As he rode around a corner of the stone house his horse snorted and stopped.  A lean, shaggy pony jumped at sight of him, almost displacing a red long-haired blanket that covered an Indian saddle.  Quick thuds of hoofs in sand drew Shefford’s attention to a corral made of peeled poles, and here he saw another pony.

Shefford heard subdued voices.  He dismounted and walked to an open door.  In the dark interior he dimly descried a high counter, a stairway, a pile of bags of flour, blankets, and silver-ornamented objects, but the persons he had heard were not in that part of the house.  Around another corner of the octagon-shaped wall he found another open door, and through it saw goat-skins and a mound of dirty sheep-wool, black and brown and white.  It was light in this part of the building.  When he crossed the threshold he was astounded to see a man struggling with a girl—­an Indian girl.  She was straining back from him, panting, and uttering low guttural sounds.  The man’s face was corded and dark with passion.  This scene affected Shefford strangely.  Primitive emotions were new to him.

Before Shefford could speak the girl broke loose and turned to flee.  She was an Indian and this place was the uncivilized desert, but Shefford knew terror when he saw it.  Like a dog the man rushed after her.  It was instinct that made Shefford strike, and his blow laid the man flat.  He lay stunned a moment, then raised himself to a sitting posture, his hand to his face, and the gaze he fixed upon Shefford seemed to combine astonishment and rage.

“I hope you’re not Presbrey,” said Shefford, slowly.  He felt awkward, not sure of himself.

The man appeared about to burst into speech, but repressed it.  There was blood on his mouth and his hand.  Hastily he scrambled to his feet.  Shefford saw this man’s amaze and rage change to shame.  He was tall and rather stout; he had a smooth tanned face, soft of outline, with a weak chin; his eyes were dark.  The look of him and his corduroys and his soft shoes gave Shefford an impression that he was not a man who worked hard.  By contrast with the few other worn and rugged desert men Shefford had met this stranger stood out strikingly.  He stooped to pick up a soft felt hat and, jamming it on his head, he hurried out.  Shefford followed him and watched him from the door.  He went directly to the corral, mounted the pony, and rode out, to turn down the slope toward the south.  When he reached the level of the basin, where evidently the sand was hard, he put the pony to a lope and gradually drew away.