he met the glance stonily with eyes in which
her dislike had suddenly crystallized into open abhorrence. She gave a
jerk of her head toward his horse, a movement of contemptuous command,
and obeying it he mounted and rode away.

She joined the two men, who were examining Bess, now stretched
motionless and uttering pitiful sounds. David had the head, bruised
and torn by Leff's kicks, on his knees, while Courant with expert hands
searched for her hurt. It was not hard to find. The left foreleg had
been broken at the knee, splinters of bone penetrating the skin. There
was nothing to do with Bess but shoot her, and Courant went back for
his pistols, while Daddy John and the doctor came up to listen with
long faces. It was the first serious loss of the trip.

Later in the day the rain stopped and the clouds that had sagged low
with its weight, began to dissolve into vaporous lightness, float
airily and disperse. The train debouched from the gorge into one of
the circular meadows and here found Leff lying on a high spot on the
ground, his horse cropping the grass near him. He made no remark, and
as they came to a halt and began the work of camping, he continued to
lie without moving or speaking, his eyes fixed on the mountains.

These slowly unveiled themselves, showing in patches of brilliant color
through rents in the mist which drew off lingeringly, leaving filaments
caught delicately in the heights. The sky broke blue behind them, and
clarified by the rain, the shadows brimmed high in the clefts. The low
sun shot its beams across the meadow, leaving it untouched, and
glittering on the remote, immaculate summits.

In exhaustion the camp lay resting, tents unpitched, the animals nosing
over the grass. David and Daddy John slept a dead sleep rolled in
blankets on the teeming ground. Courant built a fire, called Susan to
it, and bade her dry her wet skirts. He lay near it, not noticing her,
his glance ranging the distance. The line of whitened peaks began to
take on a golden glaze, and the shadows in the hollow mounted till the
camp seemed to be at the bottom of a lake in which a tide of some gray,
transparent essence was rising.

"That's where Lucy's gone," he said suddenly without moving his head.

Susan's eyes followed his.

"Poor Lucy!" she sighed.

"Why is she poor?"

"Why?" indignantly. "What a question!"

"But why do you call her poor? Is it because she has no money?"

"Of course not. Who