Brand Blotters

They unsaddled at Dead Cow Creek, hobbled the ponies, and ate supper.

Norris seemed in no hurry to resaddle. He lay stretched carelessly at full

length, his eyes upon her with veiled admiration. She sat upright, her

gaze on the sunset with its splashes of topaz and crimson and saffron,

watching the tints soften and mellow as dusk fell. Every minute now

brought its swift quota of changing beauty. A violet haze enveloped the

purple mountains, and in the crotch of the hills swam a lake of indigo.

The raw, untempered glare of the sun was giving place to a limitless pour

of silvery moonlight.

Her eyes were full of the soft loveliness of the hour when she turned them

upon her companion. He answered promptly her unspoken question.

"You bet it is! A night for the gods--or for lovers."

He said it in a murmur, his eyes full on hers, and his look wrenched her

from her mood. The mask of comradeship was gone. He looked at her

hungrily, as might a lover to whom all spiritual heights were denied.

Her sooty lashes fell before this sinister spirit she had evoked, but were

raised instantly at the sound of him drawing his body toward her.

Inevitably there was a good deal of the young animal in her superbly

healthy body. She had been close to nature all day, the riotous passion of

spring flowing free in her as in the warm earth herself. But the magic of

the mystic hills had lifted her beyond the merely personal. Some sense of

grossness in him for the first time seared across her brain. She started

up, and her face told him she had taken alarm.

"We must be going," she cried.

He got to his feet. "No hurry, sweetheart."

The look in his face startled her. It was new to her in her experience of

men. Never before had she met elemental lust.

"You're near enough," she cautioned sharply.

He cursed softly his maladroitness.

"I was nearer last night, honey," he reminded her.

"Last night isn't to-night."

He hesitated. Should he rush her defenses, bury her protests in kisses? Or

should he talk her out of this harsh mood? Last night she had been his.

There were moments during the day when she had responded to him as a

musical instrument does to skilled fingers. But for the moment his power

over her was gone. And he was impatient of delay.

"What's the matter with you?" he asked roughly.

"We'll start at once."

"No."