'Stranger, Purdie is liked, but the Burdettes is feared.'
Which was exactly what the puncher wanted to know.
THE C P ranch-house occupied a little plateau in the foothills around the base of Old Stormy, facing the great valley in which, ten miles distant, lay the town of Windy. Solidly built of 'dobe bricks and shaped logs, with chimneys of stone, it had an imposing appearance despite the fact that it consisted of one storey only. A broad, covered verandah, paved with pieces of rock, stretched along the front of the building, and to the left were the bunkhouse, barns, and corrals. A few cottonwoods, spared when the ground had been first cleared, provided shade. At the back of the house a grassy slope climbed gently to the black pines which belted the mountain. Sudden found the owner on the verandah.
'Mornin', friend,' Purdie greeted, and pulled forward a chair. 'That's a good hoss yu got.'
'Shore is,' replied the puncher, and waited.
'Made them plans yet?' came the question, and when the visitor replied in the negative, another silence ensued. Sudden was aware that the cattleman was sizing him up, turning over some problem. Presently he straightened as though he had come to a decision.
'Kit was my foreman,' he said slowly. 'Like his job?'
The puncher stared at him in surprise; he had expected an offer to ride for the ranch, but not to be put in charge. His reply was non-committal :
'Yore outfit won't admire takin' orders from a stranger.'
'Yu needn't worry about that; they're good boys an' they'll back my judgment,' Purdie said confidently. 'Yu see, it ain't just a question o' runnin' the ranch--a'most any one o' them could do that--but outguessin' that Bur- dette crowd is a hoss of a different brand. I'm gamblin' yu can swing it--if yo're willin' to take the risk.'
The visitor's jaw hardened. 'Here's somethin' yu oughts to know,' he said, and went on to relate the scene he had witnessed in 'The Lucky Chance' the previous evening. The cattleman nodded gloomily.
'Yu'll be buyin' into trouble a-plenty,' he said. 'I dunno as it's fair to ask yu. Them Burdettes is the toughest proposition. For about a year past there's been doin's---bank robberies, stage hold-ups, cattle-stealin's, within a radius of a hundred miles, an' that gang on Battle Butte is suspected. They's a hard lot--half of 'em ain't cowmen a-tall, just gun-fighters, an' there's twice the number necessary to handle their herds. I sent a writing to Governor Bleke--rode the range with him when we was both kids tellin' him how things was an' that the Burdettes was a plain menace, but I s'pose he's a busy man; I ain't had no reply.'
'I reckon mebbe I'm it,' Sudden smiled, and went on to tell of the happenings in Juniper, omitting, however, the name his gun-play had earned for him.
The cattleman's face shone; his hand came out to grip that of his guest. 'I'm damned glad to meet yu, Green?' he said heartily. 'Yu got any plan?'
'I'm takin' the job yu offered, Purdie,' he said. 'But I gotta play 'possum, remember; I'm just an ordinary cow-punch who has pulled his picket-pin an' is rovin' round, sabe?' Purdie nodded, and Sudden added irrelevantly, 'I don't believe that fella Luce did the killin'.'
'His own brothers didn't deny it,' the old man pointed out.
'That's so, an' I can't quite savvy it,' Sudden admitted. 'Allasame, Luce struck me as bein' straight.'
The rancher was about to reply when his daughter
appeared. Seeing the stranger, she would have retired again, but her father called her.
'Meet Mister Green, Nan,' he said. 'He's goin' to be foreman here.'
She shook hands, a kindness in her eyes for which he could not account. Her words explained it, or at least he thought so.
'I have to thank you for--what you did,' she said.
The new foreman fidgeted with his feet; he would rather have faced a man with a gun than this dewy-eyed, grateful girl.
'It don't need mentionin',' he stammered.
'Green's goin' to help us find the slinkin' cur that did it, Nan,' Purdie put in harshly : and to the puncher, 'Well, Jim, fetch yore war-bags along an' start in soon's yu like; it'll be a relief to know yo're on the job.'
'I'll be on hand in the mornin',' the puncher promised. They watched until a grove of trees hid him from view, and then the rancher asked a question.
'I like him,' Nan replied. 'But isn't it taking a chance? We know nothing about him.'
'Mebbe it is, but I'm playin' a hunch,' her father told her. 'That fella ain't no common cow-punch. He's young, but he's had experience, an' them guns o' his ain't noways new. I'm bettin' he'll make them Burdette killers think.'
Just at the moment, however, it was the other way about, for the new foreman's brain was busy with the burden he had so promptly undertaken. He had no illusion as to the nature of his task; he had been hired to fight the Burdette family, and, judging by the samples he had seen, and the information he had gained regarding their outfit, he was likely to have his hands full. A thin smile wreathed his lips; the little man in Juniper had not over- stated the case.
Absorbed in his thoughts, he was pacing slowly through a miniature forest when a little cry aroused him, and hel ooked up to see a woman running along the trail ahead of him. Fifty yards in front of her a saddled pony was trotting. A touch of the spur sent Nigger rocketing past the pedestrian and in a few moments Sudden was back again, his rope round the runaway's neck. He found the woman sitting on a fallen tree-trunk. She was young--about his own age, he estimated--and her oval face--the skin faintly tanned by the sun--black hair and eyes, made her good to look upon. A neat riding costume displayed her perfect figure to advantage. He noted that her cheeks were but slightly flushed and her breathing betrayed no sign of haste.
'Gracias, senor,' she greeted in a low, sweet voice. 'I descend to peek ze flower an' my ponce vamos.'
The puncher grinned, twitched his loop from the animal's neck and flung the reins to the ground.
'If yu'd done that he'd 'a' stayed put,' he exclaimed. Her eyes widened. 'So?' she said. 'The senor weel see zat I am w'at is call a sore-foot, yes?'
Sudden laughed and said. 'The word is `tenderfoot.' ' His gaze travelled to her trim high boots. 'Yu've shore got a pretty one,' he added.
The lady dimpled deliciously, and lifting her feet from the ground, inspected their shapeliness critically.
'You like heem?' she asked archly.
'I like heem,' the puncher repeated. 'I like heemboth. Now, s'pose we drop the baby-talk an' speak natural; yu ain't no Greaser.'
The girl's eyes danced. 'So young, and yet--so wise,' she bantered.
'My second name is Solomon,' he told her gravely. 'Mebbe yu've heard of him?'
'Oh yes, he was the first Mormon, I believe,' she smiled. 'I hope you...'
Sudden shook his head emphatically. 'Not one,' he said.
'Why, of course not, at your age,' she replied, and then, as he bent down from the saddle to study the sleek black head--from which she had now removed the hat--more closely, her feminine fears were aroused. 'What is the matter?' she cried.
'I'm lookin' for the grey hairs,' he said solemnly. 'They seem to be plenty absent.'
'Dios! But you scared me,' she said, in real or pretended relief. 'I thought that you had found some, or that a rattlesnake was looking over my shoulder. You are rather a disconcerting person, Mister Green.'
'Yu know me?' the puncher queried.
'Of course,' she smiled. 'Your arrival created quite a sensation.' Her voice sobered. 'That poor Mister Purdie, and Kit was such a nice boy. Now, can you guess who I am?'
'No need to guess--yu must be Mrs. Lavigne,' Sudden replied. 'Someone was tellin' me about yu.'
'Nothing bad, I hope?' she asked anxiously.
'No, it was a man,' the puncher grinned. 'He said yu were restful to the sight.'
She laughed delightedly. 'So you might venture to come and see me at `The Plaza,' ' she suggested. 'That is, if you are staying in Windy.'
'I'm goin' to ride for Purdie,' he told her.
The news struck the merriment from her face. She hesitated as though about to speak, and then put on her
