was gone. Glen told Bella she was getting stupid, even
Daddy John wondered at her dull, self-centered air. She would not have
cared what they had said or thought of her. Her interest in men as
creatures to snare and beguile was gone with her lost maidenhood. All
that she had of charm and beauty she hoarded, stored up and jealously
guarded, for her husband and her child.

"It'll be best for you to go down to the town," Bella had said to her,
reveling discreetly in her position as high priestess of these
mysteries, "there'll be doctors in Sacramento, some kind of doctors."

"I'll stay here," Susan answered. "You're here and my husband and
Daddy John. I'd die if I was sent off among strangers. I can't live
except with the people I'm fond of. I'm not afraid."

And the older woman decided that maybe she was right. She could see
enough to know that this girl of a higher stock and culture, plucked
from a home of sheltered ease to be cast down in the rude life of the
pioneer, was only a woman like all the rest, having no existence
outside her own small world.

So the bright, monotonous days filed by, always sunny, always warm,
till it seemed as if they were to go on thus forever, glide into a
winter which was still spring. An excursion to Sacramento, a big day's
clean up, were their excitements. They taught little Bob to help at
the rocker, and the women sat by the cabin door sewing, long periods of
silence broken by moments of desultory talk. Susan had grown much
quieter. She would sit with idle hands watching the shifting lights
and the remoter hills turning from the afternoon's blue to the rich
purple of twilight. Bella said she was lazy, and urged industry and
the need of speed in the preparation of the new wardrobe. She laughed
indolently and said, time enough later on. She had grown indifferent
about her looks--her hair hanging elfish round her ears, her blouse
unfastened at the throat, the new boots Low had brought her from
Sacramento unworn in the cabin corner, her feet clothed in the ragged
moccasins he had taught her to make.

In the evening she sat on a blanket on the cabin floor, blinking
sleepily at the flames. Internally she brimmed with a level content.
Life was coming to the flood with her, her being gathering itself for
its ultimate expression. All the curiosity and interest she had once
turned out to the multiple forms and claims of the world were now
concentrated on the two lives betwe