old her his will was inexorable, that he would
do exactly what he said he would do, and perhaps more, if she opposed
him.

Without a word she turned back, crushed under the sense of defeat.
Useless destruction of property and money did not seem to mean
anything at all to a Lorrigan, but to her the thought was horrible.
She could not endure the thought of what he would do if she refused to
use the schoolhouse. Much less could she endure the thought of
entering the place again while it remained a Lorrigan gift.

Blindly fighting an hysterical impulse to cry aloud like a child over
her hurt, she reined Jamie into the shortcut trail of the Slide.
Coming down she had followed the wagon road, partly because the longer
trail postponed a dreaded meeting, and partly because Jamie, being
uncertain in his temper and inclined to panicky spells when things did
not go just right with him, could not safely be trusted on the Slide
trail, which was strange to him.

Until she reached the narrow place along the shale side hill she did
not realize what trail she was taking. Then, because she could not
leave the trail and take the road without retracing her steps almost
to the stable, she went on, giving Jamie an impatient kick with her
heel and sending him snorting over the treacherous stuff in a high
canter.

"Go on and break your neck and mine too, if ye like," she sobbed. "Ye
needn't think I'll give an inch to _you;_ it's bad enough." When
Jamie, still snorting, still reckless with his feet, somehow managed
to pass over the boulder-strewn stretch without breaking a leg, Mary
Hope choked back the obstreperous lump in her throat and spoke again
in a quiet fury of resentment. "Burn it he may if he likes; I shall
_not_ put my foot again inside a house of the Lorrigans!"

Whereat Jamie threw up his head, shied at a white rock on the steep
slope beneath, loped through the sagebrush where the trail was almost
level, scrambled up a steep, deep-worn bit of trail, turned the sharp
corner of the switch-back and entered that rift in the cap-rock known
as the Slide.

Mary Hope had traveled that trail many times on Rab, a few years ago.
She had always entered the Slide with a little thrill along her spine,
knowing it for a place where Adventure might meet her face to
face--where Danger lurked and might one day spring out at her. To-day
she thought nothing about it until Jamie squatted and tried to whirl
back. Then she looked up and saw Advent