assault on Wayland--"

He looked up quickly. "Assault? Did he make trouble?"

"Yes, he overtook them on the trail, and would have killed Norcross if
Berrie hadn't interfered. He was crazy with jealousy."

"Nash didn't say anything about any assault."

"He didn't know it. Berrie told him that Norcross fell from his horse."

McFarlane was deeply stirred. "I saw Cliff leave camp, but I didn't think
anything of it. Why should he jump Norcross?"

"I suppose Mrs. Belden filled him with distrust of Berrie. He was already
jealous, and when he came up with them and found them lunching together,
he lost his head and rushed at Wayland like a wild beast. Of course he
couldn't stand against a big man like Cliff, and his head struck on a
stone; and if Berrie hadn't throttled the brute he would have murdered
the poor boy right there before her eyes."

"Good God! I never suspected a word of this. I didn't think he'd do
that."

The Supervisor was now very grave. These domestic matters at once threw
his work as forester into the region of vague and unimportant
abstractions. He began to understand the danger into which Berea had
fallen, and step by step he took up the trails which had brought them all
to this pass.

He fixed another penetrating look upon her face, and his voice was vibrant
with anxiety as he said: "You don't think there's anything--wrong?"

"No, nothing wrong; but she's profoundly in love with him. I never have
seen her so wrapped up in any one. She thinks of nothing else. It scares
me to see it, for I've studied him closely and I can't believe he feels
the same toward her. His world is so different from ours. I don't know
what to do or say. I fear she is in for a period of great unhappiness."

She was at the beginning of tears, and he sought to comfort her. "Don't
worry, honey, she's got too much horse sense to do anything foolish.
She's grown up. I suppose it's his being so different from the other boys
that catches her. We've always been good chums--let me talk with her. She
mustn't make a mistake."

The return of the crew from the corral cut short this conference, and
when McFarlane went in Berrie greeted him with such frank and joyous
expression that all his fears vanished.

"Did you come over the high trail?" she asked.

"No, I came your way. I didn't want to take any chances on getting mired.
It's still raining up there," he answered, then turned to Wayland:
"Here's your mail, Norcross, a whole hatf