Square Deal Sanderson | Page 5

time. I suppose it is too much to hope that you are still there, but it is that hope which is making me write this letter.
Will, father is dead. He died yesterday, right after I got here. He asked for you. Do you know what that means? It means he wanted you to come back, Will. Poor father, he didn't really mean to be obstinate, you know.
I shall not write any more, for I am not sure that you will ever read it. But if you do read it, you'll come back, won't you--or write? Please.
Your loving sister,
MARY BRANSFORD.
The Double A Ranch.
Union County, New Mexico.
Sanderson finished reading the letter. Then folding it, he shoved it back into the envelope and gravely drew out the other letter. It bore a later date and was in the same handwriting:
MR. WILLIAM BRANSFORD,
Tucson, Arizona.
DEAR BROTHER WILL: I was so delighted to get your letter. And I am so eager to see you. It has been such a long, long time, hasn't it? Fifteen years, isn't it? And ten years since I even got a letter from you!
I won't remember you, I am sure, for I am only nineteen now, and you were only fifteen when you left home. And I suppose you have grown big and strong, and have a deep, booming voice and a fierce-looking mustache. Well, I shall love you, anyway. So hurry and come home.
I am sending you a telegraph money order for one thousand dollars, for from the tone of your letter it seems things are not going right with you. Hurry home, won't you?
With love,
Your sister,
MARY.
Sanderson finished reading the letter. He meditated silently, turning it over and over in his hands. The last letter was dated a month before. Evidently Bransford had not hurried.
Sanderson searched all the other pockets, and discovered nothing of further interest. Then he stood for a long time, looking down at the man's face, studying it, his own face expressing disapproval.
"Mebbe it's just as well that he didn't get to the Double A," he thought, noting the coarse, brutal features of the other.
"If a girl's got ideals it's sometimes a mighty good thing the real guy don't come along to disabuse them. William ain't never goin' to get to the Double A."
He buried the body in a gully, then he returned to the other men.
Upon their persons he found about nine hundred dollars in bills of small denomination. It made a bulky package, and Sanderson stored it in his slicker. Then he mounted Streak, turned the animal's head toward the northeast, and rode into the glaring sunshine of the morning.
CHAPTER III
"SQUARE" DEAL SANDERSON
Three days later, still traveling northeastward, Sanderson felt he must be close to the Double A. Various signs and conclusions were convincing.
In the first place, he had been a week on the trail, and estimating his pace conservatively, that time should bring him within easy riding distance of the place he had set out to seek. There were so many miles to be covered in so many days, and Streak was a prince of steady travelers.
Besides, yesterday at dusk, Sanderson had passed through Las Vegas. Careful inquiry in the latter town had brought forth the intelligence that the Double A was a hundred and seventy-five miles northeastward.
"Country's short of cow-hands," said Sanderson's informer. "If you're needin' work, an' forty a month looks good to you, why, I'd admire to take you on. I'm German, of the Flyin' U, down the Cimarron a piece."
"Me an' work has disagreed," grinned Sanderson; and he rode on, meditating humorously over the lie.
Work and Sanderson had never disagreed. Indeed, Sanderson had always been convinced that work and he had agreed too well in the past. Except for the few brief holidays that are the inevitable portion of the average puncher who is human enough to yearn for the relaxation of a trip to "town" once or twice a year, Sanderson and work had been inseparable for half a dozen years.
Sanderson's application had earned him the reputation of being "reliable" and "trustworthy"--two terms that, in the lexicon of the cow-country, were descriptive of virtues not at all common. In Sanderson's case they were deserved--more, to them might have been added another, "straight."
Sanderson's trip northeastward had resulted partly from a desire to escape the monotony of old scenes and familiar faces; and partly because one day while in "town" he had listened attentively to a desert nomad, or "drifter," who had told a tale of a country where water was to be the magic which would open the gates of fortune to the eager and serious-minded.
"That country's goin' to blossom!" declared the Drifter. "An' the guy which gets in on the ground floor is goin' to make a clean-up! They's a range there--the Double A--which is right in the middle