had been both amazed and awed by the size of the country into which she had landed. She was just now beginning to get her bearings. It had been different with Bud. He had liked the country from the first. The more lonely it was the more he gloried in it.
“The only thing wrong with this outfit,” he asserted, as he settled himself on the left side of the seat, “is that I wish I had a saddle horse. When we get to Charley’s ranch you bet I’m going to have me a horse and saddle.”
“We don’t know what we’ll get when we reach Charley’s ranch,” Leda reminded.
“An’ you said a mouthful then,” Nevada concurred.
As the buckboard started up Penoloa canyon the girl was conscious that they were at last beginning the final leg of their journey. In four more days, Nevada had told her, they would reach the town of Highriver, and learn the truth about the I X L ranch.
They had got well into the canyon, and the buckboard was worming its bumpy way beneath the towering red cliffs which walled the canyon when they were overtaken by two horsemen. Leda, seated in the middle, felt their guide stiffen, and there was a quaver in his voice as he spoke to the team of ponies.
The riders parted, and passed one on each side of the buckboard. They were young, hard-bitten fellows, dressed in the usual trappings of rangeland; wide-brimmed, flat-topped hats; silk neckerchiefs, tied loosely at their throats; blue shirts and overalls, the latter pretty much covered by their leather, batwing chaps. Their feet were encased in the high-heeled boots with which Leda was beginning to be familiar. Charley Harrison had brought much the same kind of regalia home with him on the occasion of his last visit, and as soon as they reached the West Bud had insisted upon getting a similar outfit.
In addition to this, each rider wore a filled cartridge belt slung loosely about his waist, and a heavy Colt’s .45 swung low at his right thigh in an open-topped holster. Each man carried a carbine under the fender leather of his saddle.
The riders were grinning, but they sized up the outfit with eyes that missed nothing. Leda felt herself coloring under their scrutiny.
“What yuh blushin’ about, sister?” one of them jibed good-naturedly. “You ain’t got nothin’ you need tuh be ashamed of.”
“Aw, come on, Jack,” the other said angrily, “we’ve gotta git tuh Hopkins’ ranch ’fore dark.”
“Naw, wait a minute,” Jack Fossum said drunkenly. “Mebbe little sister here wants a drink.” He drew a pint flask out of his chaps pocket and airily extended it toward the girl.
“Thank you, I don’t drink,” Leda refused icily.
“No? Don’t drink? Why, yuh don’t know what yo’re missin’. How ’bout you, old badger?”
“Th-th-thanks. I n-never refuse go-good whisky,” Nevada said, and taking the proffered bottle he let the fiery liquid run down his throat in a gurgling stream. The contents had decreased perceptibly when he handed it back.
“Aw, come on, Jack,” Al Biggers rasped.
“Shore—just as soon’s I drink toas’ to the purtiest dang gal ever seen in Utah. Here’s to yuh, miss. The next best thing to the lips of a good-lookin’ girl is the lip of a bottle.”
With the same motion which withdrew the bottle from his mouth he flung it against the hub of the buckboard, and emitted a yell which mingled discordantly with the crash of glass, and rolled the spurs to his mount. He passed his companion, who also hooked in his spurs, and they galloped out of sight.
“I thought you told me you didn’t drink,” Leda accused the guide.
“I think too much o’ my health not tuh drink when I’m asked to by the Wild Ones,” Nevada replied.
“You mean you think those men are—are outlaws?”
“I’ll bet seven dollars an’ a half they are,” Nevada stated positively.
“Then why didn’t they hold us up?” Bud demanded.
“They ain’t fools, but we ain’t outa the woods yit,” Nevada said gloomily. “I wish tuh the Lord there was some cut-off we could take.”
“You mean you’re afraid those men will come back and rob us?” Leda demanded. “They wouldn’t dare. We would identify them.”
“I wouldn’t be too shore about that,” Nevada demurred. “If yuh got any val’ables yuh’d better keep ’em well hid. Where’d yuh keep yore money anyway?”
“In—in here,” Leda replied with a blush, as she touched the bodice of her dress. “They—they wouldn’t dare.”
“I wouldn’t bank on that either,” the guide said pessimistically.
It would soon be dark, and Nevada constantly urged his ponies so as to reach a small, grassy park where he meant to camp. Leda could not restrain the feeling of acute uneasiness which crept over her. Suppose those men were outlaws, and should force her to hand over the money? It was all that she and Bud had in the world. If they couldn’t find Charley they would be at the mercy of this forbidding land. The very thought caused her a shudder.
“Gettin’ cold, miss?” Nevada queried. “We’ll soon be there. Gid-ap, Snip. Hustle along thar, Coley.”
The little park was reached just as twilight was settling down over the canyon. Already the sides of the canyon walls resembled the frowning fronts of monster citadels. The park itself was a couple of acres of open grass where a tiny stream cataracted down a precipitous side-canyon.
Nevada proved himself an expert camp attendant, whatever his other shortcomings. He leaped to the ground and had the team unhitched and unharnessed almost before Bud and Leda could get the cramp out of their limbs. Five minutes later he had a cheerful fire burning, and the Easterners crouched around it gratefully. The chill of the mountains had descended as soon as the sun was out of sight.
The tents were quickly set up, and almost before they knew it Nevada had a savory supper of beefsteak, potatoes, and coffee cooking on the coals. But before they were ready to eat darkness had settled about them until there was nothing but a black void between the ring of firelight and the ghostly luminosity of the star-bathed crags.
“Don’t be fretted, miss, if yuh hear noises ye ain’t used to in the town where ye was raised,” Nevada attempted to be reassuring when he saw Leda start at some strange cry from far above them. Then he went on practically to frustrate his own purpose.
“This here country is plumb lousy with b’ars an’ mountain lions which’ll prob’ly come sniffin’ ’round the camp atter we git tuh bed, but they won’t hurt nothin’ if ye jest lay still.”
“Oh!” the girl gasped.
“Gee!” Bud ejaculated.
“Don’t worry. I got my old forty-five-seventy an’ I’ll have ’er right handy tuh my hand,” Nevada boasted.
From just behind sounded a chuckle. All three became motionless.
“Hold the pose, everybody,” a jeering voice commanded. “Don’t reach for that forty-five-seventy now because this ain’t no b’ar.
