He studied her profile for several moments. That she was a very pretty girl, he decided. Rex knew very little about girls, but he thought she was pretty. He felt of his head and found it heavily bandaged. Some of the incidents of the previous day flashed through his mind, but they seemed like a dream now.
The mad race down the crooked grade, the smashing of the stage wheel, his ride through the dark on a bareback horse—all unreal to him now. Nan turned from the window and looked at him.
‘Hello,’ he said weakly. She came over to the bed and smiled at him.
‘Oh, I’m glad you are awake,’ she said. ‘I was just a little afraid. Dad said you had been hit pretty hard.’
‘Pretty hard,’ parroted Rex. ‘I don’t seem to remember much about it.’
He blinked painfully, but tried to smile.
‘We found you out by the porch,’ she said, indicating the front of the house. ‘Dad heard a noise out there, and he found you near the bottom step. He thought it was one of the 6X6 outfit. Two of them were here earlier in the evening, and Dad almost had trouble with them.’
‘I—I remember something about it now,’ said Rex. ‘I was trying to find my way to Mesa City. The stage broke down, and Mr. Smith sent me for help. Perhaps I got on the wrong road.’
‘And then what happened to you?’
‘I really don’t know. There was a man at the corner of the house, and he came up to me in the dark. He asked me what I wanted, but before I had a chance to answer——’