Minnie crossed the clean white floor and taking the pie from the window ledge where it sat cooling, divided it neatly. She fixed the two quarters on a plate from the cupboard and adding a fork, carried the whole to the boy. She was the embodiment of the spirit of womanhood since the world was—selling her service to man for love. “Take it, Rod Stone,” she said. It was indicative of her race that she did not exact her payment first. It was sufficient that she serve. If the white man chose to pay, to keep his word, so much the better. Stone took the plate and put one arm about the splendid broad shoulders. Bending down he kissed the half-breed full on the lips—and for a second the black eyes glowed. Minnie Pine put a hand on his cheek with a caress infinitely soft. “Humph,” said Josefa, in English this time and pointedly, “I, too, have stood in the bend of a man’s arm—but mine was a full-blood pomo. I did not live to cover my head and weep.” “Shut up, Josefa,” said the boy laughing again, “neither will Minnie, through me.” At that moment the door to the south part of the house opened noiselessly, and Kate Cathrew stood there scanning the group with her keen glance. “Stone,” she said coldly, “is this the best you can do to earn your wages? Get out with the men—go quick. Minnie, if I see any more of this you’ll go back where I got you. Josefa, what’s the matter with your rule out here? Do you let all the morning be wasted without care?” Josefa gazed at her out of old eyes, calm with much looking on life, undisturbed. “Not always,” she answered, “but I, too, have been young. Minnie will work better for the kiss.” “Well,” said Kate, “you’d better see that she does.” CHAPTER VII THE SHADOWS THICKEN Old man Conlan was, as McKane had said, half crazy with the loss of his cattle. They were not so many, only a matter of some twenty-two head, but they meant a lot to him. He owned no patented land. He was merely a squatter in the lower fringes of the Upper Country around at the western end of Mystery Ridge where Rainbow Cliff stopped spectacularly. He lived with his wife in a disreputable old cabin and worked beyond his years and strength in the white fire of an ambition—a laudable ambition, for he had a crippled son back East in college. He ran cattle in the hills and he knew every head of his brand to the last wobbly calf, an easy matter, since they were few. At the store in Cordova he told his woes to the countryside, and he had an attentive audience, for his issue was theirs, and in a broader way. On a pleasant day in late June, the old man reiterated his grievance, pulling his long grey beard and flailing his gaunt arms in eloquent gesture.