-she's changed, she's so changed!"

"Well, _adios_ to you, mom, and the best of luck."

"_Adios_, Banjo, boy; good-bye!"

She waited at the window for him to pass the gate. He appeared there
leading his horse, and bent to examine the girths before putting foot
to the stirrup. She hoped that he was coming back, to tell her that he
could not find it in his heart to go. But no; the change that was
coming over the cattle country was like an unfriendly wind to the
little troubadour. His way was staked into the west where new ties
waited him, where new hearts were to be won. He mounted, turned to the
window, waved his hat and rode away.

Mrs. Chadron sat in her old place and watched him until he passed
beyond the last hill line and out of her sight. Her last glimpse of
him had been in water lines through tears. Now she reached for her
basket and took out her unfinished knitting. Broken off there, like
her own life it was, she thought, never to be completed as designed.
The old days were done; the promise of them only partly fulfilled. She
was bidding farewell to more than Banjo, parting with more than
friends.

"Good-bye, Banjo," she murmured, looking dimly toward the farthest
hill; "_adios!_"

CHAPTER XXV

"HASTA LUEGO"

Frances came into the room as fresh as a morning-glory. Her cheeks
were like peonies, and the fire of her youth and strength danced in
her happy eyes. Macdonald rose to greet her, tall, gaunt, and pale
from the drain that his wound had made upon his life. He had been
smoking before the fireplace, and he reached up now to put his pipe
away on the manteltree.

"And how are things at the post?" he asked, as she stood before him in
her saddle dress, her sombrero pressing down her hair, her quirt
swinging by its thong from her gloved wrist.

Before replying she intercepted the hand that was reaching to stow the
pipe away, pressed it firmly back, inserted the stem between his close
lips.

"In this family, the man smokes," she said.

His slow smile, which was reward enough to her for all the trouble
that it took to wake it, twinkled in his eyes like someone coming to
the window with a light.

"Then the piece of a man will go ahead and smoke," said he, drawing a
chair up beside his own and leading her to it with gentle pressure
upon her hand.

"Has Mrs. Chadron been overfeeding you while I was gone? Did she give
you chili?"

"She _offered_ me chili, in five different dishes, which I,
r