Armstrong was taken aback by this declaration. Turning to Miss Armstrong, Stranleigh took from his pocket a long, well-filled envelope. "These, Professor, are all the legal documents necessary to make you the owner of the ranch, including deed and what-not. I am quite incapable of understanding the red tape wound round the transaction, but I am assured it is all right. I tender this in payment of my medical bill." "Oh," cried the girl, softly. Then she smiled. "As the sensational plays have it, this is too much!" "Not a bit of it," returned Stranleigh. "You have no idea of the appalling charges made by specialists in New York and London. Besides, this includes payment of Jim's bill. You cured Jim's ear as well as my shoulder, and I am responsible for Jim. His ear is the only shooting I have had since I came to the ranch." The girl again began to protest, but Stranleigh interrupted. "As you are so loth to receive the property, I shall burden it with some conditions. Your father will ask you to mortgage this land to raise money for him. You must refuse that. Keep the ranch in your own name. You have just seen how much trouble has been caused by Ricketts getting his claws on the place. Your father has got, or will get, something between ten and twelve thousand dollars from the proceeds of the sale. Will you put that money into your daughter's hands, Mr. Armstrong?" "I suppose I'll have to if you say so," rather grudgingly conceded the rancher. "Yes; I say so, because she is a good business woman. Now, Miss Armstrong, you own the ranch, and with this money at your disposal, you should be able to prove conclusively whether there is profitable ore in that mine. When you are ready to demonstrate that fact, write to me, and I'll get together the capital you need for the energetic development of the mine. And now I must be off. Will you bid good-bye for me to my friends, the bunk house men?" "Certainly; where shall I write to you when there is news of the mine to send?" "Mr. Banks of New York always has my address." The girl held forward her hand. "Good-bye to you, Lord Stranleigh of Wychwood," she said. For the first time in his life, his lordship neglected to take the proffered hand of a lady. "Are you making a guess, or stating a certainty, Miss Armstrong?" "I guess it's a certainty. I saw in a New York paper that Earl Stranleigh of Wychwood was coming into this district to shoot. Then from Jim's ear I unbound a handkerchief with a crest and a monogram on it." Stranleigh laughed, and took the hand still outstretched to him. THE END. WARD, LOCK & CO., LIMITED, LONDON. Ward, Lock & Co.'s POPULAR FICTION A. E. W. MASON LAWRENCE CLAVERING. A remarkably powerful and stirring historical romance, full of life and movement. STANLEY WEYMAN MY LADY ROTHA. A Romance of the Thirty Years' War THE SATURDAY REVIEW.--"No one who begins will lay it down before the end, it is so extremely well carried on from adventure to adventure."