die than
live--now."

His words, his tone, brought back to her a vision of the man he had
seemed when she first met and admired him. Her hand fell, the woman in
her reasserted itself. A wave of weakness, of indecision, of passionate
grief overwhelmed her. "Oh, Cliff!" she moaned. "Why did you do it? He
was so gentle and sweet."

He did not answer. His glance wandered to his horse, serenely cropping
the grass in utter disregard of this tumultuous human drama; but the
wind, less insensate than the brute, swept through the grove of dwarfed,
distorted pines with a desolate, sympathetic moan which filled the man's
heart with a new and exalted sorrow. "You're right," he said. "I was
crazy. I deserve killing."

But Berrie was now too deep in her own desolation to care what he said or
did. She kissed the cold lips of the still youth, murmuring passionately:
"I don't care to live without you--I shall go with you!"

Belden's hand was on her wrist before she could raise her weapon. "Don't,
for God's sake, don't do that! He may not be dead."

She responded but dully to the suggestion. "No, no. He's gone. His breath
is gone."

"Maybe not. Let me see."

Again she bent to the quiet face on which the sunlight fell with mocking
splendor. It seemed all a dream till she felt once more the stain of his
blood upon her hands. It was all so incredibly sudden. Only just now he
was exulting over the warmth and beauty of the day--and now--

How beautiful he was. He seemed asleep. The conies crying from their
runways suddenly took on poignant pathos. They appeared to be grieving
with her; but the eagles spoke of revenge.

A sharp cry, a note of joy sprang from her lips. "He _is_ alive! I saw
his eyelids quiver--quick! Bring some water."

The man leaped to his feet, and, running down to the pool, filled his
sombrero with icy water. He was as eager now to save his rival as he had
been mad to destroy him. "Let me help," he pleaded. But she would not
permit him to touch the body.

Again, while splashing the water upon his face, the girl called upon her
love to return. "He hears me!" she exulted to her enemy. "He is breathing
now. He is opening his eyes."

The wounded man did, indeed, open his eyes, but his look was a blank,
uncomprehending stare, which plunged her back into despair. "He don't
know me!" she said, with piteous accent. She now perceived the source of
the blood upon her arm. It came from a wound in the boy's head which had