"That would be the best," commented Traynor. "You and Doctor Powell can leave here the same day that the herd starts to Willcox. Then let the doctor wait at Hot Springs until you get back there after the shipment."
"It would suit me perfectly," was Powell's hearty reply. "That is if I will not be imposing unwarrantedly on Doctor King's hospitality."
"If you knew him you would not say that," Traynor spoke earnestly. "He is one of the biggest-hearted men I have ever known. You and he will find many topics of mutual interest apart from your profession. I am pretty sure he will be delighted with your idea of sanitarium for children as he loves children dearly. He has not an enemy in Arizona. Every one likes him."
So the matter was settled, and four days later Limber and Doctor Powell started just after daylight breakfast for their ride of twenty-six miles across the Galiuro Mountains to the Hot Springs.
CHAPTER THREE
Katherine Glendon stood outside the door of the Circle Cross ranch house. On every side the view was blocked by the tall Galiuro Mountains above which loomed a sky of intense, glaring blue without a cloud to soften it—a sky as hard and defiant as the mountains that stared back at it; a masculine sky—a masculine country.
For eight years she had called four crude adobe rooms home. Other women had attempted to live in the Hot Springs Cañon. But the isolation was too oppressive, and one by one the squatters drifted away, leaving deserted ranches to testify to their defeat, until only the Glendons and old Doctor King, three miles distant, remained.
The morning meal was over, and Juan led a saddled pony from the stable to a hitching-post in front of the house. A tall, heavily set man slouched out, and the Mexican paused to ask; "Shall I saddle my pony, señor?"
"Not now," Glendon replied. "I want you to mend the fence in the lower pasture. When you get done you can follow me."