ly from the doorway,
felt his arms around her. She struggled in his grasp, trying to fight him
off, and then she drifted into oblivion.

CHAPTER XIX

SOME MEMORIES

When Sheila recovered consciousness she was in Dakota's cabin--in the bunk
in which she had lain on another night in the yesterday of her life in
this country. She recognized it instantly. There was the candle on the
table, there were the familiar chairs, the fireplace, the shelves upon
which were Dakota's tobacco tins and matches; there was the guitar, with
its gaudy string, suspended from the wall. If it had been raining, she
might have imagined that she was just awakening from a sleep in that other
time. She felt a hand on her forehead, a damp cloth, and she opened her
eyes to gaze fairly into Dakota's.

"Don't, please," she said, shrinking from him.

It occurred to her that she had uttered the same words to him before, and,
closing her eyes for a moment, she remembered. It had been when he had
tried to assist her out of the water at the quicksand crossing, and as on
that occasion, his answer was the same.

"Then I won't."

She lay for a long time, looking straight up at the ceiling, utterly
tired, wondering vaguely what had become of her father, Duncan, Allen, and
the others. She would have given much to have been able to lie there for a
time--a long time--and rest. But that was not to be thought of. She
struggled to a sitting position, and when her eyes had become accustomed
to the light she saw her father sitting in a chair near the fireplace. The
door was closed--barred. Sheila glanced again at her father, and then
questioningly at Dakota, who was watching her from the center of the room,
his face inscrutable.

"What does this mean? Where are the others?" she demanded.

"Allen and his men have gone back to Lazette," returned Dakota quietly.
"This means"--he pointed to Langford--"that we're going to have a little
talk--about things."

Sheila rose. "I don't care to hear any talk; I am not interested."

"You'll be interested in _my_ talk," said Dakota.

Curiously, he seemed to be invested with a new character. Just now he was
more like the man he had been the night she had met him the first
time--before he had forced her to marry him--than he had been since. Only,
she felt as she watched him standing quietly in the middle of the room,
the recklessness which had marked his manner that other time seemed to
have entirely disappeared,