, better stretch your legs a little before we turn in."

She walked under the pines, along the brook, out into the open. But she did not go far. The windfalls, the clumps of sage might harbour some of the varmints Logan feared. She looked back to see he had replenished the camp fire. He stood beside it, a tall, dark, stalwart figure, singularly fitting this unfamiliar scene. There appeared to be something wild and raw, yet thrilling about it. The flames lighted up the exquisite lacy foliage of the pines. Sparks flew upwards. The great white wagon loomed like a spectre. Black always depressed Lucinda, but white frightened her. Logan stood there spreading his hands...He was splendid, she thought. She could well transfer the love she had given him as a boy to the grown man, for Logan had matured beyond his years. In repose his face showed fine, stern lines. He had suffered pain, hardship, if not grief. Lucinda's fears of Logan vanished like the columns of smoke blowing away into the darkness. She had vague fears of this West, and she divined they would be magnified and multiplied, but never would there be a fear of Logan Huett. Whatever it would cost her, she was glad she had answered to his call for a mate, and she would try to make herself a worthy one.

She returned to the fire and warmed her hands over the blaze. How quickly the air had chilled!

"I never knew how good fire could feel," she said, laughing.

"Ha! You said a lot." Then he drew her to a seat on the log near by. He removed his pipe and knocked the ashes from it. "Lucinda,' I'm not much of a fellow to talk," he said, earnestly, with the light from the fire playing on his dark strong face and in his clear grey eyes. "Sure, I'll talk your head off about cattle and range, bears and cougars, Indians and all that's wild. But I mean the--the deep things--the things here----" and he tapped his broad breast. "I've got them here, only they're hard to say...Anyway, words would never tell how I appreciate your leaving your people, your friends and civilized comforts, to come out to this wild Arizona range. To be my wife--my pardner I It's almost too good to be true. And I love you for it...I reckon I was selfish to make you come to me and rush you at that. But you'll forgive me when you see our ranch--the work that's to be done--and winter coming fast...You're only a young girl, Lucinda. Only eighteen! And I feel shame to think what you must have overcome--before you accepted. But, my dear, don't fear I'll rush you into real wifehood--you know, like I did into marriage. All in good time, Lucinda, when you feel you know me as I am now, and love me, and want to come to me...That's all, little girl. Kiss me good night and go to your bed in our prairie-schooner."

Lucinda did as she was bidden, relieved and comforted as she had not thought possible except after long trial. She peeped out to see Logan in the flickering firelight. Then she crawled under the warm woollen blankets. How strange! How marvellous to be there! She would not have exchanged that bed, and the canvas roof with its moving weird shadows, for the palace of a princess. But the wind moaned through the pines--moaned of the terrible loneliness, the distance, the wildness of this West.

CHAPTER THREE

Lucinda awakened some time in the night, coming out of a dream of a strange, pale place, where she wandered down empty, echoing streets, fearful lest she should be seen in her boy's garb. The night was pitch dark and silent as the grave. The crickets, the wind, the brook had all but ceased their sounds. She was cold despite the blankets. She lay there shivering while the black canopy of the canvas changed to grey. Soon she heard sharp, weird, piercing yelps, wild and haunting.

Dawn came. The ring of an axe and splitting of wood told her that Logan had begun his work. Lucinda sat up with an impulse to go out and join him. But the keen air made her change her mind. When she heard a fire crackling, however, she threw back the blankets and hunted for her boots. By the time she had the second one laced her little fingers were numb. She donned her coat, took her little bag and crawled out.

Logan was not in sight. Lucinda made for the fire. If it had felt good the night before, what did it feel now? She had not known the blessing of heat. While she warmed her hands she gazed about. The grass was grey-white with frost; tar across the open Logan appeared astride one of the horses, driving in the oxen. The sky in the east was ruddy, but the all-encompassing wall of pines appeared cold, forbidding. Logan had been thoughtful to put on a bucket of water to heat. Before he arrived at the camp Lucinda had washed her face and hands and combed her hair. This morning she braided it and let it hang.

"Howdy, settler," she called to Logan.

"Well! Hello, red-cheeks! Say, but you're good to see this morning...How'd you rest?"

"Slept like a log. Awoke once, after a queer dream. I was in a deserted town wandering about in these pants. What made those barks I heard?"

"Coyotes. I like to hear them. But wolves make me shiver. I saw the track of a big lofer out there."

"Lofer?"

"That's local for wolf. Perhaps that track was made by Killer Gray. He's got a black ruff, Lucinda. I'll shoot him and cure his hide for a rug. We must live off the land."

Lucinda helped him prepare breakfast. Afterwards, while Logan hitched the oxen to the wagon, Lucinda went after the second horse. He was not easy to catch, and the best she could do, was to drive him into camp, where Logan secured him. The exercise made her blood tingle, but she was glad to warm hands and feet at the fire. The red in the east paled and sun arose steely. Logan, remarking that the day was not going to be so good, advised Lucinda to procure her gloves and put a blanket on the seat.

Presently the oxen were swinging on, tirelessly, their great heads nodding in unison. Lucinda marvelled at them. How patient, how plodding were these gentle beasts of burden! She had her first inkling of the value of such animals to the settlers in the wilderness. Thick woods swallowed up the wagon and claimed it for hours. But Lucinda was more at ease because the cold wind was shut off and the sun shone now and then.

"Move over here and take your lesson," said Logan, at length, and put the whip in Lucinda's hands.

"What'll I do?" she asked, breathlessly.

"Drive," he replied, laconically.

Before she realized it, Lucinda was piloting a prairie-schooner. The oxen went along as well for her as for Logan. But what would she do when he left the wagon to handle the cattle?

"It's easy," said Logan--"much easier than driving a team."

"But suppose they do something," protested Lucinda.

"Yell 'whoa' when you want them to stop, 'gee' when you want to go to the right, 'haw' to the left, and when you start up--a crack of the whip and 'gidap,'" replied Logan, with suppressed mirth.

"It's not so funny," said Lucinda petulantly. "It looks too easy. They do go right along--but it's straight road. What if a herd of buffalo or band of Indians broke out of the woods..."

"That sure wouldn't be funny. But the buffalo are gone, Lucinda, and we put the Apaches on the reservation. Reminds me of Matazel."

"Who was he?" asked Lucinda, a little fearfully.

"Young Apache buck. Said to be one of old Geronimo's sons. He sure didn't favour that ugly old devil. Matazel looks a noble red man if ever an Indian gave reason for such a fool idea. Lucinda, the Navajo braves caught your fancy. Matazel would have done that and more. He had grey eyes--the most wonderful eyes! Wild, bright, fierce! I'll never forget the look in them when he tapped me on the breast and said: 'Matazel live--get even!'"

"My word! Logan, whatever did you do to incur his hatred?"

"Huh. I did a lot. I was one of General Crook's scouts. Crook sent me out with some soldiers to round up Matazel and his braves. I trailed them across the mesa and cornered them. We had a skirmish. Nobody killed. We captured Matazel and sent him back to the reservation with the rest of Jeronimo's outfit. They'll break out some day."

"Won't that be bad for the settlers?"

"I reckon it will. But no danger for us. We are a long way from the Cibeque."

The wind increased until it began to blow the dust. This, added to the cold, induced Lucinda to crawl back over the eat and wrap herself in the blankets. Lucinda propped herself against the packs and gazed out, thinking wearily of the women who had crossed the plains in caravans. What incredible hardship and privation they must have endured! The dim, dark forest, with its threshing foliage, the open range with its flying dust, the lowering sky, the slow steady roll of wheels, the dry permeating pitchy odour that filled her nostrils-=these held Lucinda's senses until she fell asleep.

When she awakened, Logan informed her that the lake was in sight. Cramped and stiff, Lucinda crawled back on the seat with Logan. Grey pastures fringed by pine led to a wide sheet of water, dark as the clouds. She saw fences running tip to cabins on the shore. The west side of the lake sheered up in a bold bronze bluff, while the road ran along the east shore, a ragged, rocky slope, desolate and uninviting to Lucinda's gaze.

"Will these settlers want to take us in?" she asked.

"Sure. We'll eat with them, but we'll' sleep same as last night. They're crowded in those log shacks. You'll be more comfortable in the wagon."

"I'd like that better," said Lucinda, with a sense of relief.

Lucinda found herself welcomed by Holbert and his womenfolk. If she had not been so cold and hungry and miserable, she might have regarded that poor cabin and its plain inmates in some such way as she had the long day and the hard country. But she realized that what counted were protection and nourishment, and the kind hearts that furnished them. Holbert's wife, two daughters, and a sister lived there with him. She gathered that one of the daughters was married and lived in an adjoining cabin. They seemed to take Lucinda's advent as a matter of course. The married daughter was younger than Lucinda and had a baby. None of them had been to Flagg since spring--six months--and they were hungry for the news that was easy for Lucinda to furnish.

Presently the son-in-law came in, accompanied by a grey-furred, wild-looking dog. He at once joined Holbert and Logan in a discussion of cattle.

"What a strange dog!" exclaimed Lucinda, who loved dogs. "Is he a shepherd?"

"Half shepherd an' half wolf," replied the settler's wife. "Her mother is John's best cattle-dog."

"How interesting! Half wolf? I never saw a wolf. What's her name?"

"Reckon she hasn't none. She's no good, because she won't run cattle, an' fights the other dogs. John would be glad toil get rid of her."

"Logan," asked Lucinda, eagerly interrupting the trio of, men, "may I have this dog, if Mr. Holbert will give her to me?"

"Why, sure. How about it, Holbert?"

"You're welcome, if you can get her to go with you," replied the settler.

Lucinda made overtures to the unwanted wolf-dog, and they were accepted. When presently Lucinda grew so drowsy from the hot fire that she could scarcely keep her eyes open, Logan came to her rescue. They bade their new friends goodnight and left for their wagon. The dog came readily with Lucinda.

"Rustle up to bed before you freeze again," said Logan, helping her along. "And here's your dog. I like his looks. I'll bet he sticks to you."

"It's a she, Logan. What'll I call her?...Come, doggie, you can sleep right here at my feet."

"A good name always comes...Luce, I'll go back and finish my deal with Holbert. He'll sell me some stock very cheap and give me more on credit. The drawback is there's no one here to help me drive the cattle. But by gosh! if you'll drive the oxen I'll drive all the cattle Holbert will let me have."

"I'll try," rejoined Lucinda, suppressing her fears because of his eager hope.

"There's an old homestead half-way to our place. If we can make that to-morrow night and turn the stock inside the fence we'll be jake. Next night we'll be home!"

Lucinda pulled off her boots, and folding, her coat for a pillow, crawled under the blankets. The dog nestled close to her. Outside, the wind was blowing a gale. As Logan had laced up the front flaps of the wagon, Lucinda was protected. But to hear it was enough. It whistled hauntingly around the canvas and roared through the trees overhead and swept away, scattering the pebbles and propelling the dust along the road. Finally Lucinda's drowsy spell ended in sleep.

Logan's voice penetrated Lucinda's deep slumbers. "Daybreak, Luce! Pile out and get going...Did your dog stay with you?...Well, she did, by gosh! No man or varmint who ever pleased you would quit."

"Compliment so early?--Oh, Logan, I can't get up. It's so nice and warm in here. Ugh!...I guess I'm a tenderfoot."

"Well, Luce dear, you won't be one by nightfall, that's a good bet," replied Huett, grimly. "I'm going to start you out with the oxen and follow you with the stock. Then I'll be close to you. So you can't stop to pick flowers by the roadside."

The day promised better than yesterday. Clouds were wanting in the brightening sky and the wind had abated. Still Lucinda's fingers ached again when she had laced her boots. After breakfast the womenfolk detained Lucinda for a little, while Holbert accompanied Logan out to the wagon. But Lucinda soon followed, promising to stop on her first trip into Flagg.

"Hope thet'll be soon. But winter's comin'," called Mrs. Holbert after her. "Don't get in front of thet bull John sold your man. He's wilder'n a skeered jack-rabbit!"

Lucinda's breast felt as if it had suddenly been crushed. She was glad the Holberts could not see her face as she ran off, with the dog leaping at her side. Her husband and Holbert were not in sight, but she heard a halloaing over in the corral. Presently Logan appeared riding one horse and leading another.

"Climb aboard, Luce," he said briskly, in a matter-of-fact tone. "Better keep the dog with you. Here, coyote--say! there's a name for her."

"Coyote? Oh, it's pretty," replied Lucinda, as she climbed up. "Here, lift her up...Well! She doesn't need to be packed. Logan, I believe she won't have to be tied."

Huett leaped up to the seat and yelled: "Gadep!" The oxen moved away with the wagon creaking. "Gee! gee!" They turned into the main road. "Now, Luce, it's all plain sailing, without a turn-off for fifteen miles--to the old homestead. We've got to make it before dark...Put on your gloves...Gosh! if we make it with all my stock--one brindle bull, a mean cuss, eight cows, six two-year-old steers, and five heifers--oh! I'll feel rich. But I'll have to ride some."

With outward composure Lucinda took the whip he tendered her, and averted her face. Was the man stark mad to set her this task? Or was he paying her the tribute due the women of the Oregon Trail? She chose not to let him guess her perturbation. Logan leaped off while the wagon was moving.

"Good luck, old girl!" he called, happily. "If this isn't great? Luce Huett, ox-driver of the Arizona range! Whoopee!"

Lucinda failed completely to share his enthusiasm, although she was glad to find that a really momentous occasion could pierce his practicality. She was left alone on that high driver's seat, too high to leap off without risking life and limb. Coyote regarded her with intelligent eyes, as if she understood Lucinda's predicament. Lucinda held the whip with nerveless hand. The wagging beasts plodded on unmindful of her tightly oppressed breast and staring dyes. Ahead the road followed the lake-shore for miles, as far as she could see. Her ponderous steeds could not turn to the left; but supposed they turned to the right? The wagon and she, with her trunks of pretty clothes and her chest full of even more precious and perishable belongings, and Logan's utensils and supplies for his great enterprise--these must all go toppling down into the lake. But while Lucinda watched with uncertain breath the oxen travelled along, slowly and steadily, ponderously, as they had done the day before. Probably they were not even aware that a woman-driver now held the whip. Lucinda hugged that comforting thought to her heart. She determined not to yell "Gee," "Haw," or "Whoa" until necessity compelled it; and gradually her fears subsided. She could look at the slope and out upon the lake, and far ahead with a growing sense of something beside the risk of the situation. She was doing an unprecedented thing: driving a prairie-schooner drawn by oxen! Here was an amazing fact that should have indulged her primitive side to the full. But that part of her seemed in abeyance.

"I had an idea school-teaching was hard," she soliloquized. "But this pioneer game!...Oh, I do love Logan!"

The sun came up glaringly hot. Lucinda removed her heavy coat. When she looked back she thought she saw the dust-obscured cattle running the other way, and before she realized disloyalty to Logan, she hoped they were.

The time came, however, when she realized her mistake. A breeze from behind brought a smell of dust, then the sound of hoofs. Peering back, Lucinda saw that Logan's stock was not far behind. Then through the dust she espied him, and on the moment he appeared to be throwing stones with a violence that suggested impotent fury. Lucinda had it in her to laugh. "Serves him right-'the cowboy cattleman husband who does not have time even for a honeymoon!"

Almost before she realized it she had reached the end of the lake, where the road turned across a bare flat to enter the forest. The oxen apparently saw nothing save the road, and they kept on it, oblivious of the cattle behind. Lucinda also made the surprising discovery that the sun stood nearly overhead. She was hot and thirsty, and she could not find the canteen that Logan had stuck somewhere under the seat.

As the wagon rolled around a bend in the road Lucinda looked back. The cattle were strung out. On the moment Logan was chasing some wild heifers that had swerved far off the course. The cows looked dusty and tired. Then Lucinda saw the bull. In fact, he bellowed on the instant. She had to see him. So close behind that he had driven the haltered horse right on the wheels of the wagon! A dusty beast with wide horns and a huge head with eyes of green fire and a red tongue hanging out! Lucinda conceived the fearful idea that he would frighten the horse, charge the wagon, and perhaps gore the oxen into a stampede.

This direful catastrophe failed to materialize. The oxen gained the woods, where the wide canvas top brushed the foliage on each side.

Meanwhile the hours had been passing. Soon the character of the woods gave way to scaly ground covered with brush and scattered oaks, then a large oval open grey with sage, and centred in a depression which had at one time held water. Lucinda's quick eyes caught sight of a band of fleet, grey-rumped, graceful animals fleeing behind a coal-black leader. They flashed into the forest on the far side.

Some time in the afternoon Logan passed her to the left, making a cut off across the sage. He was at full gallop in pursuit of some of his stock. He rounded them up and turned them back with the others. After a while, far in the distance, Lucinda espied an old cabin and a fence. Logan drew far ahead. She saw him drive his stock through the fence or around it.

Lucinda was half an hour covering the intervening space. She needed all that time to recover her equanimity. But she need not have concerned herself about Logan. It transpired that at sunset, when she drove up to the old cabin, and yelled "Whoa!", she came upon Logan sitting on a log, grimy with dust and sweat, red as fire where he wiped the black off, and manifestly possessed by an elation that had just banished a very ignoble rage.

"How'd you make it--when I wasn't close?" he asked. "Just fine. But that bull gave me a scare."

"I reckon. I'll kill him yet. Of all the damn, ornery, muddleheaded beasts I ever had to do with--he's the worst...Wife, I worried myself sick about you, all for nothing."

"Yes, you did," scoffed Lucinda, secretly pleased. She got off, with Coyote leaping down after her. The ground felt queer--or else her legs were insensible. "Where do we camp? And where's the water?"

"Holbert said there's a spring behind the cabin. Reckon we'll camp right here."

Lucinda untied the swinging buckets and with two of them started to hunt for water. Disillusion and weariness hung on her like wet blankets; nevertheless some feeling antagonistic to them worked upon her. A few plaintive flowers, primrose and dahlia, growing out of the weeds beside the cabin, eloquently told Lucinda that a woman had tended their parent roots there once upon a time. Perhaps a tenderfoot woman like herself! There was tragedy in the vacant, eye-like windows. She was crossing a level grassy place when Coyote sprang back with a bark. Bsszaz! A loud buzzing rattle sent Lucinda's nerves tingling.

"That's a rattler. Look out!" shouted Logan, from behind. He came on a heavy run. "There! See him? A timber rattlesnake."

Lucinda saw a thick snake, black and yellow, scaly and ugly, glide under the cabin. "That's all right," she said to the perturbed Logan. "I'm not afraid of snakes."

"Well, don't go kicking one of those boys in the grass...Here's a trail."

They discovered the clear, bubbling spring of cold water, which made the difference, Logan stated, between a good and a poor camp. On the way back Lucinda, peeping into the log-cabin, became virtually obsessed by wonder and dread. The littered earthen floor, the blackened fireplace, the rude shelves and the bedstead of poles, told a story that saddened and shocked her. What had happened there? How little Eastern people realized the crude living of those who set their faces West! Lucinda did not want Logan to find out how strongly she felt. She asked him if he had seen the beautiful black-horned animal leading the white and tan ones across the open.

"Sure did. Golly, I wanted my rifle. That was a black antelope, king of that herd. Holbert has seen him for years."

"Logan, you wouldn't kill him, would you?" she asked, gazing at him in horror.

"Reckon I would. Wild animals sort of excite me. I like to hunt. I'll bet we make the acquaintance of Gray, that black-ruffed lofer."

"I hope not, if you must murder everything," returned Lucinda sharply.

Logan stared at her, then stamped away with a puzzled frown on his face. Lucinda remembered how she used to fight her brothers and their comrades for chasing chipmunks along the rail-fences. How they would yell and run, wild as any young savages! But she must conquer her disgust at Logan's passion to kill, she knew, regardless of her own feeling in the matter.

Supper was soon over and the chores finished. The lonely night clamped down upon the forest. Lucinda was glad to crawl into her wagon-bed and stretch out--glad that weariness inhibited thought. Her slumbers were punctuated by dreams of an enormous bull and a huge snake. Logan routed her out in the grey of dawn. Before sunrise the wagon was packed and the oxen ready for Lucinda.

"I'll follow, same as yesterday," said Logan, imperturbably, as she climbed up to the seat. "I'm not sure about all the road. But it's most as good as that we've come over. There's a long downhill stretch through the woods. When you hit that you'll be getting near home. But I'll be on your heels before we get there. Good luck."

"Let me try to start them," said Lucinda, after she had helped Coyote up. She uncoiled the long whip and tried to crack it. She did make a noise, but that was the end of the leather thong lashing her back.

"Gadep!" she shouted, at the top of her lungs. The oxen obeyed at once, to her surprise, and relief, and the wagon' was on its way.

"Turn left," called Logan. He waved his hat.

"Haw!...Haw!" yelled Lucinda. They wagged to the left and straightened out on the road, headed south.

"Say," shouted Logan, gleefully, "let me drive the oxen and you drive that bull!"

"I should say not!" retorted Lucinda, refusing to allow her husband's flattery to inflate her egotism. Something was bound to happen--she just knew it.

The morning was warm, compared with the others before it. There was no frost. When she drove into the forest she had an agreeable surprise. Jays were screeching, squirrels were chattering, grey deer with white tails up bounded away from the road. Presently Lucinda came upon a flock of wild turkeys, scratching in the grass under the pine saplings. Those near the road ran with a "Put-put, put-put-put." But most of them let the wagon go by without taking flight. The sight greatly pleased Lucinda.

As the day progressed, the heat poured down from the sun and rose like transparent veils of smoke from the ground. Lucinda grew unbearably hot and wet. Then she ran into the stretch of dust that Logan had mentioned. It appeared to be half a foot deep on the road, and every step of the oxen sent up great yellow puffs, thick and dry, that rolled back upon Lucinda. Her clothes became as yellow as the roadside; the dust ran off her sombrero; her gloves filled; she gasped and choked and nearly suffocated. "Whoa!" she finally yelled in desperation to her oxen. They stopped, as if glad of a respite. The dust-pall rolled back, so that Lucinda could breathe. Her nostrils were clogged. She could smell no longer. Then she remembered the silk scarf which Logan had advised for this very emergency. She tied the ends around her neck and drew the wide fold up over her nose. This was stifling, yet not so unendurable as the dust. At her call the oxen lurched on, and again she was enveloped. Then followed an almost insupportable period, the length of which could only be computed by slow, hateful miles. The tears that Lucinda shed saved her from being blinded.

Presently the oxen floundered into the dust that was so suffocating that they halted of their own accord. Lucinda coughed and choked miserably. Would this horrible day never end? She felt that she could not bear it longer. The afternoon must be waning, and when the air cleared somewhat, she looked around for the position of the sun. It was low in the sky and shone dark red through the pall. Their destination could not be far off now, but, despite her misery, she hoped that Logan's Canyon was not located in this terrible country. Where was Logan? Suddenly a distant yell quickened Lucinda's pulse. She looked back. Dust-clouds far behind!

"Gadep!" she called. But the oxen did not budge. She called louder. Then she yelled. But the gentle, long-suffering beasts of burden had rebelled at last. Lucinda did not blame them. She looked back. That terrible bull was coming at a gallop. Swift terror shook Lucinda. Suppose he ran into us, she thought wildly. She yelled hoarsely and cracked the whip, but the drooping oxen never swung an inch under the wooden yoke.

A bawl and pound of hoofs behind elicited sharp barks from the dog. Coyote leaped to the ground and dashed back. Lucinda thanked her stars that she was high up on the wagon seat. The bull, his hide as yellow as the road, dashed about the wagon, his huge head lowered at the snapping dog. He lunged this way and that. Coyote nipped him on the nose. Then with a bellow he charged and in blind fury or by accident ran into the oxen with a terrific crash. The shock nearly upset the wagon. Lucinda screamed. The bull sprawled as the oxen, leaping ahead, struck him with the yoke. Down the road the oxen galloped madly, Lucinda holding on to the seat, terrified. They were running off, going faster every moment. The wagon rolled and swayed, but careened along fast enough to keep ahead of the great stream of dust which rolled from under the oxen's ponderous hoofs.

Lucinda realized she must leap for her life. Sooner or later the oxen would run off the road into a log or a ditch; but every time she essayed to get a hold and a footing which would enable her to spring clear a bump would throw her back. The yellow road flashed under her; the trees blurred; the ground appeared like moving sheets of grey. A heavy, clattering thud of hoofs mingled with the rolling, creaking roar of the wagon. Alas for her trunks and Logan's treasured possessions!

The oxen sheered off the road towards brush and trees. They were slowing down of their own accord, or the soft going retarded them. Lucinda made up her mind to leap into the brush. She stood up, leaning out, holding desperately to the canvas-covered hoop. But before she could jump, the oxen plunged into a wash, the wheels hit a bank with a tremendous shock, and Lucinda shot as if from a catapult far out into the brush. Thick branches broke her fall. Still, she landed on the ground hard enough to make her see a shower of sparks.

She struggled to her feet, dizzy, scratched, torn, but sound in limb. A few rods beyond, the wagon stood upright, with the heaving oxen halted by the brush. The extra horse that had been haltered was missing. Lucinda staggered out to a log at the edge, and there she sank down, panting, scarcely able to believe her good fortune, suddenly freed of mingled terror and anger.

Then she saw that Coyote had stopped the bull a short distance up the valley. Logan appeared beyond, urging on the spent, straggling bunch of cattle. He chased the bull in among them, and, riding from one side to the other, shunted them off the road on Lucinda's side, passed her with a wild shout, and drove them into the woods. Because of that move, Lucinda knew gratefully they had not far to go.

She rested, endeavouring to remove some of the travel-stains and the blood on her wrists where the brush had scratched her. Coyote sought Lucinda out and sank to the ground, her red tongue protruding and her heavy coat yellow with dust. Presently Lucinda espied the horse that had been tethered behind the wagon. She secured it and led it back to the oxen. Oppression from her exertion and fright weighed heavily upon her.

At length Logan rode back to her; black as a coal-heaver; yet nothing could have hidden his triumphant air, his grim mastery, his gay possession of success.

"Done!" he cried, ringingly. "Not a hoof lost! But oh, what a hell of a drive!...What happened to you, Luce?"

"Oh, nothing--much," she answered, calling upon a sense of humour that eluded her.

"But you look queer. And the wagon there--in the brush! But say, Luce, your face--it's all scratched."

"That awful bull! He butted into the oxen. They ran off. Down here they turned off the road, hit a bank and pitched me into the brush."

Logan leaped off to approach her with earnest solicitude. "You poor kid! I was afraid something had happened. I shouldn't have left you so far ahead. But are you hurt, dear?"

"No. Only a scratch or two."

"Thank God for that!" He shook his head in wonderment. "I can't get over how my luck holds." He ran to the wagon, then examined wheels and tongue and the oxen. Evidently no damage had been done, for he mounted the seat and with yells drove the oxen out of the brush.

"All right. Come on, honey. Get up while I tie the horses behind...It won't be long now, Luce! Sycamore Canyon! My range! Our home!"

Lucinda had lost her hopes and what little curiosity she might have had. Logan drove into the woods, along what appeared to have once been a road. Oxen and wagon jarred heavily over saplings. After about a mile or less Lucinda saw a light space through the woods. The green failed, and far beyond and above appeared again, only dimmer. There was an opening and a valley--a canyon, Logan had said--just ahead. On the left side of the road a rocky ledge rose. Logan drove through a gap between the ledge and a brushy bank, halted and dismounted to carry poles and small logs with which to improvise a gate closing the opening. How energetic he was and tireless! There seemed a growing passion within him. Lastly he hauled a log that two men might well have found burdensome, which he placed across the gap.

"Luce girl," he said, intensely, as he mounted beside her. "Our stock is down in the canyon. Fenced in, all save a few holes in the rock rim they'll never find before I close them. Aha!...I'll show you pronto." A great weight seemed lifted from his shoulders.

Lucinda could not look just yet. She watched Logan jump off the wagon, untie the horses at the back and drive them past the wagon, down what appeared a narrow, overgrown road. She saw him take an axe and chop down a small pine as thick at the base as his thigh. The whole bushy tree, by prodigious effort, he dragged behind the wagon and secured with a chain.

"What's that for?" she asked him as he returned.

"Just a drag to hold us back. Pretty steep. Hold on now and look. You'll see the greatest valley in all the West!"

In spite of herself, Lucinda was compelled to gaze. A long, winding, apparently bottomless gorge yawned beneath them. As the wagon lurched down the grade, this thing Logan called a canyon gradually became visible. It struck Lucinda with appalling force: a grey, granite-walled abyss widening to the south, yawning up at her as if to swallow her. It appeared narrow just below, but it was not narrow. As all this deceitful West, it was not what it appeared. A ribbon of water and waste of white sand wound through the centre of it, to disappear round a bend; beyond, the canyon widened out into a great basin enclosed by yellow slopes and pine-fringed rims.

Lucinda had to hold on tightly to keep from being thrown off the seat. As the wagon rolled deeper into the declivity, brush on one side and bluff on the other obscured Lucinda's view. The grade steepened. Screeching brakes and crunching wheels increased their clamour. Despite the oxen holding back and the drag of the pine tree behind, the wagon rolled and bumped too fast for safety. Lucinda held on to her seat, although she wondered bitterly why she clung to it so dearly. Then suddenly the pine tree behind broke or pulled loose; the wagon rolled down upon the oxen, forcing them into a dead run, and swaying dangerously one side to the other. Barely in time for safety it rattled out upon the level open of the canyon floor and came to a jarring stop. Manifestly unable to control his elation, Logan drove across a flat of seared, bleached grass, across a shallow brook and bar of sand, up a considerable grade to a flat where big pines stood far apart and a white-barked tree shone among them.

"Whoa!" he yelled, in stentorian voice of finality, that echoed from the black, looming slope above. He threw away his whip and, giving Lucinda a grimy, sweat-laden embrace, leaped to the ground, and held out his arms to help her down.

"Sycamore Canyon, sweetheart!" he said, with husky emotion. "Here's where we homestead."

But Lucinda did not move nor respond on the moment. She gazed about spellbound, aghast. The drab, silent rocks, the lonely pines, shouted doom at her. The brook babbled in mockery. There was no view, no outlook except down the grey, monotonous canyon, with its terrible, forbidding walls. Savage wilderness encompassed her on all sides. Solitude reigned there. No sound, no brightness, no life! She would be shut in always. A pioneer wife chained irrevocably to her toil and her cabin! A low, strange murmuring--the mysterious voice of the wild--breathed out of the forest. The wind in the pines! It seemed foreboding, inevitable, awful, whispering death to girlish hopes and dreams.

CHAPTER FOUR

Huett, seldom prey to strong feeling, expected Lucinda to share his joy at their safe arrival in the canyon which they were to homestead, but he was somewhat taken back by his wife's pale face and the strange gaze that seemed to see beyond the pines. When she had no word to say, he divined that his vague fear of her reaction to Sycamore Canyon had been justified. But, he reflected, women were queer, and beyond men's understanding. What difference did it really make where they began to live their lives together? The essential thing was that they were together, mated, facing the great project. He stifled his disappointment.

"Come down and let's rustle," he said, and helped her out of the wagon, aware that she was heavy on her feet. "Rest a bit. Or better walk about. I'll throw supper together in a jiffy."

As she walked slowly away, not looking, Logan felt sorry for her. But what had he done that was amiss? This was the finest place he had ever seen. He threw off his coat and filled all the water-pails. What a wonderful spring--cold as ice, straight from granite rock, soft as silk, and even now, late in the fall, flowing a hundred gallons a minute! That spring was priceless. As Logan carried the pails, he gazed about for firewood. Up the canyon on the slope stood an aspen grove, burning vivid gold in the sunset. There would be dead aspen wood there--a wood next best to dead oak for a corking fire. He fared forth with an axe and dragged down some long poles. He noted with pleasure that beaver had been cutting the live aspens, and he wondered where their dam was. He built a fire with pine, and split the aspen to burn afterwards. Lucinda had not come back.

While Logan was rushing the supper, Lucinda returned, carrying a handful of flowers.

"Purple asters!" she exclaimed, her pale features animated for the first time. "My favourite flowers! These are wild--so much larger and lovelier than cultivated ones."

"Lots of wild flowers in these woods," he replied. "I like best that yellow one, like a bell in shape, that nods at you in the creek bottoms."

"I saw golden rod along the road. That's something," she said thoughtfully. She helped him get supper, ate without appetite, and wiped the utensils after he washed them.

Logan felt full of thoughts and feelings. He was not given to voluble expression, but if she had encouraged him now he might have formed the nucleus of a habit to talk. But she said only that it was much warmer down in the canyon. This night she did not put on her heavy coat, nor stand eagerly by the fire.

"I'll make your bed before it gets too dark," he said.

"What will we use for lights?" she asked, curiously.

"Camp-fire. I can get some pine knots presently. There's a box of candles to use in the cabin, when we throw that up:' When Logan emerged from his task in the wagon, Lucinda was standing with her dog watching the afterglow fade in the west. He made his own bed under the great pine near-by. Dusk fell, and then began the gloaming hour Logan liked best. He lighted his pipe. Lucinda came back presently.

"I'm tired," she said. "I'll be--all right to-morrow. Good night, Logan."

"Good night, dear. You've sure been game." He patted her shoulder awkwardly with his hand, but did not attempt to kiss her.

Night closed down upon the canyon. Logan sat smoking. He saw the fading red embers of his fire, the great looming pines, the black, shadowy wall; he smelled the smoke and the tang of the forest; he heard the sough of the wind, the brawl of the brook, the wail of coyotes. But he did not waste thought on these external manifestations which measured his contentment. He had made the drive from Flagg in three days, with a heavy load, the latter half of the distance with a score and more of cattle, and a wild bull. That stock, his oxen, and horses were safe in the canyon. It seemed incredible. Even with less than that he would have had a splendid start. His ranch was an established fact, and his range would be the envy of cattlemen some day. Yet he did not dream; he had no illusions. He was assured of the fact that he would have a great herd. Holbert had had trouble with a grasshopper plague one year, but such a contingency did not worry Logan here.

He looked impartially towards success in the long run. As he would not require cowboys for many years, he could manage the ranch himself. Lucinda would cook and take care of the children when they came. He would do the thousand and one tasks that fell to a homesteader's lot. For the immediate present he had the log cabin to throw up speedily--a job for one man; then the gaps to close in his natural fences around the canyon; and after that the winter's supply of firewood and meat. He would never have to kill any beef--not in this forest. Such a reflection afforded him double satisfaction. He would be able to indulge in his one and only pleasure, and, besides that, save many calves and yearlings.

It did not occur to Huett, as he stretched out under the blankets, that he was a happy man. Nevertheless he felt a great sense of accomplishment--to have won Lucinda Baker for a wife, to have driven safely into Sycamore Canyon with supplies and stock sufficient for the long task ahead--this seemed as much of a miracle as he ever dared hope for. The rest depended upon him, and he was positive that he was equal to the task. He had never tested his powers, but he felt that they were unlimited. Sleep glued his eyelids the instant he closed them.

At dawn he was up, wading through the dewy grass to 'fetch in his horse. He saw deer with the cattle, and wished he had brought along his rifle. Venison was tasty after the first frosts and would keep if hung up in the shade. Returning to camp, he put his heaviest saddle on Buck and left him standing bridle down. Logan next applied himself to putting up a tarpaulin shelter in a convenient place. He had a camp-chair somewhere in the wagon. This and a box for a table would do for Lucinda.

The sun struck down early into Sycamore--another of the many desirable features of this canyon. In summer it would be hot, but in winter the more sun the better. Huett anticipated much from those ample south slopes and walls, Which, would not only melt snow off promptly, but reflect heap down-upon the level. What corn, beans, cabbage, hay, grapes, peaches, he would raise! While mixing the biscuit dough that morning Logan located certain spots for gardens and fields.

Lucinda appeared, her face sunburned and slightly swollen.

"Mawnin', settler," she said, with a brightness that he was quick to grasp.

"How are you, Luce?" he greeted her, heartily.

"Fine. Only burnt to a crisp, lame in one leg, and sore from sundry scratches," she replied wryly. She had brushed her hair and left it to hang in a braid, a way that made her look more girlish, and pleased Logan. "I'm afraid to wash my face, it's so sore."

"Don't. Be chary of water in this country till you're broken in."

"Heaven!--What'll we do for a bath?"

"There's the brook."

"Be sensible, Logan. Besides, I felt that water last night. Cold--why, it made me jump! Can't you fix a place for us?"

"Sure I can. And I'll do it pronto. The brook will be good enough for me yet awhile."

"Where's my dog?"

"I haven't seen her."

"She went out before daylight."

"Coyotes! By gum! I hope she doesn't run true to form. Them half-wolf dogs are queer. She might go back to her kind; for she's more wolf than shepherd."

Lucinda made a face. "Oh dear!--I suppose I mustn't let myself love anything out here, because I can't keep it."

"I reckon, Luce. Nothing except me," he replied, not realizing the jest.

"You? Why--er--of course, Logan. But can't I keep pets?"

"Sure. But I won't swear how long. You can have bear-cubs, fawns--anything I can catch for you."

"A bear-cub? Oh, how darling! I'd love that."

While they sat at breakfast Coyote came back, her long fur full of burrs, her tongue hanging out. Lucinda was delighted at her return, while Logan was manifestly not displeased. The dog had evidently been chasing some wild animal, but apparently knew when to return home.

"Well, Luce, you clean up while I tackle the big job," drawled Logan finally.

"What?"

"Our cabin."

"How thrilling! Let me help."

"I should smile you will help."

"Where'll we put it? How big?"

"Right there, in the centre of the bench. I reckon those pines are good to stand a hundred more years. How big?--Doggone, that stumps me. I guess I can manage twenty-four-foot logs, if they're not too big around."

"Twenty-four feet! How many rooms?"

"One. We'll have to live in one room. After a time, as our needs grow, we can add a section."

"But, Logan, that Holbert cabin was awful," cried Lucinda impetuously. "Small, dark--no floor, no porch..."

"Don't worry, Luce. I've thought of that," Logan assured her. "We'll have a floor and a flat stone hearth. I'll extend the roof beyond the cabin wall--say twenty more feet...like this," he drew a rude plan on the ground, "with posts to hold it up at the corners. And a loft to store things."

"Logan, can you do all this alone?" she queried, as if suddenly appreciating the enormity of his undertaking. "Sure can. You'll have to help, though. Our tough jo! will be to lift logs one above the other, after we get so high. But I'll cut a forked sapling, heave up an end of the log in that. You'll hold the sapling while I tend to the other end." "But suppose the log should slip," suggested Lucinda fearfully.

"I won't let it. Shall I move your things under the shelter? I've a chair and a box. Then you can find something to do until I come back."

"Yes, please. I've plenty of sewing."

"Good. Can you knit, Luce?"

"That is one of my few accomplishments."

"I'll bet you have a lot of them," Logan declared pridefully. Then, having moved her belongings and the boxes to the shelter, he took his axe, and, mounting Buck, rode up the canyon. Round the bend and conveniently half-way up the slope stood a dense grove of pines which Logan had remembered from a former trip. He could drag what he needed downhill all the way, a factor saving of labour and time.

It took less than half an hour to cut and trim the first log for snaking down to camp. How deep the heavy axe had bitten into the pine, and how satisfying the feel of swinging it! Logan took a half-hitch with his rope round the log's end and, mounting, looped the pommel and started at a long angle downhill. The lop slipped along as if greased. As he neared camp the dog barked, and Lucinda ceased her work to watch him. It was something deeply exhilarating tor Logan to see her there.

"Making out fine, Luce," he called in a cheery tone, as he dragged the log into camp. "What have you been doing?"

"Chastening my spirit, Logan," she returned cryptically.

Riding back up the canyon, he wondered what Lucinda bad meant. But he did not ponder long over her complexity.

In the following hour Logan snaked down the three other logs, and by the time Lucinda called him to eat 'he had the four foundation sides of his cabin squared, levelled, and blocked up with flat stones.

"I'll cut logs this afternoon and to-morrow," he told Lucinda. "Maybe it'll take another day. Fine crop of small pines to choose from. But the shakes have me stumped."

"Shakes?" inquired his wife.

"Yes. Shingles for the roof. They're called shakes in the West. You split them out of a big pine log. It's got to be straight grain, and not too sappy. Maybe I can find a lightning-struck pine. Ought to, for lighting sure strikes in this forest."

"Thunderstorms, you mean?" asked Lucinda fearfully. "I'll say. Terrible electric storms. Trees crashing all around you--rain, wind..."

"I'm afraid of storms," said Lucinda in a troubled voice. "When I was a child, Mother used to shut me up in a dark hall."

"Don't worry, Luce. It's too late for that kind of storm." He glanced at the sky, shaking his dark head. "Lord, I hope the snow holds off till we're under a roof. But the weather here is fine till Thanksgiving, mostly."

When Logan finished his work, supper was almost ready and would have been earlier, Lucinda explained, but for the biscuits. She had burnt the first batch.

"Luce, it's no easy job," said Logan, hastening to excuse her. "Did you remember to heat the lid while you wen heating the oven?"

"No. But I put a shovelful of coals on the lid."

"Always heat it first...Well, this has been a doggone good day. Only too short."

"It was long for me--and lonesome," she replied wistfully. "You'll always be at work, won't you?"

Logan nodded gravely. "I reckon so, Luce, come to think of it. But I like work. That's what I want. And presently you will be so busy the days will fly."

Lucinda did not seem to share his optimism. The thought struck Logan that he must be kind and attentive to her. He helped her with the work after supper, talked about the cabin, and afterwards persuaded her to walk with him along the brook. He felt affection and solicitude, and warm yearning; but he was clumsy about expressing such feeling. Still his presence and his attention had a brightening effect upon her that he was glad to see. Lastly he kissed her good night, and was amazed at her wet eyes, shining in the firelight.

Before sunrise next morning Logan shot and dressed a deer, cut and stacked firewood, and had breakfast ready when Lucinda arose. He then put in a prodigious day with the logs, cutting and trimming fifty, and peeling most of them. He did not know where the hours went, but that one spent with Lucinda after supper seemed to bring them closer. She was beginning to display interest in his work, to ask about the future. Yet she seemed to have a dread of being left alone, and she hated the cold. Logan vowed he would make their cabin snug and warm; and as if the daylight hours were not enough, working by firelight, he notched and laid the second square of logs.

"But there's a space between," protested Lucinda when she noticed their arrangement.

"Sure. We can't get the logs perfectly flat one on another."

"What will we do, then? The rain and wind would blow in."

"Tenderfoot! What's dobe mud for if not to fill in the chinks? This kind here in Arizona sets like mortar."

"I used to build mud houses--and now I'm to live in one," said Lucinda dreamily, then, "But where'll the doors be?"

"Only one door. Opening on the porch to the east. Storms usually blow from the south-west. I'll strain a point, and put in a window for you--in the south wall. That'll let in sun and light."

Without any help, the following day Logan notched and lifted and squared four sections of logs on top of the two already laid. This, he told Lucinda, was getting somewhere, but he would need her assistance from then on. His mode of procedure might not have been original, but it was effective. He leaned a forked sapling against the cabin wall and lifted the end of a log to rest in it. Then Lucinda held the sapling while he performed a like service with the other end of the log. He managed to hold it, too, while he climbed up on the wall. Then he set his notched end in place, after which he crossed to Lucinda's side and placed hers. Logan was delighted with his ingenuity, and could not see why his wife was not the same.

The fifth day bade fair to be the hardest and most trying of all. Log after log Logan notched and set in place, one on, top of the other. The fragrant yellow wall went up. Once Lucinda came near to disaster. A log slipped at Logan's end while he was climbing and holding at the same time. It fell. Only by remarkable strength for a girl did Lucinda hold here prop in place.

For once Logan lost his characteristic reserve.

"Luce girl, are you all right?" he cried anxiously as he swung down from the ladder. "My God! If that had come down to hit you..." He could not finish the sentence.

After the log had slipped into place, Lucinda leaned against the wall, her face white. "I'm all right--I guess," she said.

"Lord! what a jackass I am! After this I'll use the rope and haul my end up!" exclaimed Logan fervently. "But, then you haven't got those square shoulders and round arms for nothing." Coincidentally his pride in her grew.

They worked late that night and completed the walls. Log was jubilant. He relieved the weary Lucinda from the supper task and laughed at her sore hands, although he tenderly picked the splinters from them. Then he gave her a good night embrace and sat up long beside the fire pondering the problem of the roof. Before he went to bed he solved it; and the following morning, putting the simple plan into effect, had flattened poles, laying them across from wall to wall, giving him a foothold from which to erect the roof structure. He wanted a high peak for two reasons: first to make a steep slant from which the snow would slide, and secondly to give the loft room for a man to stand.

That brought Logan to another problem--to find a suitable pine, cut it down and split out the shakes. But, his good fortune attended him further. He found a fallen pine, riven at the top by lightning. It lay at the edge of the pines above the cabin. Another downhill haul!

Logan's first few bundles of shakes would make excellent firewood and no more. Presently, however, he got the knack of it and made up for lost time by putting on extra muscle. Packing the shakes down proved a harder job than he had expected. His initial attempt was to drag down a bundle in a canvas. This proved a poor way. Then he tried packing bundles on Buck, an equally ineffectual task, because Buck was a poor pack-horse and displayed temper. By using a burlap bag as a pad on his shoulders, Logan carried a bundle of a hundred or more shakes down at a trip. The climb up was short, and unburdened he made it quickly. Sunset of that day saw his roofing piled neatly beside the cabin.

The weather had been fine, even too hot in the afternoons, but on the last day a change threatened. A haze overspread the sky. The golden Indian summer was at an end. The wind moaned in the pines; November was at hand.

That night Logan was awakened by dull, rumbling thunder away to the south-west. He groaned. Then he swore. Pattering rain fell upon his canvas. The first fall storm always began in that way: usually it rained a little, turned into snow, and then into a blizzard. It would be serious indeed if Lucinda and he were caught without their cabin completed.

Morning came, drab, raw, with misty cold rain falling. Logan built a fire, cooked breakfast, and then carried firewood for Lucinda to burn while he worked. It heartened him that she still preserved a cheerful spirit.

Logan tackled his job grimly. He placed bundles of shakes along the wall, so that he could heave them up with a rope. Lucinda slipped the noose under the bundles as fast as he could loft them. He laid as many along the rafters as he thought he would need on that side, then, while Lucinda repaired to her shelter to get warm and dry, he set to work.

With the cold rain falling, the slippery rafters hard to straddle, and the nailing to be accomplished with benumbed hands, Logan had as grievous a job as even he wanted. But he stuck doggedly at it without time wasted at noonday. Lucinda called him, but he kept on. Every shake meant so much. Another few inches of roof! About mid-afternoon the rain ceased, to Logan's grateful surprise, the clouds broke up a little, and a pale sun shone through. Logan finished a whole side of the roof by evening in a tremendous burst of energy. Then, wet and starved and half-frozen, he clambered down the pole ladder to a warm fire and a hot supper.

"Logan, you are wonderful," said Lucinda with enthusiasm. "But, giant though you are, I fear you'll kill yourself."

"Ha! Work never hurt any man...I don't know, though. If I'm not tired I'm damn near froze!...Golly! Venison and mashed potatoes. And gravy! Whoopee!...Luce, I'll have a roof over us by to-morrow night."

On the morrow the sun shone again, and before it set Logan made good his boast.

"There! She'll shed--water," he panted, huskily, as he came down, a flame in his grey eyes. "Our homestead cabin is up--and roofed. Now let's move in."

"I see," replied Lucinda. "But Logan, how do we move in? There's no door--no window."

Logan stared. His jaw dropped. "Holy mavericks!" he exclaimed in consternation verging on mirth. "I'm a son-of-a-gun if I didn't forget to cut either...Luce, I guess we don't move in to-night, after all."

Huett kept up his mighty pace of labour. He began his floor from the foundation log of the cabin. Here his proficiency with an axe asserted itself. To rough-hew logs and lay them close and flat, with level sides uppermost, called out all his skill. He laid the floor in two days, leaving a large open square against the north wall for the stone hearth and fireplace.

Logan built a bough bedstead in the corner, framing it so it would hold a goodly mattress of evergreen foliage. He wanted to use balsam for this, but he did not believe that species of evergreen could be obtained as low down from the rim as Sycamore Canyon. Therefore he chose fir, which was as springy as balsam, if not so sweet-smelling. He packed huge bundles of fir boughs down from the slope, and cut them, using only the tips, in short lengths. When he had a sufficient quantity he carried it in. He folded a piece of canvas and laid that over the bed. "Here, wife, is a job for you," he said cheerfully, and he showed her how to lay the tips of fir with the butts down, one, upon another, in layer after layer. While she laboured at this task Logan spread the blankets in the warm sun, then sat down for the first daytime rest. This was not through weariness--he never acknowledged such a weakness as that--but because he became conscious of something no longer possible to put aside. Once released, it surged over Logan, warm, imperious, staggering... his love for his wife and his need of her. Of late she had appeared less strange and no longer aloof. She had worked willingly at whatever task he gave her, and sometimes she laughed. This isolation, he could see, was tremendously hard for her, being used to family and friends, to the social life of a town; but he believed she would grow used to solitude and become engrossed in their great task. Strong emotion, so seldom actuating Logan, and never before like this, came over him. He had been considerate of Lucinda, far more than most husbands would have been, and during these days of toil he felt that she had grown dearer for his restraint. He packed in the warm woolly blankets and threw them in a bundle at Lucinda's feet.

In the subdued light of the cabin she looked pale, and her dark eyes met his questioningly. Logan took her in his arms. "Dear wife," he said, "I love you--and I want you. Will you make our bed--and let me come to you--to-night?"

"Why, Logan! Of course," she answered, shyly. "I'm your wife. And I--I love you, too."

If Huett had been happy before he was happier now. The still, smoky, warm days persisted. He laid his hearthstones and built' his fireplace and chimney. It was a serviceable job, though wanting the finish he had been able to put upon his carpentry. But he was not a mason. When he found that his chimney would draw, and not fill the cabin with smoke, he whooped his delight. Then with boards he had brought in the wagon he built shelves and a table. He drove pegs in the logs upon which to hang utensils. In his mind's eye he saw a fine head of elk antlers on the wall for his rifles. In an opposite corner he constructed shelves for his ammunition, of which he had a large amount, and his few personal belongings. For Lucinda he built a wardrobe with a canvas curtain, and a box-like affair she could use as a bureau. Above this he hung a little mirror.

The hour came when Logan fared out on horseback to attack another important job--the fencing of the gaps on his canyon walls. It took him a week of arduous labour, but labour in which he revelled for many reasons, not the least of which was the sight of deer and elk, and lion tracks and flocks of wild turkeys, and his cattle grazing below. One day he sighted a newly born calf, and thought of that as a herald and a promise of the great herd to come.

His anxiety over the possibility that snow would come before he had rolled and snaked down sufficient firewood for winter was without warrant. November days stayed clear and warm with pale sun. Dead aspen wood by the cord, hard as iron, lay, already felled by the beaver. Huett had but to drag it to the cabin--cut, split, and stack it on the windward side of the wide porch. Dead oak he snaked down from the woods above. And he sawed many sections of pine, to roll them down the slope. Before he completed the cutting, however, the weather changed. The pale sun faded behind gathering cloud, the air lost its warmth, the wind sang the knell of Indian summer. A cold fine rain began to fall.

"Luce, she's coming, and we almost got her beat," announced Logan, stamping in at noon that day...

"Who's she?" interrogated Lucinda, in mild surprise. "Winter, by gosh! Just let me hang up some meat to freeze--then we're jake."

The drizzle turned to sleet, and when Logan awoke during the night he heard its soft patter and seep upon the cabin. How good it felt to be housed, snug in this strong abode made by his own hands, warm under the woollen blankets beside his young and hot-blooded wife! Logan had no fear of wind or snow or cold. But before he went to sleep he heard the wild bay of hunting wolves. That was different. Wolves were the bane of settlers.

In the morning there was a thin sheet of snow on the ground and white flakes were falling scantily. His horses favoured the lee side of the canyon, where, under the high shelving wall, neither wind nor snow reached them. Logan saddled Buck and, rifle in hand, rode up the canyon. "Well, varmints," he said to the tracks in the snow, "you better keep off my range." Before Logan had ridden two miles up the draw he crossed tracks of beaver, fox, marten, deer, and cat, but none of cougar or wolf. While building the fences at the upper end of his range he had barred two elk trails, with the satisfaction of realizing that the elk which had come down could not get back. At length Logan came upon a small herd, feeding in one of the offshoots of the canyon. They were as tame as cattle, but Logan had no compunction about shooting a fine bull. He hung it up from a strong branch, dressed it, and cut off the antlered head. This he stuck safely in the crotch of a sapling. The carcass he loaded over his saddle. Buck snorted under the heavy load, and packed it unwillingly back to the cabin.

Logan chose the big pine nearest the cabin, and therefore unexposed to sunshine, upon which to hang this meat. He skinned the carcass first, and nailed the fine hide to the wall of the cabin. Then he cut out the haunches and hung the several parts high over a branch, out of the reach of all beasts but the cat family.

Lucinda fried elk liver for Logan that night for supper. She, had learned how to bake fine sourdough biscuits. Logan thought he fared sumptuously, and he told Lucinda so.

"I'll hang up a couple of deer to freeze and some wild turkeys," he went on. "Then, if I can only track a fat bear that hasn't holed up, we'll be jake. Bear-fat renders fine grease and oil. Best to cook with. As good as butter. And a bear rib roasted--umm umm!"

As luck would have it, Huett shot his complement of game without travelling three miles from his cabin. The brakes in the lower end of the canyon appeared to be winter quarters for all kinds of animals. These ravines were choked with splintered cliffs and windfalls and thickets of oak. Buck came in for some hard packing before Logan brought all the meat home.

On the last trip, late one grey November afternoon, Logan came upon the half-eaten remains of one of his heifers. Cougar tracks in the thin snow! Logan sustained a strong shock: This was an abrupt break in the happy and fortunate sequence of events. The big cat had rolled the skin back and eaten the liver, taking hardly any more. Coyotes had consumed about half the carcass.

Logan vented his rage vehemently to the leaden skies. It was his first set-back. No doubt the cougar had killed other heifers and calves. Logan had no time that night to search, but he swore he would trail that cougar to its lair.

It was dark when he returned to the cabin. He unpacked and unsaddled Buck, to turn him loose. The load of meat he lifted up on the wood pile. Then he burst into the cabin, where for the first time a bright blaze of faggots in the fire, and steaming pots on the hearth, and Lucinda's pale, pretty face warming at his entrance, failed to elicit a glad shout.

"Wife, what do you think?" he began, his face red and heated. "I found a cougar kill. One of our heifers! Damn cat ate only the liver. I'll bet he's killed others...Why in hell don't cougars stick to deer meat? But when the snow flies they want beef...By God, I'll kill him! Here's a chance to use your dog. Coyote will trail that varmint if I can't...Luce, wolves and lions are the curse of cattlemen on wild ranges. I knew that, yet I overruled the warning...But, I see now--and it's war on the meat-eaters!"

Lucinda looked at him with what seemed surprise and compassion.

"My dear husband! Has it taken that to show you the terrific truth of your trial? I have known it since we got here. All the time I've known it...Don't be discouraged by this loss, or by what it threatens. You will conquer all obstacles."

"Why--bless your heart!" exclaimed Huett, turning his big cold hands to the fire. He felt amazed, ashamed, and something else he did not quite grasp. "Sure, you're right. It's nothing...But how good to feel the fire--to smell that stew--to see you here!"

CHAPTER FIVE

Lucinda watched the drifting snow. It was late in the afternoon of a winter day. A steely brightness showed where the sun hung over the western fringe of the canyon, and black patches stood out on the south slopes where the snow had melted. The dry, scattered flakes swirled down; ceaselessly the wind moaned in the pines. During these winter months that ghostly wind had been the cruellest of Lucinda's trials. She hated it. She feared it. For ever it haunted her with the spectre of loneliness and isolation. When the storm-king raged out of the north, sometimes it drove her frantic. In the dead of night, when Logan slept beside her like a log, it was endurable, but she could not refrain from listening. There would come a lull, and then a faint moan far off. It would grow and swell, and sweep through the forest, mounting to a tremendous roar. She could feel the cabin move over the roots of the great swaying pines. The roar would move on, dying to a moan.

Twilight was creeping out from under the walls. It would soon be dark. When Logan did not come home by nightfall she would fall prey to uneasy worry. It was nearly time to begin supper. The fire was red, the kettle beginning to sing.

The months had dragged by. Logan Huett was not only a natural hunter, but also a rancher who had conceived a passion to kill predatory beasts. Day after day he left Lucinda by herself in the cabin. At first she nearly died of loneliness, but she never let her husband see that. She had her housework, her sewing, and her knitting--tasks she left numberless times to look out, as she was gazing now, unseeingly across the cold, white, black-tipped ridge to the outside world. Logan had killed nine cougars, and many coyotes. The wolves, however, had so far been too keen for him.

His herd, his poor little herd of cattle, had dwindled to the brindle bull and three cows. Calves, heifers, steers all gone, except the furry bags of bones! That had been heart-rending for Logan. He dreaded this would defeat his cherished hopes, yet he was a man whom nothing could stop. His one consolation was the growth of Lucinda's respect and love for him. In many ways Huett was wanting. He was neither callous nor selfish nor indifferent, but his great fault was his blindness to the martyrdom that he had nailed upon his wife. Long since, however, Lucinda had given herself to his project, and nothing could have swerved her from it now. She had resolved to make herself the helpmate of the pioneer. She had every qualification, but her one weakness was her sensitive mind, her emotional nature.

Hours on end she had pondered over the lives of the women who had come before her to this devastating West. What had happened to them? If they had been delicately organized as she was, they had become hardened to meet the callousness and brutality of the wilderness; or else they had died.

Lucinda was heavy with child now in this last winter month, and the feeling of life within her had been the best resistance to the morbidness of the early weeks of that season. She had always loved children. She longed for some of her own. She wanted passionately to give Logan the sons he would need in this long fight to success, but giving birth to them in this desolate hole in the forest appalled her as nothing else ever had. The nursing and caring for them as babies did not loom so terribly; nevertheless, it struck her deeply. When they grew old enough for her to teach--that would be her happy task; and when they were lads, big enough to ride and shoot and plant and chop, to do all Logan talked so fondly of--that would be wonderful.

She fought loyally against the tragedy that seemed inevitable, against the disillusionment which hung in the balance, against the magnifying fears that beset her.

Down across the pale track of daylight upon the snow Lucinda made out the dark figure of Huett, bowed under a burden, w