"I've got four months to go," Racey had replied with a placidity he did not feel. Now as he rode, his eyes closely scanning the various places in the landscape providing good cover for possible bushwhackers, he recalled what Loudon had said. "I'll show him all the happenstances he wants to see before I'm through," he said, aloud. "Something's gonna happen. Something's got to happen. Jack Harpe won't let this slide. Not by a jugful." The words were confident enough, but they were words that he had been in the habit of repeating to himself nearly every day for some time. Perhaps they had lost some of their force. Perhaps-- "Twelve hundred dollars," mused Racey. "And the same for Swing. Six months' work for--Hell, it can't turn out different! I know it can't. We'll show 'em all yet, won't we, Cuter old settler?" Cuter old settler waggled his ears. He was a companionable horse, never kicked human beings, and bucked but seldom. "Yep," continued Racey, sitting back against the cantle, "she's a long creek that don't bend some'ers or other." And then the creek that was his flow of thought shot round a bend into the broad and sparkling reaches of a much pleasanter subject than the one that had to do with Harpes and Tweezys and Joneses. After a time he came to where the pleasanter subject, on her knees, was weeding among the flowers that grew tidily round Moccasin Spring. Baby-blue-eyes, low and lovely, cuddled down between tall columbines and orange wall-flowers. Side by side with the pink geranium of old-fashioned gardens the wild geranium nodded its lavender blooms in perfect harmony. The subject, black-haired Molly Dale, rested the point of her hand-fork between two rows of ragged sailors and Johnny-jump-ups and lifted a pair of the clearest, softest blue eyes in the world in greeting to Racey Dawson. "This is a fine time for you to be traipsing in," she told him, with a smile that revealed a deep dimple in each cheek. "I thought you promised to help me weed my garden to-day." "I did," he returned, humbly, dismounting and sliding the reins over Cuter's neck and head, "but you know how it is Sunday mornin's, Molly. There's a lot to do round the ranch sometimes. Now, this mornin'--" "I'll bet," she interrupted, smoothing out the smile and frowning as severely as she was able. "I'd just tell a man that, I would. I would, indeed. I'm sure it must have taken you at least half-an-hour to shine those boots. Half-an-hour! More likely an hour. Why, I can see my face in them." "And a very pretty face, too," said Racey, rising to the occasion. "If I owned that face I'd never stop looking at it myself. I mean--" He floundered, aghast at his own temerity. But the lady smiled. "That'll do," she cautioned him. "Don't try to flirt with me. I won't have it." "I ain't--" he began, and stopped.