Belle-Ann stood before them.
"I 'low yo'-all kin be comin' along now, pap, 'fore th' snack gits cold," she said shyly in her low, sweet drawl.
As the men rose the sheriff caught himself ogling. Following the gliding, moccasined feet, he noted the grace and loveliness of her lithe, round form. He assured himself that he had never beheld such artless, unusual, natural beauty in a girl.
And he pondered soberly upon a lineage of blue blood manifest in her face, her form, her voice, and manner.
A restless murmur rippled through the cool cedars where the birds had gone to sleep. Cautiously a small shape with wizened face slid from out the mystic shadows, lugging a rifle twice his length. Even for his eleven years, Buddy Lutts was undersized.
His body was thin and small. His reasoning was little. But his heart was big with hate for that devil-thing, the law. He vanished as noiselessly and furtively as he had come. Little Bud had overheard every word the sheriff had uttered.
CHAPTER IV
AN ULTIMATUM
A veil of azure morning mist lingered at the apex of Henhawk's knob. A young eagle—aggressively bold in his youth—sallied forth into the mystic dawn, setting himself high on Eagle Crown rock, and surveyed the dim world with a challenge in his blinkless agate eye. The air was fragrant with the perfume of a thousand blossoms.