thinkin'
with his eyes lookin' out same as he used to look at the sunsets before
he got broke down. And then he tells me it was a fall, that he clum up
to the top of the rock and thinks he got a touch o' sun up there. For
first thing he knew he was all dizzy and staggerin' round, goin' this
side and that, till he got to the edge where the rock broke off and
over he went. He come to himself lying under a ledge alongside some
bushes, with a spring tricklin' over him. He guessed he rolled there
and that's why we couldn't find him. He don't know how long it was, or
how long it took him to crawl round to the camp--maybe a day, he
thinks, for he was 'bout two thirds dead. But he got there and saw we
was gone. The Indians hadn't come down on the place, and he seen the
writing on the rock and found the cache. The food and the water kep'
him alive, and after a bit a big train come along, the finest train he
even seen--eighteen wagons and an old Ashley man for pilot. They was
almighty good to him; the women nursed him like Christians, and he rid
in the wagons and come back slow to his strength. The reason we didn't
hear of him before was because they come by a southern route that took
'em weeks longer, moving slow for the cattle. They was fine people, he
says, and he's thick with one of the men who's a lawyer, and him and
David's goin' to the coast to set up a law business there."

The flicker of outside interest was dying. "Thank Heaven," she said on
a rising breath, then cast a look at the cabin and added quickly:

"I'll go and tell Low. Maybe it'll cheer him up. He was always so
worried about David. You tell Bella and then come to the cabin and see
how you think he is."

There was light in the cabin, a leaping radiance from the logs on the
hearth, and a thin, pale twilight from the uncovered doorway. She
paused there for a moment, making her step light and composing her
features into serener lines. The gaunt form under the blanket was
motionless. The face, sunk away to skin clinging on sharp-set bones,
was turned in profile. He might have been sleeping but for the glint
of light between the eyelids. She was accustomed to seeing him thus,
to sitting beside the inanimate shape, her hand curled round his, her
eyes on the face that took no note of her impassioned scrutiny. Would
her tidings of David rouse him? She left herself no time to wonder,
hungrily expectant.

"Low," she said, bending over him, "Dad