Out Of The Depths Part 13

Horse and rider were still in the curve of their swift flight when Isobel Knowles came out into the porch, yawning behind her plump, sunbrowned hand. A glance at Gowan cut the yawn short. She looked alertly afield and at once caught sight of the runaway.

"Kid!--O-oh!" she cried. "Mr. Ashton!--on Rocket!"

Gowan spun about to her with a guilty start, but answered almost glibly: "You said he could ride, Miss Chuckie."

"He'll--he'll be killed!--Daddy!"

Knowles stepped out through the doorway, c.o.c.king his big blue-barreled Colt's. Gowan hastily pointed towards the runaway. Knowles looked, and dropped the revolver to his side. "What's up?" he growled.

"Kid--he--he put Mr. Ashton on Rocket!" breathlessly answered his daughter.

"Sorry to contradict you, Miss Chuckie," said Gowan. "He put himself on."

"He's on yet," dryly commented the cowman. "May be something to that boy, after all."

"But, Daddy!--"

"Now, just stop fussing yourself, honey. He and Rocket are going smooth as axlegrease and bee-lining for Stockchute. How did the hawss start off?--skittish?"

"Enough to make the tenderfoot pull leather," said Gowan.

"If he stuck at all, with that fool saddle--!" rejoined Knowles.

"Don't you worry, honey. He sure can fork a hawss--that tenderfoot."

"Oh, yes," the girl sighed with relief. "If Rocket started off bucking, and he kept his seat, of course it's all right. See him take that gully!"

"You sure gave me a start, honey, calling out that way.--Well, Kid, it's about time we were off. I'll get my hat."

Gowan stepped nearer the girl as her father went inside. "I'll leave it to the tenderfoot to tell you, Miss Chuckie. He'll have to own up I gave him fair warning. Told him he wouldn't need his spurs, and asked if he'd have another bit and saddle; but it wasn't any use. He's the kind that won't take advice."

"I know you meant it as a joke, Kid. You did not realize the danger of his narrow stirrups. Had he been caught in mounting or had he been thrown, he would almost certainly have been dragged. And for you to give him our one ugly hawss!"

"You said he could ride," the puncher defended himself.

"I'll forgive you for your joke--if he comes back safe," she qualified, without turning her gaze from the now distant horse and rider.

Gowan started for the corral, the slight waddle of his bowlegged gait rather more p.r.o.nounced than usual. When Knowles came out with his hat, the runaway was well up on the divide towards Dry Fork. Rocket was justifying his name.

In a few seconds the flying horse and rider had disappeared down the far slope. The girl followed her father and Gowan to the corral, and after they had ridden off, she roped and saddled one of the three horses in the corral. She mounted and was off on the jump, riding straight for the nearest point on the summit of the divide.

As, presently, she came up towards the top of the rise, she gazed anxiously ahead towards Dry Fork. Before she could see over the bend down to the creek channel, she caught sight of a cloud of dust far out on the mesa beyond the stream. She smiled with relief and wheeled about to return. The tenderfoot had safely crossed the stream bed. He would have Rocket well in hand before they came to rough country.

CHAPTER IX

THE SNAKE

Early in the afternoon, having nothing else to do, Isobel again saddled up and started off towards Dry Fork. Her intention was to ride out on the road to Stockchute and meet Ashton, if he was not too late.

As she rode up one side of the divide, a hat appeared over the bend of the other side. She could not mistake the high peak of that comic opera sombrero. Ashton was almost back to the ranch. Her first thought was that he had gone part way, and given up the trip. The big sombrero bobbed up and down in an odd manner. She guessed the cause even before Ashton's head and body appeared, rising and falling rhythmically. She stared as Rocket swept up into view, covering the ground with a long-strided trot.

Ashton waved to her. She waved back. A few moments later they were close together. As she spun her pony around, he pulled in his horse to a walk, patting the beast's neck and speaking to him caressingly.

"Back already?" she asked. "Surely, you've not been to Stockchute--Yes, you have!" Her experienced eye was taking in every indication of his horse's condition. "He's been traveling; but you've handled him well."

"He's grand!" said Ashton. "Been putting him through his paces. I suppose he is your father's best mount."

"Daddy and Kid ride him when they're in a hurry or there's no other horse handy."

"You can't mean--? Then perhaps I can have him again occasionally."

"You like him, really?"

"All he needs is a little management," replied Ashton, again patting the horse's lean neck.

"If you wish to take him in hand, I'll a.s.sign him to you. No one else wants him."

"As your rural deliveryman's mount--" began Ashton. He stopped to show the bulging bag slung under his arm. "Here's the mail. Do you wish your letters now?"

"Thank you, no."

"Here is this, however," he said, handing her a folded slip of paper.

She opened it and looked at the writing inside. It was a receipt from the postmaster at Stockchute to Lafayette Ashton for certain letters delivered for mailing. The address of the letter to Thomas Blake was given in full. The girl colored, bit her lip, and murmured contritely: "You have turned the tables on me. I deserved it!"

"Please don't take it that way!" he begged. "My purpose was merely to a.s.sure you the letter was mailed. After all, I am a stranger, Miss Knowles."

"No, not now," she differed.

"It's very kind of you to say it! Yet it's just as well for me to start off with no doubts in your mind, in view of the fact that in two or three weeks--"

"Yes?" she asked, as he hesitated.

"I--Your father will hardly keep me more than two weeks, unless--unless I make good," he answered.

"I guess you needn't worry about that," she replied, somewhat ambiguously.

He shrugged. "It is very good of you to say it, Miss Knowles. I know I shall fail. Can you expect anyone who has always lived within touch of millions, one who has spent more in four years at college than all this range is worth--He cut my allowance repeatedly, until it was only a beggarly twenty-five thousand."

"Twenty-five thousand dollars!" exclaimed Isobel. "You had all that to--to throw away in a single year?"

"He cut me down to it the last year--a mere bagatelle to what I had all the time I was at college and Tech.," replied Ashton, his eyes sparkling at the recollection. "He wished me to get in thick with the New Yorkers, the sons of the Wall Street leaders. He gave me leave to draw on him without limit. I did what he wished me to do,--I got in with the most exclusive set. Ah-h!--the way I made the dollars fly!

Before I graduated I was the acknowledged leader. What's more, I led my cla.s.s, too--when I chose."

"When you chose!" she echoed. "And now what are you going to do?"