impulse to run back to Durade,
instinctively, just as she had when a child. He had ruined her mother;
he had meant to make a lure of her, the daughter; he had showed what
his vengeance would be upon that mother, just as he had showed Allie her
doom should she betray him. But notwithstanding all this, Durade was not
Fresno, nor like any of those men whose eyes seemed to burn her.

She returned to the wagon and to the several women and men attached to
it, with the assurance that there were at least some good persons in
that motley caravan crew.

The women, naturally curious and sympathetic, questioned her in one
way and another. Who was she, what had happened to her, where were her
people or friends? How had she ever escaped robbers and Indians in that
awful country? Was she really Durade's daughter?

Allie did not tell much about herself, and finally she was left in
peace.

The lean old scout who had first seen Allie as she staggered into the
trail told her it was over a hundred miles to the first camp of the
railroad-builders.

"Down-hill all the way," he concluded. "An' we'll make it in a jiffy."

Nevertheless, it took nearly all of four days to sight the camp of the
traders--the advance-guard of the great construction work.

In those four days Allie had recovered her bloom, her health, her
strength--everything except the wonderful assurance which had been hers.
Durade had spoken daily with her, and had been kind, watchful, like a
guardian.

It was with a curious thrill that Allie gazed around as she rode into
the construction camp--horses and men and implements all following the
line of Neale's work. Could Neale be there? If so, how dead was her
heart to his nearness?

The tents of the workers, some new and white, others soiled and ragged,
stretched everywhere; large tents belched smoke and resounded with the
ring of hammers on anvil; soldiers stood on guard; men, red-shirted and
blue-shirted, swarmed as thick as ants; in a wide hollow a long line of
horses, in double row, heads together, pulled hay from a rack as long as
the line, and they pulled and snorted and bit at one another; a strong
smell of hay and burning wood mingled with the odor of hot coffee and
steaming beans; fires blazed on all sides; under another huge tent, or
many tents without walls, stretched wooden tables and benches; on the
scant sage and rocks and brush, and everywhere upon the tents, lay in a
myriad of colors and varieties the la