"I say, Dolliber, did they say it was fourteen miles to their ranch?" "Yes." "South, wasn't it?" "Yes." "They'll have the wind in their faces." "You bet!" A few minutes later the Rumpety wagon went creaking and groaning past the court-house. Ed Rankin stepped inside and got his leather jacket and woollen muffler. He met the jury straggling out with the crestfallen air of men conscious of an inglorious performance. The judge and the district attorney stood just within the door, waiting for the ranch-wagon. "They say," said the district attorney, "that Rumpety never does a stroke of work." "Saves up his strength for bullying his family," the judge rejoined. "He takes good care of himself. Did you see how warmly he was dressed?" "Yes, curse him!" "It would be a mercy if the others were to freeze to death on the way home." "Seems likely enough, too; but it would be rather hard on the three little brats waiting at the ranch for their mother." Rankin, meanwhile, had got himself equipped for his long ride. There was to be a dance in the court-house that evening, and some men were sweeping the sawdust into a corner and setting the benches against the wall. "Ain't you goin' to stay for the dance, Ed?" one of them asked. "The girls are all coming." Rankin felt himself blush ignominiously. "No," he growled. "I've got some work to do to-night." "What, at the ranch?" Rankin paused to take account with his conscience. Being a downeaster, he liked to keep on good terms with that monitor. But conscience had no fault to find as he presently answered, "Yes, at the ranch." He strode out of the court-house with a tread very different from his usual slouching gait. Out in the shed he found his bronco sniffing ruefully at an empty dinner-bag. But she whinnied pleasantly at his approach. Five minutes later horse and rider were off at a swinging pace, headed, not for their own ranch, which lay twelve miles to the northward. Straight in the teeth of the wind they travelled; in the teeth of the south wind, that stung their faces like a whiplash. Before very long they sighted the Rumpety wagon showing plainly against the snow in the starlight. The road went most of the way down-hill, and wagon and bronco made good speed. The air grew colder every minute. "About ten below, shouldn't you say, Pincher?" Pincher tossed her tousled mane affirmatively. They kept about forty yards behind the team, which went at a steady rate. "I say, Pincher, the old beast must be laying it onto them horses, to make 'em go like that." This time Pincher merely laid an ear back in token of sympathy. "We'll give him a worse trouncing than that, though. Eh, Pincher?" And Rankin fumbled with cold fingers at the whip-handle in his pocket. The reins lay across Pincher's neck. Rankin did not want his hands to get too cold "for business."