“Now, Miss Mariel, I didn’t mean to offend you,” he pleaded. “Can’t you see the position you put me in?”

Mariel turned her back on him—perhaps that he might not see the smile playing about her lips.

“But you admit there was such a conspiracy?”

“If you want to call it that—yes.”

“And Mr. Sample wasn’t stuffing me, then?”

“In the main he was right, I suppose. But old Simp does love to paint things in lurid colors.”

“And you don’t think it’s going to rain?”

Jess scanned the black clouds which now obscured the Tetons.

“These mountain showers don’t last very long. We can find shelter under some of these overhanging rocks.”

“I think I prefer to start back to the ranch. Isn’t this thing rolled up behind my saddle a raincoat?”

“It’s a slicker, Miss Mariel. If you really want to turn back, you’d better put it on before we start.”

At a glance from her he leaned over, untied the thongs which held the slicker, and without dismounting, held it while she thrust her arms in the sleeves.

Mariel, unaccustomed to the foibles of Western horses, drew the yellow oilskin forward with a widespread flourish. Instantly Dynamite, old but temperamental, leaped forward and bolted. Ears laid back, his body close to the ground, he started down the Buffalo Forks road, bent on outrunning the flapping slicker which had frightened him.

His first leap had almost dislodged Mariel from the saddle. She did not scream, but a startled cry of alarm burst from her lips as Dynamite bolted.

She had let the reins drop as she had raised her arms to don the slicker. Now she clutched at the pommel, and clung to it with every ounce of her strength.

Instantly Jess had dug his spurs into his white-stockinged chestnut. He was but two lengths behind old Dynamite, and the chestnut was a far fleeter animal.

Jess might have overtaken Dynamite, and forced him to stop by crowding him into the embankment 

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