were not trailed, unless he had been carefully trained otherwise. They were taught, during their training days, to fear the rope, and no range horse would walk far with the reins at his hoofs. She had forgotten that; her four years' absence from the Bar S had robbed her of that most essential, and very common, knowledge.
She dropped the flowers — for the stern business of getting out of the timber would fully occupy her mind and energy for some time, if Silver had strayed far—and ran to the western edge of the clearing, leaping to the trunk of a fallen tree.
From this vantage point she looked southward — toward the Bar S — which direction the horse would naturally take had he decided to desert her. Far down a narrow aisle, fully a quarter of a mile away, she saw a gray shape moving among the trees.
It was Silver, idly browsing—she could see his neck slanting downward, and his tail swishing back and forth.
She gulped with thankfulness, leaped down from the fallen tree trunk, and began to run toward Silver, her face a trifle pale and her eyes filled with a wistful expression.
But she had not taken more than three or four steps toward the horse when she halted and stood rigid, catching her breath with a shrill gasp; her face whitening, her eyes filled with horror. For not more than a dozen paces from her, and directly in the narrow aisle through which she must go to reach Silver, stood a huge, gray timber wolf, his mouth open, his jaws agape, slavering; his eyes flaming with a fire which, she knew, was a sign of the malignant ferocity that had set him across her path.
She did not know how long she stood there, watching the great gray beast. She knew that the wolf did not move, but stood there returning her gaze, its sides heaving with its rapid breaths, its tongue hanging far out of its mouth — the fangs bared a little in a hideous, grinning smirk. It seemed to her that the animal knew of her helplessness and was mocking her, content to wait, certain that she could not escape.
She did not move—she was convinced that if she made the slightest motion the beast would leap. Nor did she permit her gaze to wander for the slightest fraction of a second from the beast's eyes. She stood that way for, it seemed, many minutes; her breath catching in her throat, her heart pounding, and her nerves tingling with the horror of it.
And then she heard a sharp sound near—the crackling of a twig or a branch, it seemed. She saw the wolf raise its head, snap its ears erect and look past her — a little to her right. The fur on its neck bristled, as though it saw something that aroused it to a fighting resentment, or a craven, gripping fear. Then it snarled, wheeled, and leaped — away from her.
While its body was in the air the solemn silence of the forest was rent by a splitting, crashing report. The girl saw the wolf collapse in mid-air and come down limply, landing on its head and shoulders; its legs asprawl and jerking spasmodically.
She wheeled, aware that the wolf had received a death wound, to see a man on a big black horse directly behind her. He was lounging in the saddle, a smoking pistol in his right hand. There was a slight smile on his lips, and his eyes were agleam with interest and curiosity.
"You're scared, ma'am, eh?" he said in a low but distinct voice. "Well, you don't need to be — now. I reckon Mr. Lobo won't ever be any deader than he is right this minute."
Eleanor walked totteringly to the fallen tree trunk and sank to it, holding tightly to some barkless branches that projected from it to keep herself from slipping off — for she knew that she had never been nearer to fainting than at this minute.
Her rescuer watched her with grave concern, the smile having departed. The pistol was still in his hand, and noting that she looked at it wonderingly—as though not quite certain what he intended to do next — he sheathed it — first ejecting the empty shell and replacing it with a loaded one. The pistol in the holster, he looked at her with a straight, level gaze.
"What's happened, ma'am? You sure didn't walk into this timber!"
She stood erect now, for she had conquered the faintness that had stolen over her, and smiled at him — though her voice quavered a little when she spoke:
"I stopped to pick some flowers and my horse strayed," she told him.
His eyes gleamed with humor. "You ain't Eastern, ma'am — I can see that. Then how —"
"I forgot. You see, I haven't been home in four years — and I left the reins on Silver's saddle."
"Then he would slope," said the man; "there bein' nothin' to stop him, an' him thinkin' that mebbe you didn't need him any more. An' then — when he'd gone — old Lobo thought he'd devil you. It's likely — if you've been in the timber any time—he's been followin' you. Well, he died hungry."
"So he did," she laughed. And then seriously: "I want to thank you. I'm afraid if you hadn't come when you did—" She shivered.
He laughed lowly. "Why, I've been watchin' you for hours, ma'am," he said gravely. "Hangin' around — quite a piece away."
She flushed angrily and stood rigid, facing him. Ready to tell him what she thought of him for spying upon her, she saw a big Bar S brand on the hip of the black horse — her father's brand. And then she knew that her father had distrusted her — had been convinced that she would ride to the timber — and that he had set this man to watch her, to see that no harm befell her.
The man saw the resentment shining in her eyes, and his expression became apologetic — so obviously apologetic that her anger vanished and a fugitive smile twitched at the corners of her mouth. The man grinned with her — sensing her forgiveness. But instantly she frowned, determined that though the man had saved her from the wolf he should not be permitted to presume upon his service — for he had been employed to do what he had done.
She wondered, though, even while she looked straight at him with a slightly belligerent gaze — how it happened that her father had selected so striking a cowboy to stand guard over her.
He was not handsome — men were never that, she was convinced—for that would make them seem effeminate. But he was undeniably good-looking. And his steel-gray eyes, now watching her with a glint of humor in them, were also aglimmer with the light of an intelligence that was rare in cowboys she had known'—those who had worked for her father, for instance.
He was tall, lithe, and muscular; he looked capable — that was the word that thoroughly described him, she thought — until she began to be affected by the atmosphere of grave and grim deliberation that seemed to envelop him.
The humor which seemed to glint his eyes was, she became convinced as she studied him, oddly mingled with malice, not vicious, but cynical — as though he was continually alert for deceit and trickery.
His gaze was highly disconcerting — she felt that were she a man she would not care to trifle with him. For in his eyes, in the way he moved, and in his attitude, was a lingering threat of cold preparedness — a readiness for anything that might happen.
However, she was indignant because he had admitted he had been watching her, and was not so deeply impressed by him as she might have been had she me f him under different circumstances. She raised her chin defiantly.
"So you were watching me. Then, when you asked me if I had walked here, you were merely trying to be humorous, is that it?"
His eyes twinkled. "I wasn't intendin' to tell you." His lips twitched into a smile. "But when you shivered that way, gettin' ready to faint, I just had to let you know that you wasn't in any great danger. You see, women ain't
