miles south, and no restaurants on the way."

"But his mother--" began Alice Weston.

"Yes," said Waring. "I think that leg of lamb was for dinner to-night."

Alice Weston said nothing further, but as she got ready for dinner she
confessed to herself that the event of Lorry's escape would have been
much more thrilling, in retrospect at least, had he chosen to wave his
hasty farewell with a silken bandanna, or even a pistol. To ride off
like that, waving a leg of lamb!




Chapter XII


_Bud Shoop and Bondsman_

As a young man, Bud Shoop had punched cattle on the southern ranges,
cooked for a surveying outfit, prospected in the Mogollons, and essayed
homesteading on the Blue Mesa, served as cattle inspector, and held for
many years the position of foreman on the great Gila Ranch, where, with
diligence and honor, he had built up a reputation envied by many a
lively cow-puncher and seldom tampered with even by Bud's most
vindictive enemies. And he had enemies and many friends.

Meanwhile he had taken on weight until, as one of his friends remarked,
"Most any hoss but a Percheron draft would shy the minute Bud tried to