Nothing more was said until they crossed the ridge above them, when Hetty pulled her horse up. Across the wide levels before her advanced a line of dusty teams, the sunlight twinkling on the great breaker ploughs they hauled, while the black loam rolled in softly gleaming waves behind them. They came on with slow precision, and in the forefront rolled a great machine that seamed and rent the prairie into triple furrows. "What are they doing there? Do they belong to you?" asked Miss Schuyler. The flush the wind had brought there turned to a deeper crimson in Hetty's usually colourless face. "To us!" she said, and her voice had a thrill of scorn. "They're homesteaders. Ride down. I want to see who's leading them." She led the way with one little gloved hand clenched on the dainty switch she held; but before she reached the foremost team the man who pulled it up sprang down from the driving-seat of the big machine. A tall wire fence, with a notice attached to it, barred his way. The other ploughs stopped behind him, somebody brought an axe, and Hetty set her lips when the glistening blade whirled high and fell. Thrice it flashed in the sunlight, swung by sinewy arms, and then, as the fence went down, a low, half-articulate cry rose from the waiting men. It was not exultant, but there was in it the suggestion of a steadfast purpose. Hetty sat still and looked at them, a little sparkle in her dark eyes, and a crimson spot in either cheek, while the laces that hung from her neck across the bodice of the white dress rose and fell. It occurred to Flora Schuyler that she had never seen her companion look half so well, and she waited with strained expectancy for what should follow, realizing, with the dramatic instinct most women have, who the man with the axe must be. He turned slowly, straightening his back and stood for a moment erect and statuesque, with the blue shirt open at his bronzed neck and the great axe gleaming in his hand; and Hetty gasped. Miss Schuyler's surmise was verified, for it was Larry Grant. "Larry," said her companion, and her voice had a curious ring, "what are you doing here?" The man, who appeared to ignore the question, swung off his wide hat. "Aren't you and Miss Schuyler rather far from home?" he asked. Flora Schuyler understood him when, glancing round, she noticed the figure of a mounted man forced up against the skyline here and there. Hetty, however, had evidently not seen them. "I want an answer, please," she said. "Well," said Larry gravely, "I was cutting down that fence." "Why were you cutting it down?" persisted Miss Torrance. "It was in the way." "Of what?" Grant turned and pointed to the men, sturdy toilers starved out of bleak Dakota and axe-men farmers from the forests of Michigan. "Of these, and the rest who are coming by and by," he said. "Still, I don't want to go into that; and you seem angry. You haven't offered to shake hands with me, Hetty."