urself."

"Not I," she answered. "These bars are more inflexible than the
stiffest chaperone. And I just had to see you, Jim, at once. We've
got to get you out of here."

"How's Allan?"

"Getting better."

"And your father? Pretty angry at me, I guess."

"No, Father isn't angry any more. He's just sorry."

"Times are changing, Beulah. But if he wound that sack around my neck
in sorrow, I don't want him at it when he's cross."

She laughed a little, mirthful ripple. Then, with sudden seriousness,
"But, Jim, we shouldn't be jesting. We've got to get you out of
here."

"I'm not worrying, Beulah," he answered. "They seem to have the drop
on me, but I know a few things they don't. Shall I tell you what I
know?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Because it would seem like arguing--like trying to prove you are
innocent. And you don't need to prove anything to me. You understand?
You don't need to prove anything to me."

She felt his eyes hot on her face through the darkness. "You don't
need to prove anything to me," she repeated.

For a moment he held himself in restraint. The words were simple
enough, but he knew what they meant. And this country girl, whom he
had learned to like on her father's farm, had grown larger and larger
in his scheme of things with the passing weeks. At first he had tried
to dissuade himself, to think of it only as a passing fancy, and to
remember that he was engaged in the serious business of earning
enough money to build a shack on a homestead, and buy a team and a
plough, and a cow and some bits of furniture. It would be a plain,
simple life, but Beulah was accustomed--What had Beulah to do with
it? He scolded himself for permitting her intrusion, and turned his
mind to the mellow fields where he would follow the plough until the
sun dipped into the Rockies, And then he would turn the horses loose
for food and rest, and in the shack the jack-pine knots would be
frying in the kitchen stove, and the little table would be set, and
Beulah--

And now this girl had come to him, while he was under the shadow, and
because the shadow would not let him speak, and because her soul
would not be bound by custom, and because her love could not be
concealed, she had let him know.

"Have you thought it over, Beulah?" he said. "I have no right, as
matters stand, to give or take a promise. I have no right--"

"You have no right to say 'as matters stand' as though matters had
anything to do with it. They have