"Why don't you get a bigger herd to start with?" he asked presently. "There's lots of money in cattle nowadays, but it's slow making it when you start so small." "Of course; but we haven't the capital to start a big herd, and my brother doesn't believe in mortgaging." "That's a good principle, generally; but taking cattle on time is different. Your herd increases so fast that you're making fifteen or twenty per cent, instead of four or five. Supposing, say, you were to borrow off a stockman like me. Say I make over a hundred head of stock--white-face, good beef critters, you understand--and you have hay to feed up into the spring. Then you could figure like this." Fascinated, convinced in spite of herself, Harry listened while Ludlum rapidly sketched the problem, the profit and loss, the complete working, so it seemed to the girl, of a stock ranch. He made Rob's little bunch of cows appear almost contemptibly unimportant. After all, it appeared to be just as she had believed: if you had energy, confidence and common sense, you were virtually sure of succeeding. Rob's idea of poking along for years, collecting a heifer here and there on the way, was hopelessly wrong and unnecessary. An impulse moved her to speak. "Won't you come down to the house now and talk to Rob?" she begged. "He's off plowing, but he'll be in for dinner. I'm sure you could convince him that your plan is a sound one for us." "I'd be glad to," Ludlum answered, gathering up his reins, "but I'm on my way to the reserve to look at the pasture. If it'll be agreeable, I'll stop a few days later on my way back." "We'll always be glad to see you," Harry responded cordially. "Meanwhile I'll tell my brother what you've told me about making money with cattle." "So that's Holliday's," Ludlum said to himself as he rode on. "Joyce told me it was the best location round here. Funny how these-here suckers think they can come along any time they like and shut us old-timers out of every good water hole in the country! H'm! Well," he remarked presently as if finishing a silent argument, "the way it stands suits me first-rate. A year from July, say, I'd be able to feed a big bunch of stock in there." CHAPTER XIII After her talk with Ludlum, Harry went back to the house exulting. At last some one who could speak with authority had come to advise them; yes, and to help them, too. In her happy optimism she regarded Ludlum's brief array of facts and figures as the formula for turning their labor into a stream of gold. She spent the forenoon in bursts of energetic housework and in watching for Rob. She was wild with impatience to tell him of Ludlum's plan for them. Even the little house where they had heretofore lived so contentedly seemed suddenly cramped and outgrown. Yet it was a far better house than many wealthier ranchers owned, a better one than Rob himself had expected to build.