"We're going to see, me an' you," answered Miller. "I don't just know. But I do know there's a big guy down there that come onto the ranch a couple of hours ago an' that don't belong here. He's that guy talking. Name of Nelson. He ain't done any talking to me, but from a word or two I picked up from one of the milkers I got a hunch he's been sent over by Trevors."
Nelson, the big emissary for Trevors—for he admitted the fact openly and pleasantly—took off his hat to Judith and said he guessed he'd be going. And the men with whom he had been talking, including all of the milkers and all of the other workmen upon whom Nelson could get his meddlesome hands at short notice, all men whom Trevors had placed here, made known in hesitant speech or awkward silence that they were going with Nelson. There were good jobs open with the lumber company, it seemed. Nelson even expressed the hope that the quitting of these men wouldn't work any hardship to the Blue Lake ranch.
Judith, her eyes flashing, asked no man of them to remain, seeing that thus she would but humiliate herself fruitlessly, and turned away. And yet, with the herds of cows with bursting bags soon ready for the nightly milking, she watched the men move away, her heart bitter with anger.
"They've got to be milked, Charlie," was all that she said. "Who will milk them until I can get a new crew?"
"I'll tuck in an' help," answered Miller ruefully. "I hate it worse'n poison, an' I can't milk more'n ten cows, workin twenty-four-hour shifts. I'll try an' scare up some of the other boys that can milk." But he shook his head and looked regretfully at the pick-handle. "Good milkers is scarce as gold eggs," he muttered. "And the separator men has quit with the rest."
"Get Masters, the electrician, on the job. Get anybody you can. I'm going back to the ranchhouse pretty soon and I'll try to send some one from there."
"Cowboys can't milk," said Miller positively. "An' besides, they won't. But somehow we'll make out for a day or so."
"We've got to make out!" exclaimed Judith. "We've got to beat that man Trevors, Charlie, and do it quick. If he'll try to keep us short-handed, if he'll spend money to do it, if he'll do a trick like giving sulphur for lung-worm and then send infected stock out into the herds, I don't know just where he will stop—unless we stop him."
In spite of her intentions, it was nearing the time of dusk when she returned to the ranchhouse. As she came up the knoll from the barn, she saw for the first time a thin line of bluish smoke rising from the north ridge. Saw and understood the new menace.
For that way had Benny, the discharged cook, gone.