Me Smith

mind, Ralston had no desire to return immediately to the ranch. He wanted to be alone; to harden his heart against Dora; to prepare his mind for more shocks such as he had had of late. It was not an easy task he had set himself.
    After a time he dismounted, and, throwing down his bridle-reins, dropped to the ground to rest, while his horse nibbled contentedly at the sparse bunch-grass. As he lay in the sunshine, his hands clasped behind his head, the stillness acted like a sedative, and something of the tranquillity about him crept into his soul.
    Upon one thing he was determined, and that was, come what might, to be a man —a gentleman. If in his conceit and eagerness he had misunderstood the softness of Dora’s eyes, her shy tremulousness, as he now believed he had, he could take his medicine like a man, and go when the time came, without whimpering, without protest or reproach. He wanted to go away feeling that he had her respect, at least; go knowing that there was not a single word or action of his upon which she could look back with contempt. Yes, he wanted greatly her respect. She inspired in him this desire.
    Ralston felt very humble, very conscious of his own shortcomings, as he lay there while the afternoon waned; but, humble as he was, resigned as he believed himself to be, he could not think of Smith with anything but resentment and contempt. It hurt his pride, his self-respect, to regard Smith in the light of a rival—a successful rival.
    “By Gad!” he cried aloud, and with a heat which belied his self-abnegation. “If he were only a decent white man! But to be let down and out by the only woman I ever gave a whoop for in all my life, for a fellow like that! Say, it’s tough!”
    Ralston’s newly acquired serenity, the depth of which he had reason to doubt, was further disturbed by a distant clatter of hoofs. He sat up and watched the oncoming of the angriest-looking Indian that ever quirted a cayuse over a reservation. It was Bear Chief, whom he knew slightly. Seeing Ralston’s saddled horse, the Indian pulled up a little, which was as well, since the white man was immediately in his path.
    As the Indian came back, Ralston, who had rolled over to let him pass, remarked dryly:
    “The country is getting so crowded, it’s hardly safe for a man to sit around like this. What’s the excitement, Bear Chief?”
    “Horse-thief steal Indian horses!” he cried, pointing toward the Bad Lands.
    Ralston was instantly alert.
    “Him ridin’ my race-pony—fastest pony on de reservation. Got big bunch. Runnin’ ’em off!”
    Fast moving specks that rose and fell among the hills of the Bad Lands bore out the Indian’s words.
    “Did you see him?”
    Ralston was slipping the bit back in his horse’s mouth and tightening the cinch.
    “Yas, I see him. Long way off, but I see him.”
    “Did you know him?”
    “Yas, I know him.”
    “Who was it?” Ralston was in the saddle now.
    “Little white man—what you call him ‘bug-hunter’—at de MacDonald ranch.”
    “McArthur!” Their horses were gathering speed as they turned them toward the Bad Lands.
    “Yas. Little; hair on face—so; wear what you call dem sawed-off pants.”
    From the description, Ralston recognized McArthur’s English riding-breeches, which had added zest to life for the bunk-house crowd when he had appeared in them. The deputy-sheriff was bewildered. It seemed incredible, yet there, still in sight, was the flying band of horses, and Bear Chief’s positiveness seemed to leave no room for doubt.
    “Oh, him one heap good thief,” panted Bear Chief, in unwilling admiration, as their horses ran side by side. “He work fast. No ’fraid. Cut ’em out—head ’em off—turn ’em—ride through big brush—jump de gulch—yell and swing de quirt, and do him all ’lone! Dat no easy work—cut out horses all ’lone. Him heap good horse-thief!”
    What did it mean, anyhow? Ralston asked himself the question again and again. Was it possible that he had been deceived in McArthur? That, after all, he was a criminal of an extraordinary type? He found no answer to his questions, but both he and Bear Chief soon realized that they were exhausting their horses in a useless pursuit. It was growing dark; the thief had too much start, and, with the experience of an old hand, he drove the horses over rocks, where they left no blabbing tracks behind. Once well into the Bad Lands, he was as effectually lost as if the earth had opened and