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it nearby, he took a small hatchet from his saddlebag. Without speaking to her again, he cut two lengths of straight, stout willow sticks, trimmed and smoothed them as best he could with the hatchet. While he was doing this, he unobtrusively watched the girl and saw her cut a strip from the bottom of her dress with her knife. He was relieved that she was accepting his help.
    Kneeling down he touched the break with gentle fingers.
    “This’ll hurt like hell,” he muttered in English.
    “It is so.”
    He looked up. “Ah . . . you understand me?”
    “Little.”
    “What your name?” He made conversation to take her mind off what he was doing.
    “Little Owl.”
    “I’m Lenning.”
    “Lenning.”
    Working carefully, he pulled on her leg. There was no sound from the girl as he fitted the bone in place. But when he looked at her, he saw small white teeth sunk into her lower lip, and her eyes were tightly closed. He placed the splints on either side of her slender calf and wrapped the strip of cloth tightly around it.
    “You’re a nervy little gal. Where’s your camp?”
    “Back there.” She pointed toward Crazy Mountain.
    “How far?” When he saw her brows come together in question, he repeated the words in Sioux.
    “Sundown . . . on horse.”
    Good Lord! If he took her there it would be midnight before he got back to Larkspur. He had to get back within an hour, two at the most. He could give her his horse and walk. The roan would come back to the ranch if turned loose. But Indian’s didn’t consider taking a horse as stealing. And he was a mighty fine horse.
    “Buck Lenning,” he muttered to himself, “you can get yourself into some mighty poor situations.”
    While he was mulling these thoughts over in his mind, he saw that the girl had cocked her head in a listening position. She leaned back and placed her ear to the ground. A look of panic came over her face. She fluttered her hands in a shooing motion.
    “Go! Go! Bad men come.”
    Now Buck could hear the sound of horses approaching.
    “Indians?”
    The girl shook her head. “Bad! Bad!”
    “White men? Are they after you?”
    She nodded. “Bad!”
    Buck looked around. This wasn’t exactly the place he would have chosen for a hostile encounter, but it would have to do. He would be on his feet and they would be mounted.
    “Sit still. We’ll see what they have to say.”
    Buck stood behind his horse and watched two men come down the trail. One was leading a spotted pony. The tough-looking men reined in sharply when they saw Buck. They stared at him hard before resting their eyes on the Indian girl.
    “I see ya caught our squaw.” The one who spoke was not much more than a kid. He had a thin beard, narrow, deep-set, mean eyes, and wore a sleeveless vest decorated with tufts of hair.
    “She be a looker, ain’t she.” The older man was heavyset—fat. His gun belt rode beneath his belly. He urged his horse forward. “Glad ya found her. We thanky for the trouble. We been lookin’ for her for a couple a hours.”
    “We’ll jist take ’er off yore hands.” The kid squeezed the fire from the end of his cigarette with his thumb and forefinger and dropped it in his breast pocket.
    “It was no trouble. I’ll take her back to her village.” Buck spoke matter-of-factly.
    “Now why’d ya think we’d stand still for that?” The young one, to Buck’s way of thinking, had an attitude that would get him killed before he was twenty.
    “Can’t you see that she’s got a broken leg?”
    “Her own fault fer jumpin’ off that pony. Me an’ Lantz here cut that squaw out for ourselves. Ya want one, get ’er like we got ours.” With his eyes on Buck he spoke to Lantz. “Get her.”
    “Stay away from her.” Buck’s voice cut through the quiet sharply. “You blasted fools will get yourselves killed. Her tribe will be all over you like a swarm of ants.”
    The fat man cackled. The other man threw his leg over his saddlehorn.
    “He’s got some