, increasing the deep pallor of her face.
Keith's pity changed into sorrow. Suddenly, as he leaned forward, his
heart filled with a vague grief, she opened her eyes--as blue as he
remembered them, but now misty and dull. She did not stir or speak, but
gazed at him fixedly for a little space, and then the eyes closed again
wearily, her head dropped over to the side, and she began to sink down.

Gordon sprang forward to keep her from rolling down the bank. As he
gently caught and eased her down on the soft carpeting of pine-needles,
he observed how delicate her features were; the blue veins showed
clearly on her temples and the side of her throat, and her face had that
refinement that unconsciousness often gives.

Gordon knew that the best thing to do was to lower her head and unfasten
her collar. As he loosened the collar, the whiteness of her throat
struck him almost dazzlingly. Instinctively he took the little crumpled
handkerchief that lay on the pine carpet beside her, and spread it over
her throat reverently. He lifted her limp hand gently and felt her
little wrist for her pulse.

Just then her eyelids quivered; her lips moved slightly, stopped, moved
again with a faint sigh; and then her eyelids opened slowly, and again
those blue eyes gazed up at him with a vague inquiry.

The next second she appeared to recover consciousness. She drew a long,
deep breath, as though she were returning from some unknown deep, and a
faint little color flickered in her cheek.

"Oh, it's you?" she said, recognizing him. "How do you do? I think I
must have hurt myself when I fell. I tried to ride my horse down the
bank, and he slipped and fell with me, and I do not remember much after
that. He must have run away. I tried to walk, but--but I am better now.
Could you catch my horse for me?"

Keith rose and, followed the horse's track for some distance along the
little path. When he returned, the girl was still seated against
the rock.

"Did you see him?" she asked languidly, sitting up.

"I am afraid that he has gone home. He was galloping. I could tell from
his tracks."

"I think I can walk. I must."

She tried to rise, but, with the pain caused by the effort, the blood
sprang to her cheek for a second and then fled back to her heart, and
she sank back, her teeth catching her lip sharply to keep down an
expression of anguish.

"I must get back. If my horse should reach, the hotel without me, my
mother will be dreadfully al