"Your revolver wasn't in your pocket? Yet you sheathed your rifle!" "Didn't you notice his men had their guns pointed at us across their laps? Sheathing mine was what gave me the chance to bluff him. It's all right now. He won't try any more tricks this time." She sent a clear call ringing up the cliff. At once the hoist rope began to reeve down through the pulley of the crane. The rope ladder soon lowered from the other opening. Both saddles were fastened to the hoist hook. But Lennon thrust his rifle through the back of his cartridge belt. They found Farley in the doorway, nervously peering down the valley after the Indians. "Cochise was hiding in Devil's Chute until you rode out of sight," he quavered. "He demanded tizwin. I convinced him that Slade took away every drop. He then threatened to seize you for his woman and torture Mr. Lennon, if I did not send down Elsie. I postponed the decision until your return." "All right, Dad. We persuaded him to let us come up. But now we're here, I think we'll take no more rides till Slade comes." Lennon freed his rifle from the belt and stepped in through the doorway after the father and daughter. His first glance inside the cliff house showed him Elsie labouring at the windlass. He hastened to take the crank out of her plump little hands. His one-armed winding soon hoisted the saddles to the crane. The moment the load was safe, Elsie tremblingly lifted his hand to look at the blackening bruises left by Cochise's steel grip. "Does it--does it hurt much, Jack?" she whispered. "Once I saw him snap a dog's leg." Lennon smilingly denied the sharp pain of the strained ligaments. But inwardly his anger against Cochise hardened into enmity as he looked into the girl's innocent eyes and recalled that the brutal Apache considered her his woman. His reassurance brought instant relief to her volatile mind. She began to chatter gaily about how she and Carmena would entertain him during the wait for Slade. In this the older girl joined with cordial heartiness. Elsie displayed a high stack of women's magazines, for which Carmena was a regular subscriber. Every three or four months they were brought in from the nearest post office by Slade. Elsie fairly showered Lennon with naive questions about the faraway land of cities and green trees and vast stretches of water. Aside from the magazines and what had been told her by Farley and Carmena, she had no knowledge of the world outside the Hole. Beneath Carmena's quiet manner Lennon discovered an interest as keen as that of her foster-sister and very much more intelligent. She had childhood memories of Ohio. Much to his distaste, she persuaded Farley to remain most of the day with them in the living room.