aded him. And he,
divining the state of her feelings, kept away from the house as much as
possible.

Masten's demeanor on hearing of the insult that had been offered her by
Pickett had seemed that of a man who was lacking in courage: at the time
she had not been able to make it conform to her ideas of a man's duty to
the woman he had promised to marry--or to any woman. She had heard him
speak of reason in connection with the affair, as though there were no
such thing in the world as rage so justifiable as to make a man yearn to
inflict punishment upon another man who had attacked his woman. He had
looked upon the matter cold-bloodedly, and she had resented that. But now
that she had been avenged, she felt that she had been wrong. It had been
such a trivial thing, after all; the punishment seemed monstrous in
comparison with it. She had seen Pickett's movement when Randerson had
momentarily turned his back to him, but she had also seen Randerson's
retaliatory movement. She had known then, that Randerson had expected
Pickett's action, and that he had been prepared for it, and therefore it
seemed to her that in forcing the trouble Randerson had not only foreseen
the ending but had even courted it.

Remorse over her momentary doubt of Masten's motive in refusing to call
Pickett to account, afflicted her. He had been wiser than she; he had
traced the line that divided reason from the primitive passions--man from
beast. His only reference to the incident--a wordless one, which she felt
was sufficiently eloquent--came when one day, while they were standing
beside the corral fence, looking at the horses, they saw Randerson riding
in. Masten nodded toward him and shook his head slowly from side to side,
compressing his lips as he did so. And then, seeing her looking at him,
he smiled compassionately, as though to say that he regretted the killing
of Pickett as well as she.

She seized his arm impulsively.

"I was wrong, Willard," she said.

"Wrong, dear?" he said. "It wasn't your fault."

"But I thought--things about you that I shouldn't have thought. I felt
that you ought to have punished Pickett. I am glad, now, that you
didn't." She shuddered, and looked again at Randerson, just dismounting
at the bunkhouse, paying no attention to them.

"Then you wouldn't have me like him?" He indicated Randerson.

"No," she said.

He gave her shoulder a slight pressure, and turning his head, smiled
triumphantly.

Later, when th