she did this, naturally, by reason of
her association with Alice. She saw and took on many of the little
niceties of the older woman's way of eating and drinking.

At Lee Congdon's suggestion, she abandoned the cross-saddle. It required
a great deal of character to give up the free and natural way of riding
(the way in which all women rode until these latter days), and to assume
the helpless, cramped, and twisted position the side-saddle demands; but
she did it in the feeling that Ben liked her better for the change. And
he did. She could see approval in his eyes when she rode out for the
first time in conventional riding-skirt, looking very slim and strong
and graceful. "I can't stand for the 'hard hat,'" she confessed. "I'll
wear a cap or a sombrero, but no skillet for me."

These were perfect days for the girl-wife. Under these genial suns, with
such companionship, such daily food, she rushed towards maturity like
some half-wild colt brought suddenly from the sere range into abundant
and peaceful pasture, the physical side of her being rounded out,
glowing with the fires of youth, at the same time that the poor old
Captain sank slowly but surely into inactivity and feebleness. She did
not perceive his decline, for he talked bravely of his future, and
called her attention to his increasing weight, which was indeed a sign
of his growing inertness.

And so the months passed with no one of the little group but Alice
suffering, for Mart had attained a kind of resignation to his condition.
He still talked of going up to the camp, but the doctor and Bertha
persuaded him to wait, and so he endured as patiently as he could, and
if he suffered, gave little direct sign of it.

Alice, fully alive now to the gossip of the town (thanks to Mrs. Crego),
found herself helpless in the matter. She believed the young people to
be--as they were--innocent of all disloyalty, and she could not assume
the role of the jealous woman. She was frightened at thought of the
suffering before them all, and it was in this fear that she said to Ben
one day: "Boy, you're giving up a deal of time to the Haneys."

He answered, promptly. "They pay me for it."

"I know they do. But, dearest, you ought to take more time to study--to
prepare yourself for other clients--when they come."

He laughed. "They're not likely to come right away, and, besides, I do
get in an hour or two every day."

"But you ought to study _six_ hours every day. Aren't the tr