whistling cheerily when the keas on Lonely Hill heard Art Scannell crying down the ways, and answered with a long glad challenge. Lou looked through the gloom at the red of Randal’s pipe.
“Taking him down to the hut, then?” he said.
“Yes.”
“Murray will come after him.”
“Let him!”
“And the boys will say———”
“What?”
The word hit like a bullet, and Lou laughed, low and soft.
“More than Art Scannell’s sister would like to hear,” he muttered.
A musterer’s hut squatted at foot of a siding. Randal led the horses down, hooked the reins to a ring, and said sharply:
“Come off there. Art.”
The boy’s hands were helpless with cold, and his tears were ice on the mane. But Lou lent his lithe strength to Randal’s before the door shut on the three and Randal struck a match to the slush-lamp. Then Art fell on the bunk exhausted; and Lou grinned, dabbing a cut on his lip.
“What are you going to do with him?” he asked.
“Keep him here till he’s through with it. You can go down and tell Murray to-morrow. And
