The Trail Horde

E-text prepared by Graeme Mackreth, Suzanne Shell, and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net/)
Warden, if you move a quarter of an inch I'll blow you to hell!
Author of The Ranchman, 'Firebrand' Trevison, The Range Boss, The Vengeance of Jefferson Gawne, The Boss of the Lazy Y, Etc.
FRONTISPIECE BY P. V. E. IVORY
CHICAGO A. C. McCLURG & CO. 1920 Copyright A. C. McClurg & Co. 1920
Published September, 1920
Copyrighted in Great Britain
There were fifty thousand acres within view of the ranchhouse—virgin grass land dotted with sage, running over a wide level, into little hills, and so on to an upland whose rise was so gradual that it could be seen only from a distance, best from the gallery of the ranchhouse.
The first tang of autumn was in the sage-scented breeze that swept the county, and the tawny valley, basking in the warm sunlight that came down from a cloudless sky, showed its rugged beauty to advantage.
Kane Lawler paused at the edge of the gallery and filled his lungs from the sage-laden breeze, and then wheeled to face his mother.
She smiled at him.
Have you seen Ruth Hamlin lately, Kane?