one short thrilling note. In the gulches, where the grass grew deep and rank, the wind tossed it softly, and it rippled and sparkled in the shifting light, as water gleams in the sun. Everything was so still that animation seemed for the time suspended, as we drove along silenced by the spell of the prairies.

Three Bar, one of the oldest ranches in the country, stood against the side of a hill. It was a long, low structure of logs built in the prevailing fashion of the early ranch houses, room after room opening into one another, usually with an outside door to each.

The ranch was owned by the Mortons, English people, who were among the earliest settlers in the country. They greeted us most cordially, and as Owen went out to the corral with Mr. Morton to look at some horses, Mrs. Morton took me into the house.

The room we entered had very little furniture, but was redeemed from bareness by a wonderful old stone fireplace at one end.

Mrs. Morton was short and heavy set. “Spotless” was the only word her appearance suggested when I first saw her. Her skin was as fair as a child’s, while her hair was as white as the apron she wore.

Her flow of conversation was unceasing, and I was reminded of a remark that Charley made to me when the telephone was first put in over the fence lines.

“Old lady Morton talked so fast that she ripped all the barbs off the wire.” Before I had time to reply to one question, she had asked another, and was off on an entirely different subject. I suppose the accumulated conversation of months was vented on my innocent head, for she told me, poor thing, that she hadn’t seen another woman since Christmas.

“Us”—she never said we—“us never visits the neighbors, but was coming up to see you, Mrs. Brook, for us heard you and Mr. Brook was different. Us lives out here on a ranch, but us knows when people are the right kind.”

I didn’t know whether to be considered “different” was desirable, or not, and I was dying to ask her what constituted “the right kind,” but had no time before she suddenly asked:

“Have the Bohms gone? Us was waiting till they went.”

I explained that they were still on the ranch, as Mr. Bohm had to gather and counterbrand all the stock before turning it over to Owen, and that he had been delayed.

Mrs. Morton gave a little grunt of contempt. “Old Bohm won’t hurry any while he’s getting free board. He may be with you all winter. Us hopes Mr. Brook won’t be imposed on. He’s a smart man, old Jim Bohm is, but he’s a bad one.”

“Bad one?” I repeated, inwardly praying that the Bohms would not be permanent guests.

“Old Jim Bohm is a bad man,” Mrs. Morton said again, rocking violently back and forth. “I was here when they came. She’s all right, but there is nothing he won’t do. Why”—her voice sank to a whisper—“sixteen men have been traced as far as that ranch and never been heard of again, and Jim Bohm’s been getting richer all along.”

Mrs. Morton scarcely paused for breath, so I couldn’t have said anything. But I was speechless, anyhow.

“Not one of them, not one,” she declared, “was ever heard of again, and if you were to examine that old root cellar on the hill, you’d find out what I say is true.”

The incident of the morning flashed across my mind, and I felt as though a piece of ice were being drawn slowly along my spine.

“How perfectly horrible!” I managed to gasp, “but it can’t be true.”