“No, for two reasons. Reckon if she didn’t care for me, then it shore wouldn’t make no difference what I did. Seemed, if she—Lord it takes nerve even to suppose this—if she loved me—she’d not give me up for killin’ Setter. An’ I’ll tell you, Ina, it’ll turn out, an’ you’ll see that the law an’ the people will soon forget Setter. When they find him out they’ll welcome some fellow handy with guns. An’ that’s me, though it’s not known in these parts. Setter knows, though. He’d have to get advantage before he’d throw a gun on me as he did on Ben.”

“He meant to kill Ben, to get rid of him that way?” asked Ina, shuddering.

“Huh! He shore did, an’ it was my tough luck that I wasn’t there,” rejoined Nevada, shortly. “But we’ve drifted ’way off the trail. I’m afraid of somethin’ worse than fightin’ for Ben. He might dodge bullets, but he cain’t dodge love. An’ love’s got him roped, hobbled, down. That’s why I came over heah. To tell you what Ben wouldn’t unless you surprise or tear it out of him.”

Ina blindly held up a hand to this persuasive friend. “Tell him to come to me,” she whispered.

“I cain’t tell him that,” replied Nevada. “Shore he’d know I’d been to you. Find some other way. Reckon it’ll take more than Marvie to fetch him. When Hettie comes out, please let me see her. Tell her I love her. Tell her I’ll stick to Ben to my last gasp. Tell her we’re goin’ straight, an’ that Less Setter an’ all hell cain’t make us go crooked. Things are workin’ to a climax, Ina, an’ it’ll shore come by fall. Ben an’ I have a trump card to play. This Indian pard of Ben’s—Modoc we call him—is aboot the slickest scout an’ tracker I ever seen. We’re goin’ to trail these cattle thieves an’ ketch them red–handed. You can tell Hettie. What will your dad an’ Ben’s dad say then? … Ina, we’re fightin’ mad an’ we cain’t be licked. But you—only you can brace Ben up. Will you?”

“Oh, Nevada, how good you are! Bless you!” whispered Ina, clinging to him. “I will—I will. I’ll see Ben if I have to ride to Forlorn River.”

Chapter Ten

BEN IDE found himself exceedingly strained and nervous these days, and things that formerly he might have at least endured, now often threw him off balance.

This morning Nevada had mysteriously ridden off somewhere without a word to either him or Modoc. Nevada had a habit of doing that. Ben would not have been upset about it had they been anywhere except at Forlorn River. The Blaine summer camp across the lake had been a catastrophe for Ben.

“Modoc, did he ride off for that camp?” asked Ben, of his Indian helper.

“Me find no track on trail. Look other side lake. No savvy Nevada. He do what he want.”