"I reckon you think hanging's too good for me," he said. Harry did not answer, and in a moment he went on. "It's like this. My job is up in the reserve—keeping tabs on everything that goes on up there in the timber, where the sheep and cattle men take their herds in summer. You can see I wouldn't keep my job long if I was to believe everything fellows tell me about how honorable and noble-minded they are. I'm deputy sheriff, too—have to be in case of trouble, we're so far from town. I was running down one of those Bascoes when that pony of mine disappeared. I traced it out to the Boise base line,—this road we're on now—when I met a fellow that saw him traveling this way in a string of colts. I was on his trail when I struck your place. You see, I was kind of suspicious about that 'boarding' yarn, and yet I didn't see, honestly, how you could frame up a tale like that yourself."
"Why didn't you come back the next day and ask my brother about your horse?"
"That's what I meant to do; but I got word to go back to the reserve quick. The sheep were coming in, and I didn't have another chance to get down here until the day I met your brother hunting his cow. He had my horse, and I thought the best thing to do was to give him a chance to explain to Judge Raeburn. That's the way of it."
There was a long, strained silence. Garnett had never been so uncomfortable and unhappy in his life. Here he was, showing himself in the worst possible light to the nicest girl he had ever met.
The road, which was cut out of the side of the cliff, was steep and barely wide enough for the team. On one side was the frowning mountain wall, on the other the black abyss. Harry felt the horror of it; but when she looked up into the clear, serene sky she forgot her fear. She felt round her the splendor and immensity of the night and the wilderness, and her annoyances, her troubles and worries, slowly faded away. A delightful sense of rest came upon her. She realized how much she owed to Garnett for coming to her aid as he had done, and she was trying to think of something friendly to say to him, when he spoke.
"I hope you ain't a-cussing me still?" he said with gruff earnestness. "I'm sorry."
"No, indeed," Harry answered quickly. "You couldn't help it. But I wish Rob had never gone in with that fellow Jones—the one he's boarding the horses for. Sometimes I almost hate Jones. He's taken Rob away from me. I meant to have such a good time out here, but one thing after another has gone wrong. Part of it was my fault, I know."
And she told him the whole story of the affair with the sheep herder, how she had insisted upon keeping 'Thello and had refused to file on the homestead, of the herder's attacking Rob, and of the mysterious disappearance of the colts, and Rob's pony, and the cow.
"And if I'd done as Bobs wanted me to, all these troubles would never have happened."
"Oh, now, you mustn't talk that way. Nobody lives that ain't meeting up with something all along the trail. Might be you'll get you a homestead somewhere that you'll like a whole heap better than the one you lost."