e end of
the porch, listened to them, while his keen gaze seemed fixed down the
lane toward the cabins. How intent must he have been not to hear
Columbine's step behind him!

"Good morning, Ben," she said.

Wade wheeled as if internal violence had ordered his movement.

"Lass, good mornin'," he replied. "You sure look sweet this October
first--like the flower for which you're named."

"My friend, it _is_ October first--my marriage day!" murmured Columbine.

Wade felt her intensity, and he thrilled to the brave, sweet resignation
of her face. Hope and faith were unquenchable in her, yet she had
fortified herself to the wreck of dreams and love.

"I'd seen you before now, but I had some job with Wils, persuadin' him
that we'd not have to offer you congratulations yet awhile," replied
Wade, in his slow, gentle voice.

"_Oh!_" breathed Columbine.

Wade saw her full breast swell and the leaping blood wave over her pale
face. She bent to him to see his eyes. And for Wade, when she peered
with straining heart and soul, all at once to become transfigured, that
instant was a sweet and all-fulfilling reward for his years of pain.

"You drive me mad!" she whispered.

The heavy tread of the rancher, like the last of successive steps of
fate in Wade's tragic expectancy, sounded on the porch.

"Wal, lass, hyar you are," he said, with a gladness deep in his voice.
"Now, whar's the boy?"

"Dad--I've not--seen Jack since breakfast," replied Columbine,
tremulously.

"Sort of a laggard in love on his weddin'-day," rejoined the rancher.
His gladness and forgetfulness were as big as his heart. "Wade, have you
seen Jack?"

"No--I haven't," replied the hunter, with slow, long-drawn utterance.
"But--I see--him now."

Wade pointed to the figure of Jack Belllounds approaching from the
direction of the cabins. He was not walking straight.

Old man Belllounds shot out his gray head like a striking eagle.

"What the hell?" he muttered, as if bewildered at this strange, uneven
gait of his son. "Wade, what's the matter with Jack?"

Wade did not reply. That moment had its sorrow for him as well as
understanding of the wonder expressed by Columbine's cold little hand
trembling in his.

The rancher suddenly recoiled.

"So help me Gawd--he's drunk!" he gasped, in a distress that unmanned
him.

Then the parson and the invited relatives came out upon the porch, with
gay voices and laughter that suddenly stilled when old Bellloun