unknowing on his face, her hand lay in his, passive as a thing of
stone. Sometimes he thought she did not know who he was.

"Can't we do anything to cheer her or take her mind off it?" he said to
Daddy John behind the wagon.

The old man gave him a glance of tolerant scorn.

"You can't take a person's mind off the only thing that's in it. She's
got nothing inside her but worry. She's filled up with it, level to
the top. You might as well try and stop a pail from overflowing that's
too full of water."

They fared on for two interminable, broiling days. The pace was of the
slowest, for a jolt or wrench of the wagon might cause another
hemorrhage. With a cautious observance of stones and chuck holes they
crawled down the road that edged the river. The sun was blinding,
beating on the canvas hood till the girl's face was beaded with sweat,
and the sick man's blankets were hot against the intenser heat of his
body. Outside the world held its breath spellbound in a white dazzle.
The river sparkled like a coat of mail, the only unquiet thing on the
earth's incandescent surface. When the afternoon declined, shadows
crept from the opposite bluffs, slanted across the water, slipped
toward the little caravan and engulfed it. Through the front opening
Susan watched the road. There was a time when each dust ridge showed a
side of bright blue. To half-shut eyes they were like painted stripes
weaving toward the distance. Following them to where the trail bent
round a buttress, her glance brought up on Courant's mounted figure.
He seemed the vanishing point of these converging stripes, the object
they were striving toward, the end they aimed for. Reaching him they
ceased as though they had accomplished their purpose, led the woman's
eyes to him as to a symbolical figure that piloted the train to succor.

With every hour weakness grew on the doctor, his words were fewer. By
the ending of the first day, he lay silent looking out at the vista of
bluffs and river, his eyes shining in sunken orbits. As dusk fell
Courant dropped back to the wagon and asked Daddy John if the mules
could hold the pace all night. Susan heard the whispered conference,
and in a moment was kneeling on the seat, her hand clutched like a
spread starfish on the old man's shoulder.

Courant leaned from his saddle to catch the driver's ear with his
lowered tones. "With a forced march we can get there to-morrow
afternoon. The animals can rest u