"He will be too late directly.

They are putting up the ranch." Confidence and dismay seemed to struggle together in the face of the girl, but the former rose uppermost, for she clung fast to hope.
"There! Oh, why can they not stop talking?
That is something now," she said.
"No," said Townshead.

"Only the wind in the firs." The girl leaned forward a little, drawing in her breath as she stared down the valley.

The voices drowned the sound she fancied she had heard, and the colour came and went in her face when she caught one of them.

"The thing's no better than robbery.