The contrast between them cut Frances to the quick. She keenly realized how she, herself, must appear in the company of the pretty Eastern girl. "Of course, Pratt, and Mrs. Edwards, and all of them, must see how superior she is to me," Frances thought, as Molly galloped away with her. "But just the same, I don't like that Sue Latrop a bit!" CHAPTER XV IN THE FACE OF DANGER Frances was going by the way of Cottonwood Bottom because the trail was better and there were fewer gates to open. The Bar-T kept a gang riding fence all the time; but even so, it was impossible always to keep up the wires. Frances seldom if ever rode from home without wire cutters and staples in a pocket of her saddle. She stopped several times on this morning to mend breaks and to tighten slack wires, so it was late when she found the herd at West Run. Here were chuck-wagon, horse corral and camp--a regular "cowboy's home," in fact. The boss of the outfit was Asa Bird, and Tom Phipps was the wrangler, while a Mexican, named Miguel, was cooking for the outfit. "Ya-as, Miss Frances," drawled Asa, "I reckon we need a right smart of things. Mike says he's most out o' provisions; but for the love of home don't send us no more beans. We've jest about been beaned to death! No wonder them Greasers are fighting among themselves all the endurin' time. It's the _frijoles_ they eat makes 'em so fractious--sure is!" Frances wrote out a list of the goods needed, for the next supply wagon that passed this way to drop at the camp, and looked over the outfit in general in order to report fully to Sam and her father regarding the conditions at the West Run. It was high noon before she got in sight of the cottonwoods on her homeward trail. She was hurrying Molly, for she did not want to keep Ratty M'Gill waiting for his money. As she had told him, she wanted the reckless cowboy off the Bar-T ranges before nightfall. She had struck the plain above the river ford when she sighted a single rider far ahead, and going in her own direction. It was plain that the man--whoever he was--was heading for the ford instead of the bridge where the new trail crossed. Something about this fact--or about the slouching rider himself--made Frances suspicious. She was reminded of the last time she had come this way and of the dialogue she had overheard between Ratty M'Gill and the man named Pete. "If he turns to look back, he will see me," thought the excited girl. Instantly she was off Molly's back. There might be no time to ride out of sight over the ridge. Here was an old buffalo wallow, and she took advantage of it. In the old days when the bison roamed the plains of the Panhandle the beasts made wallows in which they ground off the grass, and the grassroots as well, leaving a barren hollow from two to four feet in depth. These dust baths were used frequently by the heavily-coated buffalo in hot weather.