spring days when the sun raises
a vapor from the earth and the clouds blow low around the upper peaks;
every ravine was poured full of blue shadow, and even high up the
slopes, where patches of snow had melted, grass glimmered, a tender
green among the white. "This ain't a day for fighting," he repeated.

A shrill, quavering neigh, like the whinney of a galloping horse, rang
from beyond the house, and Vic saw the black stallion racing up and down
his corral. Back and forth he wove, then raced straight for the bars,
flashed above them, and stood free beyond, with the sunshine trembling
on him. He seemed to pause, wondering what to do with his new freedom,
then he came at a loose gallop for the master. Not Satan alone, for
now Black Bart slid across the plateau like a shadow, weaving among the
boulders, and came straight towards Barry. Vic himself felt a change, a
sort of uneasy happiness; he breathed it with the air. The very sunlight
was electric. He saw Kate run close to Barry.

"If you go this time, you'll never come back, Dan!"

The black stallion swung up beside them, and as he halted his hoofs
knocked a rattling spray of pebbles ahead. On the other side of the
woman and the man the wolf-dog ran uneasily here and there, trying to
watch the face of the master which Kate obscured.

"I ain't goin' far. I just want to get a hoss runnin' under me enough to
cut a wind."

"Even Satan and Bart feel what I feel. They came without being called.
They never do that unless there's danger ahead. What can I do to
convince you? Dan, you'll drive me mad!"

He made no answer, and if the girl wished him to stay now seemed the
time for persuasion; but she gave up the argument suddenly. She turned
away, and Vic saw in her face the same desperate, helpless look as that
of a boy who cannot swim, beyond his depth in the river. There was no
sign of tears; they might come afterwards.

What had come over them? This desperation in Kate, this touch of anxiety
in the very horse and the wolf-dog? Vic forgot his own danger while
he stared and it seemed to him that the spark of change had come from
Barry. There was something in his eyes which Vic found hard to meet.

"The moment you came I knew you brought bad luck with you!" cried Kate.
"He brought you in bleeding. He saved you and came in with blood on his
hands and I guessed at the end. Oh, I wish you--"

"Kate!" broke in Barry.

She dropped upon one of the stones and buried her face