n, though new to him, a little town on the Santa Fe.

As he rode forward through the quiet of the afternoon he found his
thoughts a curious conflict. At times he would think of the girl, and of
his love for her, and of the long, still hours spent in the ranch-house
brooding, especially the nights, when, gazing out at the stars, he had
wondered whether she knew, or, knowing, whether, after all, she really
cared. They had been lonely nights, fever-tossed and restless, nights
sometimes curiously made up of pictures--pictures of a runaway horse and
of a girl mounted upon the horse, and of long walks and rides and talks
with her afterward, and of the last night in her company, outside a
corral and underneath a smiling moon, the girl in white, her eyes
burning with a strange glow, himself telling his love for her, and
hearing in return only that she did not and could not return that love.

These were his thoughts at times as he rode forward through the desert
solitude. Then he would awaken to his physical torture, and in this he
would completely forget his spiritual distress, would ask why he had
flung himself into this mocking silence and plunged into all this misery
and pain. He knew why--knew it was because of the girl. But would it
have been better to accept her dismissal and, returning to the East, let
her pass out of his memory? In his heart he knew that he could not.

There followed the thought of his responsibility for Pat, and of what
was left for him to do. He recalled the theft, and his weeks of futile
riding to recover the horse, and the thrill accompanying risk of life
when he finally recovered him. And after that the second theft, and
another and more dreadful ride when he raced through the night after the
cavalry--the torture of it, the agony of his arm, the shooting, and the
grappling hand to hand, and Pat sinking with exhaustion, and the thrill
again, his own, at having the horse once more in his possession. It was
_worth_ it--all of it--and he was _glad_--glad to have had an
object for once in his life. And he still had that object, for was he
not riding the horse on a journey which would end in placing Pat in the
hands of the adorable girl who owned him?

Thus he rode through the afternoon and on into an early dusk. Suddenly
awaking to the Stygian darkness around him, he gave over thinking of the
past and future and turned uneasy thoughts upon the present. Above him
was a black, impenetrable dome, seeming