"Breeds—and a long way from the home range," she added musingly. "Looks like a getaway—what honest men would be smokin' up their horses in heat like this?"
A barking sheep-dog ran up the road to greet her when, after another hour of plodding, she finally reached the ridge where she could look down upon the alkali flat where Dubois had built his shearing-pens, his log store house and his cabin of one room.
"No smoke. Darned inhospitable, I say, when it's near supper time and company comin'."
There was no sign of life anywhere save the sheep-dog leaping at her buggy wheels.
"Can it be the turtle-doves don't know it's time to eat?" she sneered. "Get ep!"
The grating of the wheels against the brake as she drove down the steep pitch brought no one around the corner of the house, which faced the trickling stream that made the ranch a valuable one.
They were somewhere about, she was sure of that, for she had recognized gray horses feeding some distance away and the sheep-wagon in which they had left town was drawn up close to the house. She tied her fagged team to the shearing-pens and sauntered toward the house, but with something of uncertainty in her face. There was a chance that she had been seen and the new Mrs. Dubois did not mean to receive her.
A faint, quavering moan stopped her at the corner of the house. She listened. It was repeated. She stepped swiftly to the doorway and looked inside. The girl was lying in a limp heap on the bunk, her face, her hands and wrists, her white shirtwaist smeared horribly with blood, while an unforgettable look of terror and repulsion seemed frozen in her eyes. The sight startled even Dr. Harpe.
"What's the matter? What's happened?" She shook her roughly by the shoulder, for the half-unconscious girl seemed about to faint. "Where's Dubois?"
She bent her head to catch the answer.