The men by the fire were ready. One of them perched on the steer's flank and freed the lariat, while another sat astride his neck and amidst a gush of blood sawed off the horns close to the head. John seared the stubs with the hot iron dipped in tar. The poor brute bellowed with fright and pain. Judith recoiled her lariat and made way for Jimmy Day, who slid up with a protesting heifer. "'Jude!" he shouted. "You're the cow ropingest girl in the Rockies! Say, Jude, ain't you afraid that baa-baa you're riding will buck with you? Swift! What a hell of a name for that thing!" "She can beat you roping 'em at that, Jimmy!" cried Douglas. "Better ride light, Jimmy," warned John. "She thinks more of that mare than she does of me." "All right, John," laughed Jimmy. "Take this heifer, fellows! She thinks she's a moose!" "She'll think she's a kitten when we finish with her," chuckled John. There was an uproar now in the two corrals that echoed from mountain to mountain. The trampled snow was crimson. White angora and sheepskin chaps were gaumed with thick clots of blood. The horses, half frantic from the smell of the bleeding cattle, tried every means in their not limited repertoires to bolt the hateful job. The work had gone fast and furiously for some time when Douglas touched his father on the arm. "Dad, look up on the shoulder of old Dead Line!" John straightened his back and shaded his eyes. A rider leading a Hereford was coming down the ridge. "That's Scott's horse, Grover," said Douglas. "Can you make out the rider?" "Not yet." John continued to stare intently. Others noticed his posture and followed his gaze. "It's Scott Parsons!" cried Charleton Falkner. "Shall we go get him?" exclaimed Jimmy Day. "No. He's starved out and giving up. Let's hear what he has to say," said John. The dehorning went on. Half a dozen more bleeding steers had been turned out before Scott, weary, gaunt, haggard beyond words, leading an emaciated young bull, drew rein beside the smaller corral. The roping came to a pause. John twisted a lariat round the neck of a steer he was working on and led it to the fence. The others followed. "Well, why the committee of welcome?" asked Scott hoarsely. His bloodshot eyes turned from one to another. "Where'd you find the bull, Scott?" asked John. "First located him on Fire Mesa. Been round about considerable since." "Whose bull is it now?" Charleton Falkner pushed Democrat toward the fence. "Mine!" Scott spoke shortly, his freckled face unmoved. "Do you think it was worth the price?" demanded Spencer. Scott looked searchingly at the crowd before him. The steer John was holding had been dehorned but not seared. The blood had run down the brute's white face and formed a crimson icicle on its under lip. John had run his fingers through his ashen hair, leaving it blood-smeared. Charleton was lighting a blood-stained cigarette with the hot searing-iron. Judith pounded her half-frozen ringers together.