He had not observed this around Slyter's house, but he had grasped that most of these Australian station owners had to catch their water in the dry season. This was the Dann station, just outside of town.

"There she is--Beryl," said Leslie, and waving a gauntleted hand she called. Sterl saw a fair-faced, fair-haired girl, distinguished by grace even in what was evidently the workaday dress of the moment.

"Pard, don't you reckon I oughta pull leather oot of heah?" said Red, in perturbation.

"I should smile you should," returned Sterl. "And me too!"

"Stand to your colors, men," retorted Leslie. Presently Sterl was doffing his sombrero, and gallantly bowing to a handsome girl, some years Leslie's senior, whose poise permitted graciousness, yet hid curiosity.

Sterl made a pleasant little speech and Red cut in with his southern drawn, "Wal, Miss Dann, I shore am glad to meet another Australian girl. My pard heah, Sterl an' me, have been sorta worried over this long trek an' thought of backin' out. But not no more."

Beryl Dann was neither too dignified nor too grown up not to be pleased and flattered by what Sterl divined was an extraordinary speech to her.

As Sterl rode on with Leslie, he observed without looking back that Red did not accompany them.

"Did you like her?" queried Leslie, a dark flash of her hazel eyes on Sterl. She was a woman; still Sterl could not react to the situation with playful duplicity, as one impulse prompted him to.

"Yes, of course," he said, frankly. "Pretty and gracious, if a little haughty. I wonder--has she lived out here long?"

"Yes. The Danns have been here all of five years. But Beryl went to school in Sydney. She visits there often. She's lovely! All the young men court her... Didn't you fall in love with her at first sight?"

"My child, I did not."

"Don't call me child," she flashed, quickly. "I'm grown up. Old enough to get married!"

"You don't say. I wouldn't have thought it," replied Sterl teasingly.

"Yes. Dad thought so. He wanted to give me to a station man over here. But I wouldn't... Red has not escaped Beryl--that's obvious. Look back."

Sterl did so, to see the cowboy still leaning over his saddle gazing down upon the fair-haired girl.

"Sterl, I like Red," went on Leslie, confidentially. "But I'd never let him see it. I don't know cowboys, of course. But I know young men who are devils after women. And he's one. I could feel it... But I guess you're different. Sterl, I'm crazy to take this trek.