He stopped at the east window and scrutinized the line as far as he could see the dim, dusty, winding trail, hoping that some of the outfit would come into sight. Then he slid the Sharps out of the window and held it on an imaginary enemy, whom he pretended was going to try to take the house. While he thought of caustic remarks, with which to greet such a person, he saw the head of a horse push up into view over the edge of the hill. Sudden hope surged through him and shocked him to action. He cocked the rifle, the metallic clicks sweet to his ears. Then he saw the rider, and it was--Mary Meeker. Astonishment and quick suspicion filled his mind and he held the weapon ready to use on her escort, should she have one. Her horse reared and plunged and, deciding that she was alone, and ashamed to be covering a woman, he slid the gun back into the room, leaning it against the wall close at his hand, not losing sight of the rider for a moment. "Now, what th' devil is she doing up here, anyhow?" he puzzled, and then a grin flickered across his face as the possible solution came to him. "Mebby she wants Hopalong," he muttered, and added quickly, "Purty as blazes, too!" And she did make a pretty picture even to his scoffing and woman-hating mind. She was having trouble with her mount, due to the spurring it was getting on the side farther from the watcher. It reared and plunged, bucking sideways, up-and-down and fence-cornered, zig-zagging over the ground forward and back, and then began to pitch "stiff-legged." Pete's eyes glowed with the appreciation of a master rider and he was filled with admiration, which soon became enthusiastic, over her saddle-ease and cool mastery. She seemed to be a part of the horse. "She'd 'a been gone long ago if she was fool enough to sit one of them side saddle contraptions," he mused. "A-straddle is th' only--_Good!_ All right! Yo're a stayer!" he exclaimed as she stepped from one stirrup and stood up in the other when the animal reared up on its hind legs. He glanced out of the other windows of the house and fell to watching her again, his face darkening as he saw that she appeared to be tiring, while her mount grew steadily worse. Then she "touched leather," and again and again. Her foot slipped from the stirrup, but found it again, while she frantically clung to the saddle horn. "Four-legged devil!" Pete exclaimed. "Wish _I_ was on you, you ornery dog! Hey! Don't you bite like that! Keep yore teeth away from that leg or I'll blow yore d----d head off!" he cried wrathfully as the animal bit viciously several times at the stirrup leather. "I'll whale th' stuffin' outen you, you wall-eyed clay-bank! Yo're too bronc for _her_ to ride, all right."