The Trail of Conflict

. Porters wearing that air of authority and responsibility for which one might justly look in a premier or secretary of state, came and went; conductors punched ticket

ination, the first stop on the detour, she thought with a sudden mist before her eyes. She hoped that the storm was not an omen of what lay before them. She shook herself mentally. "Don't be silly and superstitious,

ten note to the effect that if she and Steve regained their common sense and returned to the Manor before the end of the year he would double the income he had allowed them. There were a dozen glorious American beauties in her compartmen

at riches," she paraphrased to herself as she thought of the weeks when she had been engaged to Greyson. Her heart still smarted with contrition as she remembered how ashamed she had been that she could make so little response to the love he lavished u

of postage stamps. Nothing else. She had carried out the terms of the will in letter and spirit. After her bills had been paid she had transferred her bank balance to her father and had dropped her remaining cash into the box of a Salvation Army lassie as she entered the

gs back into her bag as she heard an approaching whistle. It was Steve. The queer merry-go-round of fortune had accomplished one thing, it had restored Steve's spirits. Since leaving New York he had been a different person from

andt stopped at the open door, then as h

expression in his eyes which set the girl's heart to beating uncomfortab

ly, "I suppose-if you complied with the terms of Uncle Nick's will you must be rather down a

until January first-and a book of two-cent stamps. Those stamps won't imperil our hopes of the inheritance, will they?" she asked with exaggerated anxiety. "Caleb Lawson held me up before I boarded

As I remember it the Beg

maid. You're right, the similari

k at Slippy Bend. Until then--" his hand we

oney, Steve," she

ou what belongs to you. Aren't you ear

ur share of Father's mo

s diff

take my money. I re

ill ta

ard, her face as

money. You will find that a Glamorgan has as much pride as a Courtlandt if she hasn't sever

You're not a

ugged l

s the

smile from his lips. He caught her hands in his

erry's face flushed with relief as the black head with its gleaming eyes and teeth bobbed in at the door.

him and the maid for me. However, as this is really a deferred wedding-trip

her laughing eyes fell

take it from me, sometime, Mrs. Courtlandt, I'll show you

biding-my-time look in his eyes. What had he meant about a honeymoon? Did he mean that he and Felice-no, no, Steve was not that kind. She looked about the compartment to make sure that sh

, waded downward through the middle of it. Every few steps he would stop to yank a howling, red-eyed bulldog from a hole which had betrayed him. Jerry valiantly blinked back the tears as she watched him. She had never seen anything quite as sordid and depressing as her surroundings. The only note of civilization in the dreary scene was the large, curta

to lick his face. He kept one hand on the animal's head as he turned to the girl beside him. "Jerry, this is Pete

hand man, but Ranlett's in the saddle now. I'm sure pleased

ross-currented with fine lines and smiles; his Stetson came close to ears which looked as though the Almighty had designed them as hat-rests and had made

roads, Steve-I would say Chief? The boys has decided that even if they did teach the new owner most of what he knows about ranchin', it won't do to be familiar-like no more. So we've decided to call him chief, ma'am,

a model sketchily done in clay as he peered down inquiringly. Gerrish expressed himself in language which the girl was sure was being painfully expurgated because of her. The wheels groaned and choked as they churned up fountains of mud. As she watched t

t?" she ventured in the lu

in a hurry or send a rescue-party through to Chin

e nothing to put under the back wheels; it would do no

gh and choppy sea. Courtlandt grimly pursued his tactics till with a roar from the motor and a lurch which sent Jerry's teeth into her lower lip, the car, looking like an uncanny prehistoric animal which had been wallowing in a mud bath, dra

which the storm had beaten from the pines. From somewhere a meadow-lark trilled an ecstatic greeting and as though frightened at its temerity as suddenly subsided. The naming color in the west might have been the

nd hovered two Chinese servants, a man and a woman. Their slant-eyes in their moon faces were lu

r emotion found vent in a little cry of delight. After the grayness and mud of the ride out the great living-room glowed like a jewel. The color stole through her senses li

eous serapes from old Mexico, Hopi saddle-blankets, heavily beaded garments of the Blackfeet, Apache bows and quivers full of arrows, Navaho blankets, skins of mountain lions and lynx there were, each one placed in ar

e's Mother!" whis

face of the woman in riding costume. She didn't seem like a thing of paint and canvass, she w

so-so surprised. It seemed for a moment as if she held out welcoming arms to

pposite. You see we have but one story in the ranch-house. Your bags are in your room. Ming Soy will come

hed with disappointment. Steve's face was a mask, only his

came from

-and had sent the roses to--" she winked her lashes furiously but not before Steve ha

Doc Rand that things have a way of coming marvelously, un

nd words but the emotion which had threatened her all day surge

e the life here and the ranch and-and-and Goober," he a