he bridge, which could be
of no use to him, but he was in a measure prompted by instincts born in
him, for he was one of the Englishmen who, with a dim recognition of
the primeval charge to subdue the earth and render it fruitful,
gravitate to the newer lands, and usually leave their mark upon them.
He had also a half-defined notion that it would be something he could
leave behind in reparation, that the men of Silverdale might remember
more leniently the stranger who had imposed on them while in the strain
of the mental struggle strenuous occupation was a necessity to him.

A bundle of papers it was now too dim to see lay beside him clammy with
the dew, and he sat bare-headed, a pipe which had gone out in his hand,
staring across the prairie with an ironical smile in his eyes. He had
planned boldly and striven tirelessly, and now the fee he could not
take would surely be tendered him. Wheat was growing dearer every day,
and such crops as he had sown had not been seen at Silverdale. Still,
the man, who had had few compunctions before he met Maud Barrington,
knew now that in a little while he must leave all he had painfully
achieved behind. What he would do then he did not know, for only one
fact seemed certain--in another four months, or less, he would have
turned his back on Silverdale.

Presently, however, the sound of horse-hoofs caught his ears, and he
stood up when a mounted figure rose out of the prairie. The moon had
just swung up, round and coppery, from behind a rise, and when horse
and rider cut black and sharp against it his pulses throbbed faster and
a little flush crept into his face, for he knew every line of the
figure in the saddle. Some minutes had passed when Maud Barrington
rode slowly to the head of the bridge, and pulled up her horse at the
sight of him.

The moon turning silver now shone behind her head, and a tress of hair
sparkled beneath her wide hat, while the man had a glimpse of the
gleaming whiteness of rounded cheek and neck. Her face he could not
see, but shapely shoulders, curve of waist, and sweeping line of the
light habit were forced up as in a daguerreotype, and as the girl sat
still looking down on him, slender, lissom, dainty, etherealized almost
by the brightening radiance, she seemed to him a visionary complement
of the harmonies of the night. It also appeared wiser to think of her
as such than a being of flesh and blood whom he had wildly ventured to
long for, and he a