For fourteen hours, without rest, the Ramblin' Kid had ridden.
The sun was up when Sing Pete electrified the Quarter Circle KT into life and action by the jangle of the iron triangle sending out the breakfast call.
Old Heck stepped to the door of the bunk-house and looked out across the valley. The Cimarron roared sullenly beyond the meadow. The lower field was a lake of muddy water, backed up from the gorge below. He glanced toward the circular corral.
"What th'—Who left horses up last night?" he asked of the cowboys dressing sleepily inside the bunk-house.
"Nobody," Parker answered for the group.
Skinny Rawlins came to the door. "It's Captain Jack," he said, "and—and darned if th' Ramblin' Kid ain't got the filly!"
"Aw, he couldn't have caught her last night," Bert Lilly said.
"Well, she's there," Skinny retorted, "somebody's corraled her—that's certain!"
Hurriedly dressing, the cowboys crowded out of the bunk-house and down to the circular corral. The Gold Dust maverick leaped to the center of the enclosure as the group drew near and stood with head up, eyes flashing and nostrils quivering, a perfect picture of defiance and fear. The swim across the river had washed the mud from her mane and sides and she was as clean as if she had been brushed.
"Lord, she's a beauty!" Chuck Slithers exclaimed.