in your life?"

Her friend laughed to cover a faint blush. "What an _enfant terrible_
you are, my dear! Of course I've been--hundreds of times."

"No, but--really?"

"If you mean the way they are in novels, a desperate
follow-to-the-end-of-the-world, love-in-a-cottage kind--no. My emotions
are quite under control, thank you. What is it you're driving at?"

"I just wondered. Look how cloudy the sky is getting. It's going to
storm. We'd better be going home."

"Let's get our flowers first."

They wandered among the hills, searching for the gorgeous blossoms of
fall. Not for half an hour did they remount.

"Which way for home?" Joyce asked briskly, smoothing her skirt.

Moya looked around before she answered. "I don't know. Must be over that
way, don't you think?"

Joyce answered with a laugh, using a bit of American slang she had heard
the day before. "Search me! Wouldn't it be jolly if we were lost?"

"How dark the sky is getting. I believe a flake of snow fell on my
hand."

"Yes. There's one on my face. The road must be just around this hill."

"I daresay you're right. These hills are like peas in a pod. I can't
tell one from another."

They rode around the base of the hill into a little valley formed by
other hills. No sign of the road appeared.

"We're lost, Moya, They'll have to send out search parties for us.
We'll get in the dreadful Sunday papers again," Joyce laughed.

An anxious little frown showed on Moya's forehead. She was not
frightened, but she was beginning to get worried. A rising wind and a
falling temperature were not good omens. Moreover, one of those swift
changes common to the Rockies had come over the country. Out of a leaden
sky snow was falling fast. Banked clouds were driving the wintry
sunshine toward the horizon. It would soon be night, and if the signs
were true a bitter one of storm.

"It's getting cold. We must find the road and hurry home," Joyce said.

"Yes." Moya's voice was cheerful, but her heart had sunk. An icy hand
seemed to have clutched it and tightened. She had heard the dreadful
things that happened during Rocky Mountain blizzards. They must find the
road. They _must_ find it.

She set herself searching for it, conscious all the time that they might
be going in the wrong direction. For this unfeatured roll of hills
offered no guide, no landmark that stood out from the surrounding
country.

Moya covered her anxiety with laughter and small jokes, but there c