"Do yo' want to sell, ma'am?"
"No, but it's all I can do now," she said tearfully. "Major Stover, in San Felipe, offered me ten thousand for it, some time ago. It's worth more, but I guess this—this is the end. I don't know why I'm tellin' you all this, young man."
"This Majah Stovah—is he an army officer?" The Kid asked wonderingly.
The woman shook her head. "No. He isn't really a major. He never was in the army, so far as any one knows. He just fancies the title and calls himself 'Major Stover'—though he has no right to do so."
"A kind of four-flushin' hombre—a coyote in sheep's clothin', I should judge," drawled Kid Wolf.
"Thet just about describes him," the woman agreed.
"But yo' sho'ly aren't alone on yo' ranch. Wheah's yo' men?" asked The
Kid.
"They quit last week."
"Quit?" The Kid's eyebrows went up a trifle.
"All of them—five in all, includin' the foreman. And soon afterward, all our cattle were chased off the ranch. Gone completely—six hundred head. Then yesterday"—she paused and her eyes filled with tears—"yesterday my husband was shot while he was standing at the edge of the corral. I don't know who did it."