The Land of Strong Men

It was light, but not yet day. The shadows of the night seemed to linger, to retreat with reluctance; and as they were beaten back by the sun, still far below the eastern curve...

On Christmas Day, Angus and Rennie found themselves alone on the ranch. Gus had gone to town, which meant that he would be drunk for some days. Turkey had not returned since he...

The judge merely told Angus that if he could work the ranch properly it would not be rented; and thus encouraged he buckled into the work. The responsibility thrust on him chang...

Toward five o'clock, her bread being baked, Faith put in the oven a pan containing two young mallards and a blue grouse, all overlaid with strips of bacon. She made her vegetabl...

On the chance that, after all, water might be got on Faith's ranch, Angus had his own levels checked by a surveyor. The result was to confirm them. Thus most of the level land w...

Winter came with the going of the last brigades of the geese. The sloughs and lakes froze, and the ground hardened to iron, ringing hollowly beneath hoofs, rumbling dully to wag...

That spring Angus kept three teams going steadily on plows and disks while the high winds dried the soil to a powder, raising dust clouds that choked and blinded, so that they c...

Kathleen returned to her room and dressed herself fully. It was only a matter of time until pursuit would be organized, would arrive, and she would be questioned. She would tell...

When Angus came to investigate the damage wrought by the hail, he found it very complete. There would be no grain to thresh. It turned out that his had been the only ranch to su...

Angus came out of the darkness slowly with the weight still upon him. There was a strange, salt taste in his mouth and a rank smell in his nostrils. His head seemed pillowed, bu...

Many miles beyond the head waters of Copper Creek four men rode along the crest of a sparsely timbered summit. Their horses were weary, gaunted with scant, frost-burnt feed. The...

"Well, I don't know that a girl would call her pretty. She doesn't dress herself up like a French wedding and frizzle her hair and all that, but she's--she's--oh, darned if I kn...

"He should be careful," said Mr. Braden. "He should go to some reliable person. Too many irresponsible dealers. He might get--er--stung. I have some very attractive propositions...

"Judge" Riley had once been on the bench, but for some reason had resigned and gone back to his profession, hanging out his shingle in Mowbray. There was no doubt of his natural...

"Sure I niver thought to see ye go off this way, wid no style about ye!" she mourned. "Foour min have I tuk, hopin' th' bether an' gettin' th' worse, but annyways ivery time the...

Mr. Braden's reasoning which fixed the responsibility on Garland, was perfectly logical; but his conclusion was entirely wrong. The missing documents were in the possession, not...

Jean Mackay, rustling through the house with broom and duster after breakfast, came on her brother reading what at first glance she took to be a magazine. This gave her what was...

Down the slope from the wind-swept summit into the valley rode the posse of Jake Bush. Their horses, too, were gaunted with scant feed and hard work. Like the men who had preced...

Angus was riding fast for Faith Winton's ranch. Rain had fallen steadily for two days, and was still falling. The hills were veiled to their bases in low clouds. Mists hung ever...

Faith rode homeward at an unwonted pace. She had always regarded that mountain, supposed to be worthless, as part of her property. Godfrey French, she now remembered more clearl...

The reason of the temporary residence of Angus and his wife at her cottage lay principally in her whim. Angus laughed at it, but yielded, and found it rather pleasant to be alon...

Though the death of Adam Mackay made a great local sensation, its cause remained unexplained. Apparently he had been unarmed, and so it seemed plain murder. But on the other han...

That spring, as soon as the frost was out of the ground, Angus did his promised work for Faith Winton, while a couple of carpenters ran up a cottage, stable and outbuilding. Wit...

As Angus drove homeward he was at first unable to adjust himself to actuality. He had given up all hope of retaining the ranch. The wrench of loss had been over. But now the ran...

A few days before the race Dorgan moved Chief to one of half a dozen sheds on the fair grounds, which a load of lumber and another of straw made comfortable. There he dwelt with...

Though Godfrey French's habits could not be called studious his private room was known as his "study," which possibly was as good as any other name. The furnishings of the room...

Angus was riding up to the French ranch. He had just parted from his companions. Their homeward progress had been slow because of the wounded men. Turkey and Rennie had gone on...

Toward noon they entered the sheriff's office. Braden was already there with his lawyer, Parks, talking with the sheriff. Presently entered the two strangers with whom Angus had...

A few days after the episode with Blake, Angus busy in his workshop ironing a set of whiffletrees, had a visit from Godfrey French. French made the reason of it plain at once.

Mr. Braden, some twenty-four hours after his interview with Judge Riley, made the shocking discovery that in all probability he had laid down a pat hand before a bluff. But thou...

"I thought it was you," he said. "Nobody else could have made as good time. You're a good guesser, too. Well--unbuckle your belt with your left hand and let it drop. Keep your r...

Pete, whose surname was Dorgan, nodded. "I like 'em some ways," he admitted. "He's got power to burn, and that'll give him speed--some. In five miles he'd be runnin' strong, but...

It took nine days to complete the flume a second time, and all hands were dog-tired. All the time the heat had continued and the hot winds were constant. The ranch had suffered...

Deciding that it was too late to go back after the deer, Angus headed for home. The sun was down when he struck into a wagon trail a couple of miles from the ranch, and he had f...

Miss Jean, spick and span in a cool dress of wash fabric, took a critical survey of herself in the mirror, and adjusted a wide shade hat at exactly the right angle. Then, taking...

Outwardly, life on the Mackay ranch settled back to its old groove. Work went on as usual. Angus entered into an agreement with McGinity which relieved him from present money wo...

Alice Page was but an episode in the life of the Mackays, but her influence was far-reaching, at least with Angus and Jean. She stimulated in the former a taste for reading, dor...

Now, though Angus was working hard under pressure, the hard part of it was not the work but the things he wanted to do and could not. Though he plugged away steadily at his task...

Jean arrived on the next boat three days later, with a tragic tale of missed connections. It seemed to Angus that the few months of absence had made quite a difference. She seem...

"Two ribs cracked," he announced, "and you're lucky at that, young man. The scalp wound is nothing. The ribs will be all right in a few weeks, if you give them a chance. Mind, y...

Jean was left in ignorance as to the occurrences of the night. No further attempts were made to interfere with the ditch; but the flume itself sagged in the middle by natural su...

The road to the track, which was nearly a mile beyond the town, was lonely and dark. Most of the way it ran through a wooded flat, and the tree shadows overlay it with denser gl...

She went alone, for Angus would not go. He held no particular ill-feeling toward Godfrey French, but as French had held it toward him he thought it best to stay away. When Faith...

Angus entering the ranch house from the rear, was amazed to see Turkey with his wife and Jean. But when he learned of the runaway he took his brother's hand in a hard grip.

If Mr. Braden had been puzzled by Garland's conduct in the first instance, he became more so. Garland made him no proposition. The thought that the latter might be dickering wit...

As Mr. Braden was quite sure that Garland had abstracted the deeds he expected to receive a proposition from him. When this did not come he was puzzled. What was Garland waiting...

The discovery of coal coming on top of sudden activity in railway survey filled the hills with prospectors, amateur and otherwise. But no further discoveries were made. Indeed,...

because there was no one who would understand even if I could have put them into words. And this is all I can say, that I love you as a man loves one woman in his lifetime, and...