no doubt, partly of the wave of shyness running through her,
but partly too of instinctive maidenly resistance to something in his
look, in the assurance of his manner, that seemed to claim too much. Last
night he had taken her by storm and at advantage. Something of shame
stirred in her that he had found her so easy a conquest, something too of
a new vague fear of herself. She resented the fact that he could so move
her, even though she still felt the charm of his personal presence. She
meant to hold herself in abeyance, to make sure of herself and of him
before she went further.

But the cowpuncher had no intention of letting her regain so fully control
of her emotions. Experience of more than one young woman had taught him
that scruples were likely to assert themselves after reflection, and he
purposed giving her no time for that to-day.

He did not count in vain upon the intimacy of companionship forced upon
them by the circumstances, nor upon the skill with which he knew how to
make the most of his manifold attractions. His role was that of the
comrade, gay with good spirits and warm with friendliness, solicitous of
her needs, but not oppressively so. If her glimpse of him at breakfast had
given the girl a vague alarm, she laughed her fears away later before his
open good humor.

There had been a time when he had been a part of that big world "back in
the States," peopled so generously by her unfettered imagination. He knew
how to talk, and entertainingly, of books and people, of events and
places he had known. She had not knowledge enough of life to doubt his
stories, nor did she resent it that he spoke of this her native section
with the slighting manner of one who patronized it with his presence.
Though she loved passionately her Arizona, she guessed its crudeness, and
her fancy magnified the wonders of that southern civilization from which
it was so far cut off.

Farnum had left his horse for the girl, and after breakfast the cowpuncher
saddled the broncos and brought them up. Melissy had washed the dishes,
filled his canteen, and packed the saddle bags. Soon they were off,
climbing slowly the trail that led up the canyon wall. She saw the carcass
of a dead sheep lying on the rocks half way down the cliff, and had spoken
of it before she could stop herself.

"What is that? Isn't it----?"

"Looks to me like a boulder," lied her escort unblushingly. There was no
use, he judged, in recalling unpleasant memor