igh peak of our mountain."

And then, in the soft sign language of the rein let loose, the ribs
knee-nudged, they bade their horses go. Side by side they rode and swung
like newly mated honkers in the spring--like two centaurs, feeling in
themselves the power, the blood rush of their every bound. In less than
half an hour they passed the little town and were at the foot of Cedar
Mountain. The horses would have gone up at speed, but the riders held
them in, and the winding trail was slowly followed up.

The mountain jays flew round the pines before them as they climbed; an
eagle swung in circles, watching keenly; while, close at hand, the
squirrels dropped their cones to spring behind the trunks and chatter
challenge.

At the half-way ledge they halted for a breathing. Belle looked keenly,
gently into Jim's eyes. She was not sure what she saw. She wondered what
his thoughts were. The brightness of the morning, the joy of riding and
being, the fullness of freedom--these were in glowing reflex on his
face, but she had seen these before; yet never before had she seen his
face so tense and radiant. Only once, perhaps, that time when he came
home walking in the storm.

He smiled back at her, but said nothing. They rode again and in ten
minutes came to the end of the horse trail. He leaped from the saddle,
lifted her down, and tied the horses. With his strong hand under her
arm, he made it easy for her to climb the last steep path. A hundred
feet above, they reached the top, above the final trees, above the
nearer peaks, above all other things about them except the tall, gray
Spirit Rock. Below spread a great golden world; behind them a world of
green. The little wooden town seemed at the mountain's foot--Fort Ryan
almost in shouting hail, though it was six miles off; beyond, was the
open sea of sage, with heaving hills for billows and greasewood streaks
for foam.

Jim gazed in utter silence so long that she looked a little shyly at
him. His face was radiant, his eye was glistening, but he spoke no
words. The seat they had used a year before was there and he gently drew
her toward it. Seated there as of old, he put his arm about her and held
her to him. She whispered, "Make a fire." She had indeed interpreted his
thought. He rose, lighted a little fire on the altar at the foot of the
Spirit Rock, and the smoke rose up straight in the still air. It
ascended from the earth mystery of the fire to be lost in the mystery of
t