The song ended. Faintly came the clapping of hands, and the ripple of a girl's laughter. Bob turned angrily and walked swiftly back up the road, walked clear past his own ranch without noticing, and finally turned aside by a clump of cottonwood trees along the levee of the main irrigation canal. The water, a little river here, ran swiftly, muddily, black under the desert stars. Bob lifted his fiddle and flung it into the middle of the stream. The heat of his anger was gone. He felt instantly cold, and infinitely lonesome. There upon the muddy water floated away the thousand songs of the hills--the melody, the ecstasy, the colour and light of his early youth. With sudden repentance he turned and dashed down the bank after the hurrying current. The fall is rapid here, and the fiddle was already far down the stream. He ran stumblingly, desperately, along the uneven bank, dodging willows and arrowweed, stopping now and again to peer up and down the stream. It was nowhere in sight. A sort of frenzy seized him. He had a queer fancy that in that moment of anger he had thrown away his soul--all of him that was not bread and dollars. He must get it back--he must! Another dash, and again he stopped on the bank. Something darker than the current bobbed upon the muddy water. Without a moment's hesitancy he plunged into the stream and waded waist deep into the middle of the current. Yes, it was his violin. Back on the bank, dripping wet, he hugged it to him like a little girl with a doll that was lost and is found. CHAPTER VIII The next morning at breakfast Noah Ezekiel remarked: "I wonder where that skunk got the money." "What skunk and what money?" Bob was pouring sirup on a pancake, a product of much patience both on his part and the Chinese cook's. "Jenkins." Noah answered both questions in one word. "Not long ago he had to borrow a dime for a doughnut. Last night he was at the Red Owl gambling with both fists. And I heard he's bought altogether ten thousand acres in leases. 'Verily,' as dad used to say, 'the sinner flourisheth like a thorn tree.'" "Do you know if he has bought Chandler's?" Bob asked, casually, not meeting Noah's eye. "No, but I reckon he will. He seems out for a clean-up." "If you see the Chandlers," suggested Rogeen, "advise them not to sell." Noah Ezekiel reached for the towel to wipe his mouth, and shook his head. "I ain't strong on giving advice. I believe in doin' as you'd be done by, and most all the advice I ever got was as hard to take as castor oil. Advice is like givin' a dog ipecac--it may break him of suckin' eggs, but it sure is hard on the dog." Bob laughed and got up and started to work. The first Saturday in June Rogeen and Noah quit at noon, for the rush was over. "I reckon," Noah insinuated, suavely, "if you are feelin' right good I might strike you for another five to-night." "Certainly," said Bob. "But look here, Noah, you ought not to gamble away your wages."