"Aren't you afraid, Mr. Hampton?" she exclaimed, picturing to herself this pleasant young gentleman at death-grips with the sombre Jose. However, she obeyed and called Jose whom Hampton merely sent to the men's quarters with word for Carson and Lee to come to the house. Mrs. Simpson, witnessing the bloodless meeting from the hallway, was a little relieved and very much disappointed. Hampton strode up and down the office, the frown gathering upon his usually smooth brows. Plainly if something had happened to Judith the present responsibility lay upon his shoulders as next in authority. "Here I am," announced Carson briefly. "What is it?" "I am a little worried, Carson," said Hampton, "about Miss Sanford." "Huh?" grunted the old cattleman. "Judith hasn't put in an appearance and it's growing late," continued Hampton hastily "I'm afraid----" "Afraid? Afraid of what? You don't think she eloped with your Jap or stole the spoons, do you?" snapped Carson. He had been interrupted at the crucial point in a game of cribbage with Poker Face and the cattleman's weak spot was cribbage. He glared at Hampton belligerently. "Where is Lee?" questioned Hampton sharply. "I told Jose I wanted the two of you. Why didn't he come?" "Dunno," answered Carson, still without interest. "I ain't seen him. Wasn't in for supper----" "I tell you," cried Hampton, angry at Carson's quiet acceptance of facts which to him were darkly significant, "he, too, was out with his rifle to-day; I saw him myself. Now _he_ fails to show up! Don't you see what all this points to?" Carson, who seldom lost his poise with one-half of his brain still given over to the hand he meant to play with Poker Face, merely sighed and shook his head. "I'm real busy down at the bunk-house, Mr. Hampton," at last came his quiet answer, "where me an' Poker Face is figuring out something important. As for worrying about a man like Bud Lee or a girl like Judy, why, I just ain't going to do it a-tall. Most likely if you'll call up the Lower End----" "I've done it!" Whirling in his impatient stride across the room, Hampton came swiftly to Carson's side. "They're not there. They left the Lower End this afternoon and came on here. Then, both armed, they rode away again at four or five o'clock. I tell you, man, something has happened to them." "Don't believe it," retorted Carson. "Not for one little half-minute, I don't. What's to happen? Huh?" "You know as well as I do what sort of characters are about. The man who robbed Charlie Miller--who shot at Bud Lee----" "Whoa!" grinned Carson. "Don't you go and fool yourself. That stick-up gent is a clean hundred miles from here right now an' still going, real lively. If any other jasper lent him a hand, why, he's on his way, too. Not stopping to pick flowers. It's the way them kind plays the game."