Suddenly the desperate beast paused and, rearing recklessly high in the air, fell backward hoping to crush his rider under his saddle. In the instant, while he towered, poised in the air, Mose shook his right foot free of the stirrup and swung to the left and alighted on his feet, while the fallen horse, stunned by his own fall, lay for an instant, groaning and coughing. Under the sting of the quirt, he scrambled to his feet only to find his inexorable rider again on his back, with merciless spurs set deep in the quick of his quivering sides. With a despairing squeal he set off in a low, swift, sidewise gallop, and for nearly an hour drummed along the trail, up hill and down, the foam mingling with the yellow dust on his heaving flanks. When the broncho's hot anger had cooled, Mose gave him his head, and fell to thinking upon the future. He had been more than eight years in the range and on the trail and all he owned in the world was a saddle, a gun, a rope, and a horse. The sight of Cora, the caressing of little Pink, and Mary's letter had roused in him a longing for a wife and a shanty of his own. The grass was getting sere, there was new-fallen snow on Lizard Head, and winter was coming. He had the animal's instinct to den up, to seek winter quarters. Certain ties other than those of Mary's love combined to draw him back to Marmion for the winter. If he could only shake off his burdening notoriety and go back to see her--to ask her advice--perhaps she could aid him. But to _sneak_ back again--to crawl about in dark corners--that was impossible. He was no longer the frank and boyish lover of adventure. Life troubled him now, conduct was become less simple, actions each day less easily determined. These women now made him ponder. Cora, who was accustomed to the range and whose interests were his own in many ways, the princess, whose money and influence could get him something to do in Wagon Wheel, and Mary, whose very name made him shudder with remembered adoration--each one now made him think. Mary, of all the group, was most certainly unfitted to share his mode of life, and yet the thought of her made the others impossible to him. The marshal saw him ride up the street and throw himself from his horse before the post office and hastened toward him with his hand extended. "Hello! Mose, I've got a telegram for you from Sweetwater." Mose took it without a word and opened it. It was from his father: "Wait for me in Wagon Wheel. I am coming." The marshal was grinning. "Did you see the write-up in yesterday's Mother Lode?" "Yes--I saw it, and cussed you for it." "I knowd you would, but I couldn't help it. Billy, the editor, got hold of me and pumped the whole story out of me before I knew it. I don't think it does you any harm." "It didn't do me any good," replied Mose shortly. "Say, the princess wants to see you. She's on the street somewhere now, looking for you." "Where's the telegraph office?" he abruptly asked.