going to consent. All he said was, 'Talk to him--' But I knew what he meant.

"So I crossed the room and looked down at the man. 'Mr. Gledware,' I said, 'are you willing to give up all your possessions in order to save your life?'

"'Oh, yes,' he gasped. 'A thousand times, yes! God bless you, Lahoma!'

"'You will deed all your property away from you? And surrender all that you own, money, bonds, stocks and so forth?'

"'My God, yes, yes!' he wailed. 'Save me--only save me, Lahoma!'

"I looked at Red Feather. 'Shall he make it all over to you?'

Red Feather shook his head. 'Me not want his money. Let him give all to Red Flower, the daughter him not see since he stole our money and desert his wife.'

"'Yes, yes, yes,' moaned Mr. Gledware, 'I'll give everything to her--I'll make over everything to her in the morning, so help me God--if you spare my life, she shall have everything.'

"All this time Red Feather had never moved his knee from the man's breast. Now he rose and pointed toward the East. 'The morning will come,' he said solemnly. 'If you keep your word--well! If you try fool Red Feather--if you keep back one piece of money, one clod of earth--' He wheeled about so suddenly with his drawn knife that I thought he was plunging it into the man's heart. It shot down like lightning, but stopped short just before the edge of the blade touched the miserable coward.

"Mr. Gledware sobbed and gasped and choked, swearing that he would keep his word, and assuring us that, if he broke it, death would be too good for him. But what he will do when he thinks him-self safe--that's another thing! I know his life is as secure as mine, if he is true to his promise. But if he breaks it--well, we know Red Feather! Do you think Mr. Gledware will keep his word? Or will he wait to see whether or not Red Kimball rids him of the Indian? I believe he'll be afraid to wait. But as soon as he's calm, it will be like death for him to give up all he owns. That will mean giving up Annabel, too.

"It hasn't been an hour since I came back to my room. When Red Feather slipped away, the only thing I asked Mr. Gledware was my mother's maiden name, and the place where her people lived. I'm going to leave here in the morning. I'm coming back where there's room enough to turn around in, and air enough to breathe, where men speak the truth because they don't care who's who, and shoot quick and straight when they have to. I'm coming back where money's mighty scarce and love's as free and boundless as Heaven, where good books are few and true hearts are many. Yes, I'm coming back to the West, and if the winds don't blow all the sand away, under the sand I expect to be buried. But I want to live until I'm buried. People have made the big world as it is,--well they are welcome to it; but God has made the cove as it is, and it's for Me and Brick and Bill.

"Good night.

"Lahoma.

"Just the three of us: just Me and Brick and Bill: ONE-TWO-THREE! There's oceans of room out in the big world for everything and everybody. But in the cove, there's room just for

"Me

"And Brick

"And Bill."

CHAPTER XIX LIKE LOVERS

On reaching Chickasha, Wilfred Compton telegraphed to Kansas City asking his brother if Lahoma was still at Mr. Gledware's house in the country. In the course of a few hours the reply came that she had already started home to Greer County, Texas. After reading the message, Wilfred haunted the station, not willing to let even the most unpromising freight train escape observation.

Everything that came down the track on this last reach of the railroad into Southwest Oklahoma, was crowded with people, cattle, household furniture, stores of hardware, groceries, dry-goods--all that man requires for his physical well-being. The town itself was swarming with eager jostling throngs bound for many diverse points, and friends of a day shouted hearty good-bys, or exchanged good-natured badinage, as they separated to meet no more.

Men on horseback leading heavily laden pack-horses, covered wagons from which peeped women and children half-reclining upon bedding, their eyes filled with grave wonder at a world so unlike their homes in the East or North--pyramids of undressed lumber fastened somehow upon four wheels and surmounted in precarious fashion by sprawling men whose faces and garments suggested Broadway, New York and Leadville, Colorado--Wilfred gazed upon the unending panorama. In those corded tents he saw the pioneer family already in possession of the new land; in the stacks of pine boards he beheld houses already sending up the smoke of peace and prosperity from their chimneys; and in the men and women who streamed by, their faces alight with hope, their bodies ready for the grapple with drought, flood, cyclone, famine, he saw the guaranty of a young and dominant state.

Strangers greeted one another with easy comrade-ship. Sometimes it was just, "Hello, neighbor!"--and if a warning were shouted across the street to one endangered by the current of swelling life, it might be-- "Look out there, brother!" The sense of kinship tingled in the air, opening men's hearts and supplying aid to weaker brethren. Those who gathered along the track awaiting the arrival of the trains had already the air of old-timers, eager to extend the hospitality of a well-loved land.

In such a crowd Wilfred was standing when he first caught sight of Lahoma among those descending to the jostling platform. He had not known how she would look, and certainly she was much changed from the girl of fifteen, but he made his way to her side without the slightest hesitation.

"Lahoma!"

She turned sharply with a certain ease of movement suggesting fearless freedom. Her eyes looked straight into the young man's with penetrating keenness which instantly softened to pleasure. "Why I how glad I am to see you!" she cried, giving him her hand as they withdrew from the rush. "But how did you know me?"

"How did YOU know?" he returned, pleased and thrilled by her glowing brown hair, her eloquent eyes, her warm-tinted cheeks, her form, as erect as of yore, but not so thin--as pleased and thrilled as if all these belonged to him. "How did you know ME?" he repeated, looking and looking, as if he would never be able to believe that she had turned out so much better than he had ever dreamed she would.

"Oh," said Lahoma, "when I looked into your face, I saw myself as a girl sitting under the cedar trees in the cove, with Brick and Bill."

"Just you three?" demanded Wilfred wistfully--also smilingly.

"Oho!" exclaimed Lahoma, showing her perfect little teeth as if about to bite, in a way that filled him with fearful joy, "and so they showed you that letter!"

"JUST you three?" repeated Wilfred. "Just room enough in the cove for you--and Brick--and Bill?"

"Listen to me, Wilfred, and I will do the talking."

"Well?"

She lowered her voice to a whisper-- "Lean your head closer."

Wilfred put down his head. "Is this close enough?" he whispered, feeling exalted. Men, women and children circled about them; the air vibrated with the shock of trunks and mail bags hurled upon the platform.

"No," said Lahoma, rising on tiptoe.

Wilfred took off his hat and got under hers.

She whispered in his ear, "Red Kimball came on this train--there he is--he hasn't seen me, yet--was in another coach."

"Well? Go on talking. Lahoma--I'd get closer if I could."

"S-H-H! He knows me, for he was a porter in our hotel. When he sees us he'll know I've come home to warn Brick. S-H-H! Then he'll try to keep me from doing it. Look--some of his gang are speaking to him--they've been waiting here to meet him--they'll go with him, I expect. We'll all be in the stage-coach together!"

"What do you want me to do to 'em, Lahoma?"

"I want you to pretend that you don't know me--and they mustn't find out your name is Compton, or they'll think Mr. Edgerton got word to you to join me here. Be a stranger till we're safe in the cove."

"All right. Good-by--but suppose I hadn't come?"

"Oh, I could have done without you," said Lahoma. "Or I think I could."

"You could never have done without me!" Wilfred declared decidedly.

"I can right NOW--" She drew away. "I'll get into the stage; don't follow too soon."

There were three stage-coaches drawn up at a short distance from the platform, and Lahoma went swiftly to the one bound for her part of the country. She was the first to enter; she was seated quietly in a corner when the two long seats that faced each other began filling up. The last to come were four men: one, tall, slender, red-faced and red-haired, two others of dark and lowering faces, who