ic, and all about the man breathed vengeance.

CHAPTER XVI

No moon showed that night, and few stars twinkled between the
slow-moving clouds. The air was thick and oppressive, full of the day's
heat that had not blown away. A dry storm moved in dry majesty across
the horizon, and the sheets and ropes of lightning, blazing white
behind the black monuments, gave weird and beautiful grandeur to the
desert.

Lucy Bostil had to evade her aunt to get out of the house, and the
window, that had not been the means of exit since Bostil left, once
more came into use. Aunt Jane had grown suspicious of late, and Lucy,
much as she wanted to trust her with her secret, dared not do it. For
some reason unknown to Lucy, Holley had also been hard to manage,
particularly to-day. Lucy certainly did not want Holley to accompany
her on her nightly rendezvous with Slone. She changed her light gown to
the darker and thicker riding-habit.

There was a longed-for, all-satisfying flavor in this night
adventure--something that had not all to do with love. The stealth, the
outwitting of guardians, the darkness, the silence, the risk--all these
called to some deep, undeveloped instinct in her, and thrilled along
her veins, cool, keen, exciting. She had the blood in her of the
greatest adventurer of his day.

Lucy feared she was a little late. Allaying the suspicions of Aunt Jane
and changing her dress had taken time. Lucy burned with less cautious
steps. Still she had only used caution in the grove because she had
promised Slone to do so. This night she forgot or disregarded it. And
the shadows were thick--darker than at any other time when she had
undertaken this venture. She had always been a little afraid of the
dark--a fact that made her contemptuous of herself. Nevertheless, she
did not peer into the deeper pits of gloom. She knew her way and could
slip swiftly along with only a rustle of leaves she touched.

Suddenly she imagined she heard a step and she halted, still as a
tree-trunk. There was no reason to be afraid of a step. It had been a
surprise to her that she had never encountered a rider walking and
smoking under the trees. Listening, she assured herself she had been
mistaken, and then went on. But she looked back. Did she see a
shadow--darker than others--moving? It was only her imagination. Yet
she sustained a slight chill. The air seemed more oppressive, or else
there was some intangible and strange thing hovering in it. S