Treve, with a collie’s inherent love of mischief, not only understood the foolish situation, but seemed to take positive delight in shaming Fenno by playful efforts to make friends with him in the presence of Mack and the shepherds. “You owe a lot to that dog, Joel,” said Royce, at dinner one day, as Fenno angrily shoved aside the paw which Treve had placed on his knee. “It’s a wonder you keep on hating him. He doesn’t make friends with every one. And I don’t see why he keeps on trying to make friends with you. He never used to. Why can’t you pat him or say ‘hello’ to him sometimes when he comes up to you like that?” “I got no use for dogs,” grumbled Joel, “nor yet for any other critter; except for the work we can get out of ’em. I got no time to go makin’ a pet of any cur. One of these days, when he comes sticking that ugly nose of his into my hand or wiping his dirty forepaw onto my knee, I’m goin’ to give him a good swift kick.” He glared forbiddingly at the collie. Treve wagged his plumed tail, unafraid; and thrust his muzzle into the cup of the forbidding old man’s gnarled hand. Joel drew back in ostentatious aversion. But, somehow, he did not carry out his threat of a kick. Presently, when Mack chanced to leave the room, Fenno slipped a large hunk of meat from his own plate to the collie’s dinner platter on the kitchen floor. He did it with the air of one poisoning a loathed enemy. But it was the biggest and tenderest morsel of meat in his noonday meal. And he had been waiting an opportunity to give it, unobserved, to Treve. All of which was silly, past words. Nobody realized that more clearly than did Joel Fenno. The endless hot summer wore itself out; but not until long after its drouth had worn out every trace of vegetation in the valley and the lower foothills; and had turned the once-verdant lowland world into a khaki brown lifelessness. Day after day, evening after evening, the mercury in the rusty thermometer on the Dos Hermanos ranch house porch registered anywhere from 110 to 120. It was weather to fray nerves and temper. Treve, under his heavy coat, sweltered and looked forward longingly to the occasional trips to the mountain pastures. Then came late autumn; and on one of these mountain trips both partners went, instead of going singly. They took along Treve; and they took every man on the ranch except Chang, the old Chinese cook. The time had come to drive all the sheep down from the mountain grazing grounds, into the valley ranges, for the winter. It was a job calling for the services of all available men and dogs. Up through the foothills toward the towering heights of the mountains rode Mack and Fenno; the collie gamboling happily along in front of their ponies and halting at every few yards to investigate the burrow of some rabbit or ground-squirrel.