"Dale claims to have proof of that. He won't tell me where he got it.
He has some sort of trumped-up evidence, I suppose, or he would not
have talked so confidently. And he is all-powerful in the basin. He
is friendly with all the big politicians in the territory, and is
ruthless and merciless. I feel that he would have succeeded, if you
had not come.

"I know what he wants; he wants the Double A on account of the water.
He is prepared to go any length to get it--to commit murder, if
necessary. He could take it away from me, for I wouldn't know how to
fight him. But he can't take it away from you, Will. And he can't say
you have no claim to the Double A, for father willed it to you, and the
will has been recorded in the Probate Court in Las Vegas!

"O Will; I am _so_ glad you came," she went on, stroking and patting
his arms. "When I spoke to you the first time, out there by the
stable, I was certain of you, though I dreaded to have you speak for
fear you would say otherwise. And if it hadn't been you, I believe I
should have died."

"An' if you'd find out, now, that I ain't Will Bransford," said
Sanderson slowly, "what then?"

"That can't be," she said, looking him straight in the eyes, and
holding his gaze for a long time, while she searched his face for signs
of that playful deceit that she expected to see reflected there.

She saw it, evidently, or what was certainly an excellent counterfeit
of it--though Sanderson was in no jocular mood, for at that moment he
felt himself being drawn further and further into the meshes of the