at
the head of the struggling horses. And so good had been his training
at such matters that it was not without method that he proceeded to
quiet the team and to set again in partial order the wreck that had
been created in the gear. The end of the damaged singletree he
re-enforced with his handkerchief. In time he had the team again in
harness, and at the bottom of the _coulee_, where the ground sloped
easily down into the open valley, whence they might emerge at the lower
level of the prairie round about. He led the team for a distance down
this floor of the _coulee_, until he could see the better going in the
improving light which greeted them as they came out from the gully-like
defile. Cursing his ill fortune, and wretched at the thought of the
danger and discomfort he had brought upon the very one whom he would
most gladly have shielded, Franklin said not a word from the beginning
of the mad dash down the _coulee_ until he got the horses again into
harness. He did not like to admit to his companion how great had been
the actual danger just incurred, though fortunately escaped. The girl
was as silent as himself. She had not uttered a cry during the time of
greatest risk, though once she laid a hand upon his arm. Franklin was
humiliated and ashamed, as a man always is over an accident.

"Oh, it's no good saying I'm sorry," he broke out at last. "It was my
fault, letting you ride behind that brute. Thank God, you're not hurt!
And I'm only too glad it wasn't worse. I'm always doing some
unfortunate, ignoble thing. I want to take care of you and make you
happy, and I would begin by putting your very life in danger."

"It wasn't ignoble," said the girl, and again he felt her hand upon his
arm. "It was grand. You went straight, and you brought us through.
I'm not hurt. I was frightened, but I am not hurt."

"You've pluck," said Franklin. Then, scorning to urge anything further
of his suit at this time of her disadvantage, though feeling a strange
new sense of nearness to her, now that they had seen this distress in
common, he drove home rapidly as he might through the gathering dusk,
anxious now only for her comfort. At the house he lifted her from the
buggy, and as he did so kissed her cheek. "Dear little woman," he
whispered, "good-bye." Again he doubted whether he had heard or not
the soft whisper of a faint "Good-bye!"

"But you must come in," she said.

"No, I must go. Make my excuses," he