Mackenzie saw that he was a boy of fifteen or thereabout, dressed in overalls much too large for him, the bottoms turned up almost to his knees. Hot as the morning was beginning, the lad had on a duck coat with sheepskin collar, but in the excitement of beholding a visitor approaching his camp so early in the day, he took off his hat, standing so a moment. Then he cut out a streak for the wagon, a few rods distant, throwing back a half-frightened look as he disappeared around its side. This was a very commodious wagon, familiar to Mackenzie from having seen many like it drawn up for repairs at the blacksmith shops in Jasper. Its heavy canvas top was stretched tightly over bows, made to withstand wind and rough weather, a stovepipe projecting through it, fended about with a broad tin, and a canvas door, with a little window in it, a commodious step letting down to the ground. Its tongue was cut short, to admit coupling it close behind the camp-mover's wagon, and it was a snug and comfortable home on wheels. The dogs came slowly to meet Mackenzie as he approached, backs still bristling, countenances unpromising. The boy had disappeared into the wagon; Mackenzie wondered if he had gone to fetch his gun. But no. Instead of a gun, came a girl, neither timidity nor fear in her bearing, and close behind her came the boy, hat still in his hand, his long, straight hair down about his ears. Mackenzie had stopped a hundred yards or so distant, not confident of a friendly reception from the dogs. The girl waved her hand in invitation for him to come on, and stood waiting at the wagon end. She was as neatly dressed as the lad beside her was uncouth in his man-size overalls, her short corduroy skirt belted about with a broad leather clasped with a gleaming silver buckle, the tops of her tall laced boots lost beneath its hem. Her gray flannel waist was laced at the bosom like a cowboy's shirt, adorned at the collar with a flaming scarlet necktie done in a bow as broad as a band. Her brown sombrero was tilted, perhaps unintentionally, a little to one side of her rather pert and independently carried head. At a word from her the dogs left the way unopposed, and as greetings passed between the sheepgirl and the stranger the wise creatures stood beside her, eyeing the visitor over with suspicious mien. Mackenzie told his name and his business, making inquiry in the same breath for Tim Sullivan's ranch. "Do you know Mr. Sullivan?" she asked. And as she lifted her eyes Mackenzie saw that they were as blue as asters on an October morning, and that her hair was a warm reddish-brown, and that her face was refreshingly pure in its outline, strong and haughty and brown, and subtly sweet as the elusive perfume of a wild rose of the hills. "No, I don't know Mr. Sullivan; I've never even seen him. I've heard a lot about him down at Jasper--I was the schoolteacher there."