The Desert Valley | Page 7

was slicing,
when the stranger swung down from his saddle and came forward. He
stood a moment just behind her, looking at her with very evident
interest in his eyes.
'How do you like our part of the world?' he asked friendliwise.
Helen ignored him briefly. Had Mr. Alan Howard been a bashful young
man of the type that reddens and twists its hat in big nervous hands and
looks guilty in general. Miss Helen Longstreet would have been swiftly
all that was sweet and kind to him. Now, however, from some vague
reason or clouded instinct, she was prepared to be as stiff as the fanged
stalk of a cactus. Having ignored him the proper length of time, she
replied coolly:
'Father and I are very much pleased with the desert country. But, may I
ask just why you speak of it as your part of the world rather than ours?
Are we trespassing, pray?' The afterthought was accompanied by an
upflashing look that was little less than outright challenge.
'Trespassing? Lord, no,' conceded Howard heartily. 'The land is wide,
the trail open at both ends. But you know what I meant.'
Helen shrugged and laid aside the half-loaf. Since she gave him no
answer, Howard went on serenely:

'I mean a man sort of acquires a feeling of ownership in the place in
which he has lived a long time. You and your father are Eastern, not
Western. If I came tramping into your neck of the woods--you see I call
it yours. Right enough, too, don't you think, professor?'
'In a way of speaking, yes,' answered the professor. 'In another way, no.
We have given up the old haunts and the old way of living. We are
rather inclined, my dear young sir, to look upon this as our country,
too.'
'Bully for you!' cried Howard warmly. 'You're sure welcome.' His eyes
came back from the father to rest upon the daughter's bronze tresses.
'Welcome as a water-hole in a hot land,' he added emphatically.
'Speaking of water-holes,' suggested Longstreet, sitting back upon his
boot heels in a manner to suggest the favourite squatting position of the
cowboys of whom he and his daughter had seen much during these last
few weeks, 'was it you who made camp right over yonder?' He pointed.
Helen looked up curiously for Howard's answer and thus met the eyes
he had not withdrawn from her. He smiled at her, a frank, open sort of
smile, and thereafter turned to his questioner.
'When?' he asked briefly.
'Last night. Just before we came.'
'What makes you think some one made camp there?'
'There was a fire; bacon was frying, coffee boiling.'
'And you didn't step across to take a squint at your next-door
neighbour?'
'We did,' said the professor. 'But he had gone, leaving his fire burning,
his meal cooking.'
Howard's eyes travelled swiftly to Helen, then back to her father.

'And he didn't come back?'
'He did not,' said Longstreet. 'Otherwise I should not have asked if you
were he.'
Even yet Howard gave no direct answer. Instead he turned his back and
strode away to the deserted camp site. Helen watched him through the
bushes and noted how he made a quick but evidently thorough
examination of the spot. She saw him stoop, pick up frying-pan and cup,
drop them and pass around the spring, his eyes on the ground. Abruptly
he turned away and pushed through a clump of bushes, disappearing. In
five minutes he returned, his face thoughtful.
'What time did you get here?' he asked. And when he had his answer he
pondered it a moment before he went on: 'The gent didn't leave his card.
But he broke camp in a regular blue-blazes hurry; saddled his horse
over yonder and struck out the shortest way toward King Cañon. He
went as if the devil himself and his one best bet in hell hounds was
running at his stirrups.'
'How do you know?' queried Longstreet's insatiable curiosity. 'You
didn't see him?'
'You saw the fire and the things he left stewing,' countered Howard.
'They spelled hurry, didn't they? Didn't they shout into your ears that he
was on the lively scamper for some otherwhere?'
'Not necessarily,' maintained Longstreet eagerly. 'Reasoning from the
scant evidence before us, a man would say that while the stranger may
have left his camp to hurry on, he may on the other hand have just
dodged back when he heard us coming and hidden somewhere close
by.'
Again Howard pondered briefly.
'There are other signs you did not see,' he said in a moment. 'The soil
where he had his horse staked out shows tracks, and they are the tracks
of a horse going some from the first jump. Horse and man took the

straightest trail