rrying her suitcase, and the matron, Mrs.
Ryers, had her arm about the girl's waist, for friends are quickly made
in the West's lonely places. School-teachers and other agency employees
chorused good-bye as the automobile was driven away.

The girl was flushed with pleasure, and there were tears in her eyes.

"I don't blame you for liking to live on an Indian reservation," she
said, "amid such cordial people."

"Well, it isn't so bad, though, of course, we're in a backwater here,"
said Lowell. "An Indian reservation gives you a queer feeling that way.
The tides of civilization are racing all around, but here the progress
is painfully slow."

"Tell me more about it, please," pleaded the girl. "This lovely
place--surely the Indians like it."

"Some of them do, perhaps," said Lowell. "But they haven't been trained
to this sort of thing. A lodge out there on the prairie, with game to be
hunted and horses to be ridden--that would suit the most advanced of
them better than settled life anywhere. But, of course, all that is
impossible, and the thing is to reconcile them to the inevitable things
they have to face. And even reconciling white people to the inevitable
is no easy job."

"No, it's harder, really, than teaching these poor Indians, I suppose,"
agreed the girl. "But don't you find lots to recompense you?"

Lowell stole a look at her, and then he slowed the car's pace
considerably. There was no use hurrying to the ranch with such a
charming companion aboard. The fresh June breeze had loosened a strand
or two of her brown hair. The bright, strong sunshine merely emphasized
the youthful perfection of her complexion. She had walked with a certain
buoyancy of carriage which Lowell ascribed to athletics. Her eyes were
brown, and rather serious of expression, but her smile was quick and
natural--the sort of a smile that brings one in return, so Lowell
concluded in his fragmentary process of cataloguing. Her youth was the
splendid thing about her to-day. To-morrow her strong, resourceful
womanhood might be still more splendid. Lowell surrendered himself
completely to the enjoyment of the drive, and likewise he slowed down
the car another notch.

"Of course, just getting out of school, I haven't learned so much about
the inevitableness of life," said the girl, harking back to Lowell's
remark concerning the Indians, "but I'm beginning to sense the
responsibilities now. I've just learned that it was my stepfather who
ke