ith pleasant thoughts. A
child of the outdoors, her skin sun-tinged to a warm golden brown, her
hair sunburnt where it slipped out of the shadow of her big hat, her
lips red with young health, her slender body in its easy, confident
carriage showing how the muscles under the soft skin were strong and
capable.

At her saddle horn, in its case, was a camera; snapped to her belt and
resting against her left hip, a pair of field glasses.

The horse played at drinking, pretending a thirst which it did not
feel, and began to paw the clear water into muddiness. The dog ran on,
turned again, barked an invitation to its mistress to join in the
search for adventures, and plunged into the tall grass.

The girl's song died away, her lips stilled by the hush of the coming
noonday. For a moment she was very silent, so motionless that she
seemed scarcely to breathe.

"Life is good here," she mused, her eyes wandering across the valley to
the wall of the mountains shutting out the world of cities. "It is
like the air, sweet and clean and wholesome! Life!" she whispered, as
though in reality she had been born just this dawn to the awe of it,
the wonder of it, "I love Life!"

She breathed deeply, her breast rising high to the warm, scented air
drawn slowly through parted lips as though she would drink of the rare
wine of the springtime.

The dog had found something in the deep grass which sent it scampering
back across the water and almost under the horse's legs, snarling.

"What is it, Shep?" laughed the girl. "What have you found that is so
dreadful?"

But Shep was not to be laughed out of his growls and whines. Presently
he ran back toward the place where he had made his headlong crossing,
stopped abruptly, broke into a quick series of short, sharp barks, and
again turning fled to the horse and rider as though for protection,
whining his fear.

"Is it really something, Shep?" asked the girl, puzzled a little. She
leaned forward in the saddle, patting her mare's warm neck. "I think
he's just an old humbug as usual, Gypsy," she smiled indulgently. "But
shall we go over and see?"

Gypsy splashed noisily across the stream, the dog still growling and
slinking close to the horse's heels. The girl saw where Shep had
parted the grass with his inquisitive nose, leaving a plain trail. And
not ten steps from the edge of the water she came upon the thing that
Shep had found.

The mare's nostrils suddenly quivered; she t