It was while they were having their community meeting that he had come to
know Jasper Hardy and his young daughter Angela, who occupied the next
ranch, about a mile and a half south of his. Before that he had been too
busy to bother about neighbors. "Red" Giddings, his foreman, had spoken
once or twice about "some nice folks down the line," but he hadn't heard
much of what he said. There were always a hundred and one odd jobs to be
done around the place--something was forever needing attention; and when
Uncle Henry wasn't grumbling about something, he was forcing his nephew to
play checkers or cribbage or cards with him. And, working so hard all day,
he was glad to turn in early at night. Social life, therefore--unless you
could call high words with a crabbed invalid a form of social life--didn't
come within Gilbert's ken. It was work, work, work, and the desire to make
good every moment for him.

But Hardy proved to be an aggressive fighter when the meeting took place,
and spoke in sharp tones of the Government's dilatoriness. He had come to
Arizona right after his wife's death in the East, and brought his only
daughter and a few servants with him. He seemed to have plenty of money,
and he was anxious lest the invading Mexicans should get any of it away
from him. His holdings, in the eight years since he had come to the border,
amounted to several thousand well-cultivated acres; and he looked like a
man who, when he set out to get anything, would get it. He had an
inordinate desire to grab up some more territory. Tall and thin, and
sharp-featured, as well as sharp-tongued, he resembled a hawk. It was
difficult to realize the fact that the pert and lovely little Angela--who
lived up to her name only once in a while!--was his own flesh and blood. It
was as incongruous as though a rose had grown on a beanstalk.

On their very first meeting, Gilbert had not been pleasantly impressed with
Hardy. But he soon saw that the man had a certain rugged strength, and