It was a beautiful morning, even for Arizona. The soft air was at its winiest best. The spring rains had carpeted the hills with an unusually fine grass, and the summer suns had not yet burnt this to the crisp brown of August. Her young heart expanded with the very joy of life. Oh, how good it was to be alive in a world of warm sunshine, of blue, unflecked sky, and of cool, light breezes. Swifts basked on the rocks or darted like arrows for safety, and lay palpitating with suspense. The clear call of the quails sounded to right and left of her. To her eager consciousness it was as if some bath of splendor had poured down overnight upon the old earth. She rode from sunlight into shadow and from shadow to sunlight again, winding along the hill trail that took her toward the Del Oro. After hours of travel she came to the saddle from which one looked down to the gap in the cañon walls that had been the common watering place of all men's cattle, but now was homesteaded by her father. Far below her it lay, a dwarfed picture with detail blurred to a vague impressionistic map. She could see the hut, the fence line running parallel to the stream on the other side, some grazing cattle, Sweeney's horse in the corral. The piteous bleating of a lamb floated to her. Kate dismounted and made her way toward the sound. A pathetic little huddle of frightened life tried to struggle free at her approach. The slim leg of the lamb had become wedged at the intersection of several rocks in such a way that it could not be withdrawn. Kate pulled the boulder away, and released the prisoner. It looked at her and bleated without attempting to move. She took the soft, woolly creature in her arms, and examined the wounded limb, all torn and raw from its efforts to escape. A wound, she recalled, ought to be washed with cold water and bound. Returning to her horse, she put the little animal in front of the saddle and continued on the trail that led down to the river. Sweeney came out from the cabin and hailed her. He was a squat, weather-beaten man, who had ridden for her father ever since she could remember. "What in Mexico you got there?" he asked in surprise. She explained the circumstances under which she had found the lamb. "And what you aiming to do with it?" "I'm going to tie up its leg and take it across the river. Some of the C. F. herders are sure to find it before night." "Sho! What are you fooling with Cass Fendrick's sheep for?" he grumbled. "It isn't a sheep, but a lamb. And I'm not going to see it suffer, no matter who owns it." She was already walking toward the river. Protestingly he followed, and lent a hand at tying up the leg with the girl's handkerchief. "I'll just ride across and leave it outside the fence," she said. "Lemme go. I know the river better." Sweeney did not wait for her assent, but swung to the saddle. She handed him the lamb, and he forded the stream. At no place did the water come above the fetlocks of the horse.