"I don't want shelter!" she said. "And I can't think of anything else till after the Three Bar is a going concern."
The voices of the three men round the fire drifted to them.
"Listen," she urged.
"Blind Valley ought to summer-feed three hundred head," the ranger was saying. "I'll recommend permits for that many cows."
"That'll suit me," Slade nodded. "I'll put in application through you?"
"Not if I can help it you won't," Harris said. "Why should you have permits right in the back yard of the Three Bar with all the rest of the hills open to you? There's a natural lead right down to the corrals; divides to form wings. It's up to Wilton, of course, but I'm going to make application to graze Blind Valley myself. They'll allow whichever one he recommends."
"Harris has first call," the ranger stated mildly. "This is the logical range for his stuff—this and one or two others right close. We can fix you up in a dozen other good grass countries further on, Slade, if it's all the same."
Slade nodded agreement. The ranger had authority to recommend the issuing of permits and his superiors would not go contrary to his suggestions in any but exceptional cases—certainly not in this matter. Slade's eyes turned frequently toward the two figures on the log, silhouetted against the white of the moonlit meadow, and his slashed mouth set in disapproval. Harris noted this and smiled as it occurred to him that Slade's views on the subject of Deane's appropriating the girl for himself were about on a par with Deane's ideas relative to her touring the hills with four men.
The two came back and sat with the others round the dying fire, then all turned in for the night, Billie in her teepee and the men in their bed rolls with no other overhead shelter than the trees. In less than an hour Harris raised on one elbow. The ranger woke just as Harris slipped from his bed roll and tugged on his chaps. The steady thud of hoofs had penetrated each man's consciousness and apprised him of the fact that the horses were coming down.
Wilton closed his eyes as Harris departed to head them back. Three times during the night Deane was roused as one or the other of the three men left his bed roll to frustrate an attempt of the horses to make a break for home. Near morning he was once more wakened by a clammy dampness on his face. A fine drizzle was falling. Slade was on his feet, shoving a few sticks of wood inside the flap of Billie's teepee.