hat," Mackenzie said, letting go a sigh of
relief.

"He tries to flatter me to tell him where Swan hides the money he
brought from the bank," she said, slowly, wearily, "but him I do not
trust. When I ask him to do what must first be done to make me free,
he will not speak, but goes away, pale, pale, like a frightened
girl."

"You'd better tell him to stay away," Mackenzie counseled, his voice
stern and hard.

"But you would not do that," she continued, heedless of his
admonition. She leaned toward him, her great eyes shining in the
light, her face eager in its sorrowful comeliness; she put out her
hand and touched his arm.

"You are a brave man, you would not turn white and go away into the
night like a wolf to hear me speak of that. Hush! hush! No, no--there
is no one to hear."

She looked round with fearful eyes, crouching closer to the ground,
her breath drawn in long labor, her hand tightening on his arm.
Mackenzie felt a shudder sweep coldly over him, moved by the tragedy
her attitude suggested.

"Hush!" she whispered, hand to her mouth. And again, leaning and
peering: "Hush!" She raised her face to him, a great eagerness in her
burning eyes. "Kill him, kill Swan Carlson, kind young man, and set me
free again! You have no woman? I will be your woman. Kill him, and
take me away!"

"You don't have to kill Swan to get away from him," he told her, the
tragedy dying out of the moment, leaving only pity in its place. "You
can go on tonight--you never need to go back."

Hertha came nearer, scrambling to him with sudden movement on her
knees, put her arm about his neck before he could read her intention
or repel her, and whispered in his ear:

"I know where Swan hides the money--I can lead you to the place. Kill
him, good man, and we will take it and go far away from this unhappy
land. I will be your woman, faithful and true."

"I couldn't do that," he said gently, as if to humor her; "I couldn't
leave my sheep."

"Sheep, sheep!" said she, bitterly. "It is all in the world men think
of in this land--sheep! A woman is nothing to them when there are
sheep! Swan forgets, sheep make him forget. If he had no sheep, he
would be a kind man to me again. Swan forgets, he forgets!"

She bent forward, looking at the lantern as if drawn by the blaze,
her great eyes bright as a deer's when it stands fascinated by a
torchlight a moment before bounding away.

"Swan forgets, Swan forgets!" she murmured, her staring eye