THE MAN OF DRY BOTTOM A young man rode around the corner of the cabin and halted his pony beside the porch, sitting quietly in the saddle and gazing inquiringly at the two.

He was about Ferguson's age and, like the latter, he wore two heavy guns.

There was about him, as he sat there sweeping a slow glance over the girl and the man, a certain atmosphere of deliberate certainty and quiet coldness that gave an impression of readiness for whatever might occur.
Ferguson's eyes lighted with satisfaction.

The girl might be an Easterner, but the young man was plainly at home in this country.
Nowhere, except in the West, could he have acquired the serene calm that shone out of his eyes; in no other part of the world could he have caught the easy assurance, the unstudied nonchalance, that seems the inherent birthright of the cowpuncher.
"Ben," said the girl, answering the young man's glance, "this man was bitten by a rattler.

He came here, and I treated him.