The Judge will tell you about our poor accommodations. Let me recommend to your consideration some good friends of mine, the Willistons, father and daughter. They live three miles northwest of Kemah. The Judge will remember Williston, George Williston of the Lazy S. They are cultured people, though their way of living is necessarily primitive. I am sure you will like it better there than at our shabby little hotel, which is a rendezvous for a pretty rough class of men, especially at court time. If you decide to come, Mary Williston will meet you at Velpen. Please let me know your decision. Very sincerely, Richard Gordon. So here she was, going into the Indian country at last. A big State, South Dakota, and the phases of its civilization manifold. Having come so far, to refuse to go on seemed like turning back with her hand already on the plough, so with a stout heart she had wired Richard Gordon that she would go. But it was pretty hard now, to be sure, and pretty dreary, coming into Velpen knowing that she would see no one she knew in all the wide, wide world. The thought choked her and the impish demon, Loneliness, he of the smirk and horns and devil’s eyes, loomed leeringly before her again. Blindly, she picked up her umbrella, suit-case, and rain-coat. “Homesick?” asked the kindly brakeman, with a consolatory grin as he came to assist her with her baggage. She bit her lip in mortification to think she had carried her feelings so palpably on her sleeve. But she nodded honestly. “Maybe it won’t be so bad,” sympathized the brakeman. His rough heart had gone out to the slim, fair-haired young creature with the vague trouble in her eyes. “Thank you,” said Louise, gratefully. There was a moment’s bewilderment on the station platform. There was no one anywhere who seemed to be Mary—no one who might be looking for her. It was evening, too, the lonesome evening to those away from home, when thoughts stab and memories sap the courage. Some one pushed her rudely aside. She was in the way of the trucks. “Chuck it! None o’ your sass, my lad! There’s my fist. Heft it if you don’t put no stock in its looks. Git out o’ this, I say!” The voice was big and convincing. The man wasn’t so big, but some way he looked convincing, too. The truckman stepped aside, but with plucky temerity answered back. “Get out yourself! Think you own the whole cattle country jest ’cause you herd a few ornery, pink-eyed, slab-sided critters for your salt? Well, the railroad ain’t the range, le’ me tell you that. Jest you run your own affairs, will you?”