.. That is a long time. Won't you come to see me sooner than
that?"

"If I can get down to Pine."

"You're the first friend I've made in the West," said Helen, earnestly.

"You'll make many more--an' I reckon soon forget him you called the man
of the forest."

"I never forget any of my friends. And you've been the--the biggest
friend I ever had."

"I'll be proud to remember."

"But will you remember--will you promise to come to Pine?"

"I reckon."

"Thank you. All's well, then.... My friend, goodby."

"Good-by," he said, clasping her hand. His glance was clear, warm,
beautiful, yet it was sad.

Auchincloss's hearty voice broke the spell. Then Helen saw that the
others were mounted. Bo had ridden up close; her face was earnest
and happy and grieved all at once, as she bade good-by to Dale. The
pack-burros were hobbling along toward the green slope. Helen was the
last to mount, but Roy was the last to leave the hunter. Pedro came
reluctantly.

It was a merry, singing train which climbed that brown odorous trail,
under the dark spruces. Helen assuredly was happy, yet a pang abided in
her breast.

She remembered that half-way up the slope there was a turn in the trail
where it came out upon an open bluff. The time seemed long, but at last
she got there. And she checked Ranger so as to have a moment's gaze down
into the park.

It yawned there, a dark-green and bright-gold gulf, asleep under a
westering sun, exquisite, wild, lonesome. Then she saw Dale standing in
the open space between the pines and the spruces. He waved to her. And
she returned the salute.

Roy caught up with her then and halted his horse. He waved his sombrero
to Dale and let out a piercing yell that awoke the sleeping echoes,
splitting strangely from cliff to cliff.

"Shore Milt never knowed what it was to be lonesome," said Roy, as if
thinking aloud. "But he'll know now."

Ranger stepped out of his own accord and, turning off the ledge, entered
the spruce forest. Helen lost sight of Paradise Park. For hours then
she rode along a shady, fragrant trail, seeing the beauty of color and
wildness, hearing the murmur and rush and roar of water, but all the
while her mind revolved the sweet and momentous realization which had
thrilled her--that the hunter, this strange man of the forest, so deeply
versed in nature and so unfamiliar with emotion, aloof and simple and
strong like the elements which had developed him, had fallen in love
with