"Splendid!" Ophelia exclaimed.

Half-way down the valley, a quarter of a mile from the bench, the
buildings of the Quarter Circle KT clustered together in a group--the
low adobe house, bunk shack, stables, graineries. Out in the fields were
hay yards with half-built stacks of alfalfa--over the tops of the stacks
white tarpaulins. In a pasture beyond the house were horses and cattle,
perhaps a hundred head in all. Climbing the hills north of the river
were a number of moving figures, dimly seen through the haze.

"Are those cattle," Carolyn June asked, "those things across the river?"

"Where?" Skinny inquired.

"Over there, on the hills," pointing toward the objects.

Old Heck glancing in the direction she indicated answered for Skinny:

"That's Parker and the boys, going over to the North Springs--they're
checking up on some yearlings we just turned across from this side of
the range." Then, speaking to Skinny: "They've already had their dinner
and won't be in till supper-time--"

"Are they cowboys?" Carolyn June asked.

"I reckon," Old Heck responded.

"Is Skinny one?" she inquired naively.

"Sort of, I suppose," Old Heck chuckled while Skinny felt his face