Echo by writing to Jack Payson, letting
him break the news of his return. Fate would have it that she would
not know until too late of his escape. A letter sent directly to her
might have prevented much unhappiness and many heartaches. Not till
months later, when happiness had returned, did Jack realize that his
one great mistake was made by not telling Echo of Dick's rescue.

Both Dick and Echo might have had a change of heart when they met
again. Echo was young. Dick had wandered far. Both had lost touch
with common interests. Jack Payson had entered her life as a factor.
He was eager and impetuous; Dick was settled and world-worn by hardship
and much physical suffering. Now Jack was at the altar racked with
mental torture, while Dick waited in the garden for his traitorous
friend. The innocent cause of the tragedy was sweetly and calmly
replying to the questions of the marriage-ritual, while Jack was
looking, as Allen said to himself, "darned squeamish."

"According to these words, it is the will of God that nothing shall
sever the marriage-bond," were the words that fell upon Allen's ears as
he stooped to look in the window at the wedding-party.

"The Sky Pilot's taking a long time to make the hitch. Darned if I
couldn't hitch up a twenty-mule team in the time that he's takin' to
get them two to the pole," said Allen, speaking to himself.

Dick had grown impatient at Jack's absence, and wandered back from the
garden to the front of the house. Spying Allen, he greeted him with
"Hello, Uncle Jim."

"That's my name," answered Allen suspiciously. "But I ain't uncle to
every stranger that comes along."

"I'm no stranger," laughed Dick. "You know me."

"Do I?" replied Allen, unconvinced. "Who are you?"

"The poor orphan you took from an asylum and made a man of--Dick Lane."

"Dick Lane!" repeated the astonished ranchman. "Come back from the
dead!"

"No, I ain't dead yet," answered Dick, holding out his hand, which
Allen gingerly grasped, as if he expected to find it thin air. "I
wasn't killed. I have been in the hospital for a long time. I wrote
Jack--he knows."

"My God!" Allen cried. "Jack knows--you wrote to him--he knows." Over
and over he repeated the astonishing news which had been broken to him
so suddenly. Here was a man, as if back from the dead, standing in his
own dooryard, telling him that Jack knew he was alive. No word had
been told him. What could Echo say? This, then, expl