did her
friends. She judged her betrothed as little as she could, but this was
not to be entirely avoided, since she expected her life to become
merged so largely in his. There were hours when she felt she must
escape the blighting influence of his lawlessness. There were others
when it seemed to her magnificent.

Except for the occasional jangle of a bit or the ring of a horse's shoe
on a stone, there was silence which lasted many minutes. Each was busy
with her thoughts, and the narrowness of the trail, which here made
them go in single file, served as an excuse against talk.

"Perhaps we had better turn back," suggested Virginia, after the path
had descended to a gulch and merged itself in a wagon-road. "We shall
have no more than time to get home and dress for dinner."

Aline turned her pony townward, and they rode at a walk side by side.

"Do you know much about the difficulty between Mr. Harley and Mr.
Ridgway? I mean about the mines--the Sherman Bell, I think they called
it?"

"I know something about the trouble in a general way. Both the
Consolidated and Mr. Ridgway's company claim certain veins. That is
true of several mines, I have been told."

"I don't know anything about business. Mr. Harley does not tell me
anything about his. To day I was sitting in the open window, and two
men stopped beneath it. They thought there would be trouble in this
mine--that men would be hurt. I could not make it all out, but that was
part of it. I sent for Mr. Harley and made him tell me what he knew. It
would be dreadful if anything like that happened."

"Don't worry your head about it, my dear. Things are always threatening
and never happening. It seems to be a part of the game of business to
bluff, as they call it."

"I wish it weren't," sighed the girl-wife.

Virginia observed that she looked both sad and weary. She had started
on her ride like a prisoner released from his dungeon, happy in the
sunshine, the swift motion, the sting of the wind in her face. There
had been a sparkle in her eye and a ring of gaiety in her laugh. Into
her cheeks a faint color had glowed, so that the contrast of their
clear pallor with the vivid scarlet of the little lips had been less
pronounced than usual. But now she was listless and distraite, the
girlish abandon all stricken out of her. It needed no clairvoyant to
see that her heart was heavy and that she was longing for the moment
when she could be alone with her pain.

Her fr