Produced by Al Haines [Frontispiece: The blazing heat was such that men and horses and steers suffered terribly.] MAN TO MAN BY JACKSON GREGORY AUTHOR OF JUDITH OF BLUE LAKE RANCH, THE BELLS OF SAN JUAN, SIX FEET FOUR, ETC. ILLUSTRATED BY J. G. SHEPHERD GROSSET & DUNLAP PUBLISHERS -------- NEW YORK COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS Published October, 1920 CONTENTS CHAPTER I. STEVE DIVES INTO DEEP WATERS II. MISS BLUE CLOAK KNOWS WHEN SHE'S BEAT III. NEWS OF A LEGACY IV. TERRY BEFORE BREAKFAST V. HOW STEVE PACKARD CAME HOME VI. BANK NOTES AND A BLIND MAN VII. THE OLD MOUNTAIN LION COMES DOWN FROM THE NORTH VIII. IN RED CREEK TOWN IX. "IT'S MY FIGHT AND HIS. LET HIM GO!" X. A RIDE WITH TERRY XI. THE TEMPTING OF YELLOW BARBEE XII. IN A DARK ROOM XIII. AT THE LUMBER CAMP XIV. THE MAN-BREAKER AT HOME XV. AT THE FALLEN LOG XVI. TERRY DEFIES BLENHAM XVII. AND CALLS ON STEVE XVIII. "IF HE KNOWS--DOES SHE?" XIX. TERRY CONFRONTS HELL-FIRE PACKARD XX. A GATE AND A RECORD SMASHED XXI. PACKARD WRATH AND TEMPLE RAGE XXII. THE HAND OF BLENHAM XXIII. STEVE RIDES BY THE TEMPLE PLACE XXIV. DOWN FROM THE SKY! XXV. THE STAMPEDE XXVI. YELLOW BARBEE KEEPS A PROMISE XXVII. IN HONOR OF THE FAIRY QUEEN! ILLUSTRATIONS The blazing heat was such that men and horses and steers suffered terribly . . . . . . _Frontispiece_ The men about him and Packard withdrew this way and that leaving empty floor space. Terry's head, her face flushed rosily, her eyes never brighter, popped up on one side of the log. "Say it!" laughed Terry. "Well, I'm here. Came on business." MAN TO MAN CHAPTER I STEVE DIVES INTO DEEP WATERS Steve Packard's pulses quickened and a bright eagerness came into his eyes as he rode deeper into the pine-timbered mountains. To-day he was on the last lap of a delectable journey. Three days ago he had ridden out of the sun-baked town of San Juan; three months had passed since he had sailed out of a South Sea port. Far down there, foregathering with sailor men in a dirty water-front boarding-house, he had grown suddenly and even tenderly reminiscent of a cleaner land which he had roamed as a boy. He stared back across the departed years as many a man has looked from just some such resort as Black Jack's boarding-house, a little wistfully withal. Abruptly throwing down his unplayed hand and forfeiting his ante in a card game, he had gotten up and taken ship back across the Pacific. The house of Packard might have spelled its name with the seven letters of the word "impulse."