s. "I promise to make your little girl happy," he whispered.

He almost fell in stooping to the portrait, but caught himself and stood
carefully quiet, trembling, and speaking to himself. "Where is your
strength?" he demanded. "I reckon it is joy that has unsteadied your
laigs."

The door opened. It was she, come back with his dinner.

"My Heavens!" she said; and setting the tray down, she rushed to him.
She helped him back to his chair, and covered him again. He had suffered
no hurt, but she clung to him; and presently he moved and let himself
kiss her with fuller passion.

"I will be good," he whispered.

"You must," she said. "You looked so pale!"

"You are speakin' low like me," he answered. "But we have no dream we
can wake from."

Had she surrendered on this day to her cowpuncher, her wild man? Was she
forever wholly his? Had the Virginian's fire so melted her heart that no
rift in it remained? So she would have thought if any thought had come
to her. But in his arms to-day, thought was lost in something more
divine.

XXIX. WORD TO BENNINGTON

They kept their secret for a while, or at least they had that special
joy of believing that no one in all the world but themselves knew this
that had happened to them. But I think that there was one person who
knew how to keep a secret even better than these two lovers. Mrs. Taylor
made no remarks to any one whatever. Nobody on Bear Creek, however, was
so extraordinarily cheerful and serene. That peculiar severity which she
had manifested in the days when Molly was packing her possessions,
had now altogether changed. In these days she was endlessly kind and
indulgent to her "deary." Although, as a housekeeper, Mrs. Taylor
believed in punctuality at meals, and visited her offspring with
discipline when they were late without good and sufficient excuse, Molly
was now exempt from the faintest hint of reprimand.

"And it's not because you're not her mother," said George Taylor,
bitterly. "She used to get it, too. And we're the only ones that get it.
There she comes, just as we're about ready to quit! Aren't you going to
say NOTHING to her?"

"George," said his mother, "when you've saved a man's life it'll be time
for you to talk."

So Molly would come in to her meals with much irregularity; and her
remarks about the imperfections of her clock met with no rejoinder. And
yet one can scarcely be so severe as had been Mrs. Taylor, and become
wholly as mild as