“It’s not false,” retorted Neale, with flashing eyes.  Then he appealed to Warburton and he was white and eloquent.  “You directors know better.  This man.  Lee is no engineer.  He doesn’t know a foot-grade from a forty-five-degree slope.  Not a man in that outfit had the right or the knowledge to pass judgment on our work.  It’s political.  It’s a damned outrage.  It’s graft.”

Another commissioner bounced up with furious gestures.

“We’ll have you fired!” he shouted.

Neale looked at him and back at Allison Lee and then at Warburton.

“I quit,” he declared, with scorn.  “To hell with your rotten railroad!”

Another hubbub threatened in the big tent.  Some one yelled for quiet.

And suddenly there was quiet, but it did not come from that individual’s call.  A cowboy had detached himself from the group of curious onlookers and had confronted the council with two big guns held low.

“Red!  Hold on!” cried Neale.

It was Larry.  One look at him blanched Neale’s face.

“Everybody sit still an’ let me talk,” drawled Larry, with the cool, reckless manner that now seemed so deadly.

No one moved, and the silence grew unnatural.  The cowboy advanced a few strides.  His eyes, with a singular piercing intentness, were bent upon Allison Lee, yet seemed to hold all the others in sight.  He held one gun in direct alignment with Lee, low down, and with the other he rapped on the table.  The gasp that went up from round that table proved that some one saw the guns were both cocked.

“Did I understand you to say Neale lied aboot them surveyin’ figgers?” he queried, gently.

Allison Lee turned as white as a corpse.  The cowboy radiated some dominating force, but the chill in his voice was terrible.  It meant that life was nothing to him—­nor death.  What was the U. P. R. to him, or its directors, or its commissioners, or the law?  There was no law in that wild camp but the law in his hands.  And he knew it.

“Did you say my pard lied?” he repeated.

Allison Lee struggled and choked over a halting, “No.”

The cowboy backed away, slowly, carefully, with soft steps, and he faced the others as he moved.

“I reckon thet’s aboot all,” he said, and, slipping into the crowd, he was gone.

11

After Neale and Larry left, Slingerland saw four seasons swing round, in which no visitors disturbed the loneliness of his valley.

All this while he did not leave Allie Lee alone, or at least out of hearing.  When he went to tend his traps or to hunt, to chop wood or to watch the trail, Allie always accompanied him.  She grew strong and supple; she could walk far and carry a rifle or a pack; she was keen of eye and ear, and she loved the wilds; she not only was of help to him, but she made the time pass swiftly.