u to marry a sick man."

"But you love me?" she said, "You want me--you have been miserable
trying to give me up."

"It has been a bitter fight," he said, "a miserable, lonesome fight."

Pearl stood up suddenly, and he thought he had never seen her so
beautiful, so queenly or so compelling. He knew he was going to do
whatever she said. The weight of responsibility seemed to be lifted.

"Come out," she said quickly, "we are too happy to stay inside. I must
breathe the sunshine and look up at the sky. My heart is too full for
a house."

They drove to the river bank, a mile away, and sat on a fallen log at
the head of a ravine, which fell sharply to the river below. Through
the opening in the trees, they would see the slow running Souris, on
which the sunshine glinted, making its easy way to join its elder
brother, the Assiniboine, on the long, long march to the sea. Across
the river plumy willows, pale green and tremulous, grew paler still as
a wind passed over them.

The afternoon sun was sinking in a sea of wine-red mist, throwing
streamers of light into the upper sky, like a giant's fan.

"I know now," said Pearl, "why I was led to Purple Springs, and why I
felt when I met Annie Gray that my life would be knit with hers;"
and then as they sat, hand-in-hand, with the glory of the sunset
transfiguring the every-day world, she told him of the wonder valley
of hot springs in the far North, whose streams have magical powers of
healing. The valley of Purple Springs--away beyond the sunset.

"We'll go over tomorrow," said Pearl, "and Annie will tell you all
about it, with its arch of mountains, its tropical flowers, the size
of the vegetables and grains which grow there, and the delight of the
Indians when they find their sick people growing well again. Annie has
been longing to go, and I told her yesterday I would go with her, and
we can still get there before the cold weather."

The doctor made one last effort to hold to his original intention:

"Pearl, I cannot let you bind yourself to me until I am well again.
I am holding my own, Dr. Brander says. He thought the election would
pull me down, but it didn't. My case is a hopeful one. It's too much
like taking advantage of your romantic way of looking at this. To
marry a sick man is a serious affair, and I cannot ask a girl like
you, so full of promise, so splendid in every way, to do it."

"You won't need to," she laughed, slipping her arm through his. "It's
al