"They're coming in and running them off almost under our eyes. I've only got one man on the ranch beside Ananias; nobody riding fence at all but myself. It takes me a good while to ride nearly seventy miles of fence." "Yes, that's so," Lambert seemed to reflect. "How many head have you got in this pasture?" "I ought to have about four thousand, but they're melting away like snow, Mr. Lambert." "We saw a bunch of 'em up there where them fellers cut the fence," Taterleg put in, not to be left out of the game which he had started and kept going single-handed so long; "white-faced cattle, like they've got in Kansas." "Ours--mine are all white-faced. They stand this climate better than any other." "It must have been a bunch of strays we saw--none of them was branded," Lambert said. "Father never would brand his calves, for various reasons, the humane above all others. I never blamed him after seeing it done once, and I'm not going to take up the barbarous practice now. All other considerations aside, it ruins a hide, you know, Mr. Lambert." "It seems to me you'd better lose the hide than the calf, Miss Philbrook." "It does make it easy for thieves, and that's the only argument in favor of branding. While we've--I've got the only white-faced herd in this country, I can't go into court and prove my property without a brand, once the cattle are run outside of this fence. So they come in and take them, knowing they're safe unless they're caught." Lambert fell silent again. The ranchhouse was in sight, high on its peninsula of prairie, like a lighthouse seen from sea. "It's a shame to let that fine herd waste away like that," he said, ruminatively, as if speaking to himself. "It's always been hard to get help here; cowboys seem to think it's a disgrace to ride fence. Such as we've been able to get nearly always turned out thieves on their own account in the end. The one out with the cattle now is a farm boy from Iowa, afraid of his shadow." "They didn't want no fence in here in the first place--that's what set their teeth ag'in' you," Taterleg said. "If I could only get some real men once," she sighed; "men who could handle them like you boys did this morning. Even father never seemed to understand where to take hold of them to hurt them, the way you do." They were near the house now. Lambert rode on a little way in silence. Then: "It's a shame to let that herd go to pieces," he said. "It's a sin!" Taterleg declared. She dropped her reins, looking from one to the other, an eager appeal in her hopeful face. "Why can't you boys stop here a while and help me out?" she asked, saying at last in a burst of hopeful eagerness what had been in her heart to say from the first. She held out her hand to each of them in a pretty way of appeal, turning from one to the other, her gray eyes pleading. "I hate to see a herd like that broken up by thieves, and all of your investment wasted," said the Duke, thoughtfully, as if considering it deeply.