"I met Larry on the prairie, and of course I talked to him," she said. "I asked him why he had not been to the Range, and he seemed to think it would be better if he did not come." Torrance smiled drily. "Then I guess he showed quite commendable taste as well as good sense. You are still decided not to go back to New York, Hetty?" "Yes," said the girl, with a little resolute nod. "You see, I can't help being young and just a little good-looking, but I'm Miss Torrance of Cedar all the time." Torrance's face was usually grim, but it grew a trifle softer then. "Hetty," he said, "they taught you a good many things I never heard of at that Boston school, but I'm not sure you know that all trade and industry is built upon just this fact: what a man has made and worked hard for is his own. Would anyone put up houses or raise cattle if he thought his neighbours could take them from him? Now there's going to be trouble over that question here, and, though it isn't likely, your father may be beaten down. He may have to do things that wouldn't seem quite nice to a dainty young woman, and folks may denounce him; but it's quite plain that if you stay here you will have to stand in with somebody." The girl, who was touched by the unusual tenderness in his eyes, sat down upon the table, and slipped an arm about his neck. "Who would I stand in with but you?" she said. "We'll whip the rustlers out of the country, and, whether it sounds nice at the time or not, you couldn't do anything but the square thing." Torrance kissed her gravely, but he sighed and his face grew stern again when she slipped out of the room. "There will not be many who will come through this trouble with hands quite clean," he said. It was during the afternoon, and Torrance had driven off again, when, as the two girls were sitting in the little room which was set apart for them, a horseman rode up to the Range, and Flora Schuyler, who was nearest the window, drew back the curtain. "That man should sit on horseback always," she said; "he's quite a picture." Hetty nodded. "Yes," she said. "Still, you told me you didn't like him. It's Clavering. Now, I wonder what he put those things on for--he doesn't wear them very often--and whether he knew my father wasn't here."