As it grew toward evening, they came upon a little grassy spot in a coulee

where the horses might rest and eat. Here they stopped, and the girl threw

herself under a shelter of trees, with the old coat for a pillow, and

rested, while the man paced up and down at a distance, gathering wood for

a fire, and watching the horizon. As night came on, the city-bred man

longed for shelter. He was by no means a coward where known quantities

were concerned, but to face wild animals and drunken brigands in a

strange, wild plain with no help near was anything but an enlivening

prospect. He could not understand why they had not come upon some human

habitation by this time. He had never realized how vast this country was

before. When he came westward on the train he did not remember to have

traversed such long stretches of country without a sign of civilization,

though of course a train went so much faster than a horse that he had no

adequate means of judging. Then, besides, they were on no trail now, and

had probably gone in a most roundabout way to anywhere. In reality they

had twice come within five miles of little homesteads, tucked away beside

a stream in a fertile spot; but they had not known it. A mile further to

the right at one spot would have put them on the trail and made their way

easier and shorter, but that they could not know.

The girl did not rest long. She seemed to feel her pursuit more as the

darkness crept on, and kept anxiously looking for the moon.

"We must go toward the moon," she said as she watched the bright spot

coming in the east.

They ate their supper of fish and corn-bread with the appetite that grows

on horseback, and by the time they had started on their way again the moon

spread a path of silver before them, and they went forward feeling as if

they had known each other a long time. For a while their fears and hopes

were blended in one.

Meantime, as the sun sank and the moon rose, a traveller rode up the steep

ascent to the little lonely cabin which the girl had left. He was handsome

and dark and strong, with a scarlet kerchief knotted at his throat; and he

rode slowly, cautiously, looking furtively about and ahead of him. He was

doubly armed, and his pistols gleamed in the moonlight, while an ugly

knife nestled keenly in a secret sheath.

He was wicked, for the look upon his face was not good to see; and he was

a coward, for he started at the flutter of a night-bird hurrying late to

its home in a rock by the wayside. The mist rising from the valley in

wreaths of silver gauze startled him again as he rounded the trail to the

cabin, and for an instant he stopped and drew his dagger, thinking the

ghost he feared was walking thus early. A draught from the bottle he

carried in his pocket steadied his nerves, and he went on, but stopped

again in front of the cabin; for there stood another horse, and there in

the doorway stood a figure in the darkness! His curses rang through the

still air and smote the moonlight. His pistol flashed forth a volley of

fire to second him.




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