CHAPTER I. THE MAN WITH A GUN The peace of midday lay upon Gunsight, broken only by the distant chang, chang of bells as a ten-mule ore-team came toiling in from the mines. In the cool depths of the umbrella tree in front of the Company's office a Mexican ground-dove crooned endlessly his ancient song of love, but Gunsight took no notice. Its thoughts were not of love but of money. The dusty team of mules passed down the street, dragging their... more...

CHAPTER ONE THE RIM AND WHAT LAY BENEATH IT Not all of the West is tamed and trained to run smoothly on pneumatic tires and to talk more enthusiastically of the different “makes” of cars than of bits and saddles. There are still wide stretches unknown of tourists and movie men hunting locations for Western melodrama where men live in the full flavor of adventure and romance and never know it, because they have never known any... more...

CHAPTER 1. TWO MEN AND A WOMAN "Mr. Ridgway, ma'am." The young woman who was giving the last touches to the very effective picture framed in her long looking-glass nodded almost imperceptibly. She had come to the parting of the ways, and she knew it, with a shrewd suspicion as to which she would choose. She had asked for a week to decide, and her heart-searching had told her nothing new. It was characteristic of Virginia Balfour that she did... more...

CHAPTER I THE THUNDERBOLT It seemed that Father Anthony gathered all the warmth of the short northern summer and kept it for winter use, for his good nature was an actual physical force. From his ruddy face beamed such an ardent kindliness that people literally reached out towards him as they might extend their hands toward a comfortable fire. All the labors of his work as an Inspector of Jesuit institutions across the length and breadth of... more...

CHAPTER I. LASSITER A sharp clip-crop of iron-shod hoofs deadened and died away, and clouds of yellow dust drifted from under the cottonwoods out over the sage. Jane Withersteen gazed down the wide purple slope with dreamy and troubled eyes. A rider had just left her and it was his message that held her thoughtful and almost sad, awaiting the churchmen who were coming to resent and attack her right to befriend a Gentile. She wondered if the... more...

These eight stories are made from our Western Frontier as it was in a past as near as yesterday and almost as by-gone as the Revolution; so swiftly do we proceed. They belong to each other in a kinship of life and manners, and a little through the nearer tie of having here and there a character in common. Thus they resemble faintly the separate parts of a whole, and gain, perhaps, something of the invaluable weight of length; and they have been... more...

CHAPTER I. THE LONG ARM OF THE LAW. How many of us, I wonder, can look back over the misty, half-forgotten years and not see a few that stand out clear and golden, sharp-cut against the sky-line of memory? Years that we wish we could live again, so that we might revel in every full-blooded hour. For we so seldom get the proper focus on things until we look at them through the clarifying telescope of Time; and then one realizes with a pang that... more...

A PROLOGUE The grey roadster purred up the driveway, and Alice Endicott thrust the "home edition" aside and hurried out onto the porch to greet her husband as he stepped around from the garage. "Did the deal go through?" she asked, as her eyes eagerly sought the eyes of the man who ascended the steps. "Yes, dear," laughed Endicott, "the deal went through. You see before you a gentleman of elegant leisure—foot-loose, and... more...

CHAPTER I On an afternoon in early spring a man lounged against the wall of the station waiting for the express from the east. Slender of waist and hip, stalwart of shoulder, some seventy-two inches of sinewy height, he was the figure of the typical cattleman. His eyes were deep-set and far-seeing; his lean, brown face, roughened by outdoor life, was austere and resolute in expression. The train had barely stopped when a boyish-looking,... more...

CHAPTER I LITTLE JIM Little Jim knew that something strange had happened, because Big Jim, his father, had sold their few head of cattle, the work team, and the farm implements, keeping only the two saddle-horses and the pack-horse, Filaree. When Little Jim asked where his mother had gone, Big Jim told him that she had gone on a visit, and would be away a long time. Little Jim wanted to know if his mother would ever come back. When Big Jim said... more...