Bob looked about him uneasily.  The ranger bent his head to the wind.  Star, walking more rapidly, outpaced Bob’s horse, until they were proceeding single file some ten feet apart.

Suddenly the earth seemed to explode directly ahead.  A blinding flare swept the ground, a hissing crackle was drowned in an overwhelming roar of thunder.  Bob dodged, and his horse whirled.  When he had mastered both his animal and himself he spurred back.  California John had reined in his mount.  Not twenty feet ahead of him the bolt had struck.  California John glanced quizzically over his shoulder at the sky.

“Old Man,” he remarked, “you’ll have to lower your sights a little, if you want to git me.”

XIV

At Christmas Bob took a brief trip East, returning to California about the middle of January.  The remainder of the winter was spent in outside business, and in preparatory arrangements for the next season’s work.  The last of April he returned to the lower mountains.

He found Sycamore Flats in a fever of excitement over the cattle question.  After lighting his post-prandial pipe he sauntered down to chat with Martin, the lank and leisurely keeper of the livery, proprietor of the general store, and clearing house of both information and gossip.

“It looks like this,” Martin answered Bob’s question.  “You remember Plant sent back old California John to make a report on the grazing.  John reported her over-stocked, of course; nobody could have done different.  Plant kind of promised to fix things up; and the word got around pretty definite that the outside stock would be reduced.”

“Wasn’t it?”

“Not so you’d notice.  When the permits was published for this summer, they read good for the same old number.”

“Then Wright’s cattle will be in again this year.”

“That’s the worst of it; they are in.  Shelby brought up a thousand head a week ago, and was going to push them right in over the snow.  The feed’s just starting on the low meadows in back, and it hasn’t woke up a mite in the higher meadows.  You throw cattle in on that mushy, soft ground and new feed, and they tromp down and destroy more’n they eat.  No mountain cattleman goes in till the feed’s well started, never.”

“But what does Shelby do it for, then?”

Martin spat accurately at a knothole.

“Oh, he don’t care.  Those big men don’t give a damn what kind of shape cattle is in, as long as they stay alive.  Same with humans; only they ain’t so particular about the staying alive part.”

“Couldn’t anything be done to stop them?”

“Plant could keep them out, but he won’t.  Jim and George Pollock, and Tom Carroll and some of the other boys put up such a kick, though, that they saw a great light.  They ain’t going in for a couple of weeks more.”

“That’s all right, then,” said Bob heartily.