The Girl from Sunset Ranch Part 3

She knew she was going to catch the runaway pony. Such an idea as non-success never entered her mind. This was the first hard riding she had done since Mr. Morrell died; and now her thoughts expanded and she shook off the hopeless feeling which had clouded her young heart and mind since they had buried her father.

While she rode on, and rode hard, after the fleeing buckskin her revived thought kept time with the pony's hoofbeats.

No longer did the old tune run in her head: "If I only _could_ clear dad's name!" Instead the drum of confidence beat a charge to arms: "I know I _can_ clear his name!

"To think of poor dad living out here all these years, with suspicion resting on his reputation back there in New York. And he wasn't guilty! It was that partner of his, or that bookkeeper, who was guilty. That is the secret of it," Helen told herself.

"I'll go back East and find out all about it," determined the girl, as her pony carried her swiftly over the ground. "Up, Rose! There he is! Don't let him get away from us!"

Her interest in the chase of the buckskin pony and in the mystery of her father's trouble ran side by side.

"On, on!" she urged Rose. "Why shouldn't I go East? Big Hen can run the ranch well enough. And there are my cousins--and auntie. If Aunt Eunice resembles mother----

"Go it, Rose! There's our quarry!"

She stooped forward in the saddle, and as the Rose pony, running like the wind, pa.s.sed the now staggering buckskin, Helen s.n.a.t.c.hed the dragging rein, and pulled the runaway around to follow in her own wake.

"Hush, now! Easy!" she commanded her mount, who obeyed her voice quite as well as though she had tugged at the reins. "Now we'll go back quietly and trail this useless one along with us.

"Come up, Buck! Easy, Rose!" So she urged them into the same gait, returning in a wide circle toward the path up which she had climbed before the sun went down--the trail to Sunset Ranch.

"Yes! I can do it!" she cried, thinking aloud. "I can and will go to New York. I'll find out all about that old trouble. Uncle Starkweather can tell me, probably.

"And then it will please father." She spoke as though Mr. Morrell was sure to know her decision. "He will like it if I go to live with them a spell.

He said it is what I need--the refining influence of a nice home.

"And I _would_ love to be with nice girls again--and to hear good music--and put on something beside a riding skirt when I go out of the house."

She sighed. "One cannot have a cow ranch and all the fripperies of civilization, too. Not very well. I--I guess I am longing for the flesh-pots of Egypt. Perhaps poor dad did, too. Well, I'll give them a whirl. I'll go East----

"Why, where's that fellow's fire?"

She was descending the trail into the pall of dusk that had now spread over the valley. Far away she caught a glimmer of light--a lantern on the porch at the ranch-house. But right below here where she wished to see a light, there was not a spark.

"I hope nothing's happened to him," she mused. "I don't believe he is one of us; if he had been he wouldn't have raced a pony so close to the edge of the bluff."

She began to "co-ee! co-ee!" as the ponies clattered down the remainder of the pathway. And finally there came an answering shout. Then a little glimmer of light flashed up--again and yet again.

"Matches!" grumbled Helen. "Can't he find anything dry to burn down there and so make a steady light?"

She shouted again.

"This way, Miss!" she heard the stranger cry.

The ponies picked their way carefully over the loose shale that had fallen to the foot of the bluff. There were trees, too, to make the way darker.

"Hi!" cried Helen. "Why didn't you light a fire?"

"Why, to tell you the truth, I had some difficulty in getting down here, and I--I had to rest."

The words were followed by a groan that the young man evidently could not suppress.

"Why, you're more badly hurt than you said!" cried the girl. "I'd better get help; hadn't I?"

"A doctor is out of the question, I guess. I believe that foot's broken."

"Huh! You're from the East!" she said, suddenly.

"How so?"

"You say 'guess' in that funny way. And that explains it."

"Explains what?"

"Your riding so recklessly."

"My goodness!" exclaimed the other, with a short laugh. "I thought the whole West was noted for reckless riding."

"Oh, no. It only _looks_ reckless," she returned, quietly. "Our boys wouldn't ride a pony close to the edge of a steep descent like that up yonder."

"All right. I'm in the wrong," admitted the stranger. "But you needn't rub it in."

"I didn't mean to," said Helen, quickly. "I have a bad habit of talking out loud."

He laughed at that. "You're frank, you mean? I like that. Be frank enough to tell me how I am to get back to Badger's--even on ponyback--to-night?"

"Impossible," declared Helen.

"Then, perhaps I _had_ better make an effort to make camp."

"Why, no! It's only a few miles to the ranch-house. I'll hoist you up on your pony. The trail's easy."

"Whose ranch is it?" he asked, with another suppressed groan.

"Mine--Sunset Ranch."

"Sunset Ranch! Why, I've heard of that. One of the last big ranches remaining in Montana; Isn't it?"

"Yes."

"Almost as big as 101?"

"That's right," said Helen, briefly.

"But I didn't know a girl owned it," said the other, curiously.

"She didn't--until lately. My father, Prince Morrell, has just died."