"It's all along of Hoover goin' away like he did, and leavin' us without a sheriff, or nobody that is anybody makin' a bluff at law and order," cried Sage-brush. "It's sot this section back twenty years," observed Parenthesis. "That's what it has," agreed the foreman. "Fresno reports that he found that Peruna slappin' the Lazy K brand on one of our calves. There ain't nobody can maverick no calves belongin' to this outfit. Not so long as I'm ranch boss an' captain of the round-up. We've got to take the law in our own han's an' make an example of this bunch, right now." Sage-brush meant what he said. He was gathering reenforcements from his own men. He knew that the boys of the Allen ranch would side with him, and he felt that there were enough lovers of law and order in the county to declare themselves against the high-handed methods of Buck McKee and his followers. "Come on, you fellows!" shouted Show Low, as he rode past the wagon up the range. "What is it now?" asked Sage-brush. Over his shoulder Show Low shouted: "We all had a run in with that Buck McKee's bunch. Fresno's laid out with a hole in his shoulder. Billie Nicker's cashed in. I've got some of the Triangle boys, and we're goin' to make a clean-up." "You ain't goin' to do nothin' unless I say so. We don't want no range-war--we'll git the man that did the killin'. Come on," commanded Sage-brush. Polly galloped after the men, saying: "Gee, I'll miss something if I don't hurry up." CHAPTER XV Peruna Pulls His Freight When Jack closed the door behind him to follow and find Dick Lane and bring him back to the woman who, the restorer believed, loved him, Echo Payson realized the supremacy over her soul--her pure ideals, her lofty sense of justice--of its tenement, the woman's body--that fair but fragile fabric which trembled responsive to the wild wind of emotional desire, and the seismic shock of the passion of sex. Ever since Jack had revealed to her his jealousy of Dick Lane, she knew that he was living on a lower moral and spiritual plane than herself, and that no longer could she look up to him as the strong protector, the nobler being than herself that had been her girlish ideal of a husband. Instead of this, another love sprang instantly into her heart, that of the stronger soul for the weaker, like to the feeling of the mother toward the child. The moral side of her desire toward Jack now became fixed in the purpose to lift him up to her own level.