Chuck wheeled Silver Tip to the side of the car and stopped.  His eyes were filled with frank admiration as he gazed at the girl.  Her cheeks were flushed with excitement, her white felt hat sat jauntily on the crown of brown hair, her eyes were sparkling and in the close-fitting riding suit she was the picture of youthful charm and grace.  The Ramblin’ Kid nodded to Old Heck, glanced at Ophelia with a smile, looked steadily an instant at Carolyn June and raising his hat to the two women passed on with the remark:  “I reckon I’ll go on over an’ see what they’re doin’.”

“Has he entered the outlaw filly for the sweepstakes, yet?” Old Heck asked Chuck as the Ramblin’ Kid reined Captain Jack down the race track.

“Yes,” Chuck answered, “he signed her up.”

“Did he name her as the Gold Dust maverick?” Old Heck inquired anxiously.

“No,” Chuck grinned, “he called her ‘Ophelia!’”

Old Heck leaned back in the seat and roared with laughter in which Carolyn June and the widow joined.

“Dorsey was there,” Chuck said with another grin, “he’d just finished entering Thunderbolt for the big race when th’ Ramblin’ Kid and me got to the registering office.  I bet him two hundred dollars.  He was bragging a good deal—­”

Old Heck’s eyes flashed and the mirth left them.

“He was blowing, was he?” he said with a hard laugh, “the damn—­darned fool!” he corrected, remembering Ophelia at his side.  “Well, ‘egg’ him on—­the higher he flies the worse he’ll flop when he bu’sts a wing!”

In the parade Skinny rode with Carolyn June.  Parker and the Quarter Circle KT cowboys were in a group directly behind them.  The Vermejo crowd, with Dorsey himself mounted on Thunderbolt, had a place just ahead of Skinny and Carolyn June.  The beautiful black Y-Bar stallion was really a wonderful horse.  Speed, strength and endurance radiated with every movement of the glossy, subtle body.  Without doubt he was the most handsome animal on the grounds.  Dorsey was a splendid rider and a man—­he was in the early forties—­of striking appearance.  He was fully conscious of the magnificent showing he made on Thunderbolt.  The racer danced proudly, prancing forward in short, graceful leaps as the column swept past the grandstand and the consolidated Eagle Butte and Vegas bands crashed out the strains of a stirring march.  A ripple of applause ran over the crowd in the grandstand as Dorsey, at the head of the Vermejo cowboys, rode by the judges’ box.  He lifted his sombrero and waved it in pleased acknowledgment.

The Ramblin’ Kid was in line a little distance behind Carolyn June, Skinny and the Quarter Circle KT cowboys.  He rode alone just back of a quartette of Indians from down on the Chickasaw.