“Oh, Ben! you startled me!” she exclaimed, as she held hard on the frightened horse.
“Good mornin', Collie,” replied Wade. “I'm sorry to scare you, but I'm particular anxious to see you. An' considerin' how you avoid me these days, I had to waylay you in regular road-agent style.”
Wade gazed up searchingly at her. It had been some time since he had been given the privilege and pleasure of seeing her close at hand. He needed only one look at her to confirm his fears. The pale, sweet, resolute face told him much.
“Well, now you've waylaid me, what do you want?” she queried, deliberately.
“I'm goin' to take you to see Wils Moore,” replied Wade, watching her closely.
“No!” she cried, with the red staining her temples.
“Collie, see here. Did I ever oppose anythin' you wanted to do?”
“Not—yet,” she said.
“I reckon you expect me to?”
She did not answer that. Her eyes drooped, and she nervously twisted the bridle reins.
“Do you doubt my—my good intentions toward you—my love for you?” he asked, in gentle and husky voice.
“Oh, Ben! No! No! It's that I'm afraid of your love for me! I can't bear—what I have to bear—if I see you, if I listen to you.”
“Then you've weakened? You're no proud, high-strung, thoroughbred girl any more? You're showin' yellow?”
“Ben Wade, I deny that,” she answered, spiritedly, with an uplift of her head. “It's not weakness, but strength I've found.”
“Ahuh! Well, I reckon I understand. Collie, listen. Wils let me read your last letter to him.”
“I expected that. I think I told him to. Anyway, I wanted you to know—what—what ailed me.”
“Lass, it was a fine, brave letter—written by a girl facin' an upheaval of conscience an' soul. But in your own trouble you forget the effect that letter might have on Wils Moore.”
“Ben!... I—I've lain awake at night—Oh, was he hurt?”
“Collie, I reckon if you don't see Wils he'll kill himself or kill Buster Jack,” replied Wade, gravely.
“I'll see—him!” she faltered. “But oh, Ben—you don't mean that Wilson would be so base—so cowardly?”
“Collie, you're a child. You don't realize the depths to which a man can sink. Wils has had a long, hard pull this winter. My nursin' an' your letters have saved his life. He's well, now, but that long, dark spell of mind left its shadow on him. He's morbid.”
“What does he—want to see me—for?” asked Columbine, tremulously. There were tears in her eyes. “It'll only cause more pain—make matters worse.”
“Reckon I don't agree with you. Wils just wants an' needs to
“Poor boy! So he imagines I don't love him any more? Good Heavens! How stupid men are!... I'll see him, Ben. Take me to him.”
For answer, Wade grasped the bridle of her horse and, turning him, took a course leading away behind the hill that lay between them and the ranch-house. The trail was narrow and brushy, making it necessary for him to walk ahead of the horse. So the hunter did not speak to her or look at her for some time. He plodded on with his eyes downcast. Something tugged at Wade's mind, an old, familiar, beckoning thing, vague and mysterious and black, a presage of catastrophe. But it was only an opening wedge into his mind. It had not entered. Gravity and unhappiness occupied him. His senses, nevertheless, were alert. He heard the low roar of the flooded brook, the whir of rising grouse ahead, the hoofs of deer on stones, the song of spring birds. He had an eye also for the wan wild flowers in the shaded corners. Presently he led the horse out of the willows into the open and up a low- swelling, long slope of fragrant sage. Here he dropped back to Columbine's side and put his hand upon the pommel of her saddle. It was not long until her own hand softly fell upon his and clasped it. Wade thrilled under the warm touch. How well he knew her heart! When she ceased to love any one to whom she had given her love then she would have ceased to breathe.
“Lass, this isn't the first mornin' I've waited for you,” he said, presently. “An' when I had to go back to Wils without you—well, it was hard.”
“Then he wants to see me—so badly?” she asked.
“Reckon you've not thought much about him or me lately,” said Wade.
“No. I've tried to put you out of my mind. I've had so much to think of—why, even the sleepless nights have flown!”
“Are you goin' to confide in me—as you used to?”
“Ben, there's nothing to confide. I'm just where I left off in that letter to Wilson. And the more I think the more muddled I get.”
Wade greeted this reply with a long silence. It was enough to feel her hand upon his and to have the glad comfort and charm of her presence once more. He seemed to have grown older lately. The fragrant breath of the sage slopes came to him as something precious he must feel and love more. A haunting transience mocked him from these rolling gray hills. Old White Slides loomed gray and dark up into the blue, grim and stern reminder of age and of fleeting time. There was a cloud on Wade's horizon.
“Wils is waitin' down there,” said Wade, pointing to a grove of aspens below. “Reckon it's pretty close to the
