Still smiling he raised his eyes again to Courtrey's face. "Courtrey," he said, this time without the Mr., "I've come to Lost Valley to _stay_. I had hoped to be friends with all my neighbours. It would have made my work easier. However, with or without, I stay." And he picked up his hat, set it on his head, walked over to the brown horse, flung up the rein, mounted and rode out of the Stronghold in utter silence. His face was flaming, the blood of outraged dignity and deep anger beat in his temples like a drum. As he rode farther away he heard the embarrassing silence broken by the hoarse shouts of laughter of half drunken men. "Go to it," he said aloud, clinching his fists on his saddle horn, "this is part of my duty. The Big Chief was right when he said, 'If you help the Service to tame Lost Valley you've got your work cut out.' It's a man-size job. I mustn't doubt my ability." CHAPTER VI EL REY AND BOLT Tharon Last and all her followers held themselves in readiness for anything in the days that followed the taking of the herds from Courtrey's range. They locked their doors at night, stood double guard at corral and stable. Mothers scattered throughout Lost Valley gathered in their little ones and watched the slopes and levels when their men were out. But a strange quietness seemed to settle down upon them. That for which they waited did not materialize. Courtrey and his gun men rode into Corvan and up and down the Valley on mysterious missions which were as unsettling as open depredations, but nothing happened. In fact, Courtrey, burning with the new desire that was beginning to obsess him, was working out a new design. He began to draw away from Lola. His triweekly visits to the Golden Cloud dropped off a bit. He took to drifting about from saloon to saloon, to being less pronounced in his frequenting of one or two places. His cold eyes, however, set in their narrow slits beneath the heavy brows, picked out every settler that he met and promised vague things for the future. He knew to a man who had ridden up from Last's that day, and he meant that not one should escape full payment--some time. Now he thought of the girl who had defied him and he waited with leaping pulse. The memory of that kiss, taken by violence at her western door, was with him night and day. She stood for right and the dignity of order. He meant, for a time, to play her hand. Therefore the settlers waited, and held their breath while they did so. And Courtrey took to riding much more alone, to watching the slopes and stretches with a hand at his hat-brim, shading his keen eyes. He looked far and wide in the golden summer land for the sight of a silver horse cutting down the wind with a slim girl in saddle.