Hours passed before Ann could sleep, and then her slumber was broken, her rest harried by weird dreams, her half-waking periods crammed with disturbing fantasies. When broad daylight came, she rose and drew down the shades of her window and after she had listened to the birds, to the sounds of the awakening town, to the passing of a train, rest came and until nearly noon she slept heavily.

She came to herself possessed by a queer sense of unreality and it was moments before she could determine its source. Then the events of the evening and night swept back to her intelligence and she closed her eyes, feeling sick and worn.

Restlessness came upon her finally and she arose, dressed, went downstairs and forced herself to eat. Several others were in the dining room and two men sat with her at table. She was conscious that the talk, which had been loud, diminished when she entered and that those nearest her were evidently uncomfortable, embarrassed, glad to be through and gone.

When Nora, the waitress, took her order, Ann saw that the girl eyed her curiously, possibly sympathetically, and, while that quality could not help but rouse an appreciation in her, she shrank from the thought that this whole strange little town was eying her, wondering about her, dissecting her as she suffered in its midst and even through her loyalty to her husband crept a hope that her true identity might remain secret.

She left the table and started for the stairway, when the boy who had given her her room the night before came out of the office. He had not expected to see her. He stopped and flushed and stammered.

"You ... last night ... you said you might ... that is, do you want th' automobile, ma'am?"

"I shan't want to go out to-day," Ann answered him, forcing her voice to steadiness. "I have changed my mind."

Then, she went swiftly up the stairs.

She knew that the youth knew at least a part of her reason for altering her plans. She knew that within the hour all Yavapai would know that she was not going to the Sunset mine because Ned Lytton was drunk and hurt, and she felt like crying aloud to relieve the distress in her heart.

Her room was hot, its smallness was unbearable and, putting on her hat, she went down the stairs, out of the hotel and, looking up and down the main street, struck off to the left, for that direction seemed to offer the quickest exit from the town.

Ann walked swiftly along the hard highway, head down until she had left the last buildings behind. Then she lifted her chin and drew a deep breath of the fine mountain air and for the first time realized the immensity of the surrounding country. Sight of it brought a little gasp of wonder from her and she halted and turned slowly to look about.

The town was set in the northern edge of a huge valley which appeared to head in abruptly rising hills not so far to the westward. But to the south and eastward it swept on and out, astonishing in its apparent smoothness, its lavish colorings. Northward, its rise was more decided and not far from the town clumps of brush and scant low timber dotted the country, but out yonder there appeared to be no growth except the grass which, where it grew in rank patches, bowed before the breeze and flashed silver under the brilliant sun. The distances were blue and inviting. She felt as though she would like to start walking and walk and walk, alone under that high blue sky.

She strolled on after that and followed the wagon track an hour. Then, bodily weariness asserted itself and she rested in the shade of a low oak scrub, twining grass stalks with nervous fingers.

"I would have said that a country like this would have inspired anybody," she said aloud after a time. "But he's the same. He's small, he's small!"

Vindictiveness was about her and her tone was bitter.

"Still," she thought, "it may not be too late. That other man ... is as big as this...."

When she had rested and risen and gone a half mile back toward Yavapai, she repeated aloud:

"As big as this...."

A great contrast that had been! Bruce Bayard, big, strong, controlled, clean and thinking largely and clearly; Ned Lytton, little, weak, victim of his appetites, foul and selfish. She wondered rather vaguely about Bayard. Was he of that country? Was he the lover of some mountain girl? Was he, possibly, the husband? No, she recalled that he had said that he lived alone.... Well, so did she, for that matter!

Scraps of Bayard's talk the night before came back to her and she pondered over them, twisting their meanings, wondering if she had been justified in the relief his assurances gave her. There, alone in the daylight, they all seemed very incredible that she should have opened her heart, given her dearest confidences to that man. As she thought back through the hour, she became a trifle panicky, for she did not realize then that to have remained silent, to have bottled her emotions within herself longer would have been disastrous; she had reached Yavapai and the breaking point at the same hour, and, had not Bayard opportunely encountered her, she would have been forced to talk to the wheezing hotel proprietor or Nora, the waitress, or the first human being she met on the street ... someone, anyone! Then, abruptly changing her course of thought, she reminded herself of the strangeness of the truth that not once had it occurred to her to worry over the fact that her husband, in an unconscious condition, had been taken away, she knew not where, by this stranger. The faith she had felt in Bayard from the first prevailed. She faced the future with forebodings; about the present condition of Ned Lytton she did not dare think. A comforting factor was the conviction that everything was being done for him that she could do and more ... for she always had been helpless.

She breathed in nervous exasperation at the idea that everything she saw, talked about, thought or experienced came back to impress her further with the hopelessness of the situation, then told herself that fretting would not help; that she must do her all to make matters over, that she must make good her purpose in coming to this new place.

As she neared the town again, she saw the figure of a man approaching. He walked slowly, with head down, and his face was wholly shaded by the broad brim of his felt hat. His hands were behind his back and the aimlessness of his carriage gave evidence of deep thought.

When the woman was about to pass him, he turned back toward town without looking up and it was the scuffing of her shoe that attracted him. He faced about quickly at the sound and stared hard at Ann. The stare was not offensive. She saw first his eyes, black and large and wonderfully kind; his hair was white; his shaven lips gentle. Then she observed that he wore the clothing of a clergyman.

His hand went to his hat band, after his first gaze at her, and he smiled.

"How-do-you-do?" he said, with friendly confidence.

Ann murmured a greeting.

"I didn't know anyone was on the road. I was thinking rather fiercely, I guess."

He started to walk beside her and Ann was glad, for he was of that type whose first appearance attracts by its promise of friendship.

"I've been thinking, too," she answered. "Thinking, among other things what a wonderful country this is. I'm from the East, I suppose it is not necessary to say, and this is my first look at your valley."

"Manzanita is a great old sweep of country!" he exclaimed, looking out over it. "That valley is a good thing to look at when we think that human anxieties are mighty matters."

He smiled, and Ann looked into his face with a new interest and said:

"I should think that such an influence as this is would tend to lessen those anxieties; that it would tend to make the people who live near it big, as it is big."

He looked away and shook his head slowly.

"I hold that theory, too, sometimes ... in my most optimistic hours. But the more I see of the places in which men live, the closer I watch the way we humans react to our physical environments, the less faith I have in it. Some of the biggest, rarest souls I know have developed in the meanest localities and, on the other hand, some of the worst culls of the species I've ever seen have been products of countries so big that they would inspire most men. Perhaps, though, the big men of the small places would have been bigger in a country like this; possibly, those who are found wanting out here would fall even shorter of what we expect of them if they were in less wonderful surroundings."

He paused a moment and then continued: "It may be a myth, this tradition of the bigness of mountain men; or the impression may thrive because, out here, we are so few and so widely scattered that we are the only people who get a proper perspective on one another. That would be a comfortable thing to believe, wouldn't it? It would mean, possibly, that if we could only remove ourselves far enough from any community we would appreciate its virtues and be able to overlook its vices. I'd like to believe without qualification that a magnificent creation like this valley would lift us all to a higher level; but I can't. Some of your enthusiastic young men who come out from the East and write books about the West would have it that these specimens of humanity which thrive in the mountains and deserts are all supermen, with only enough rascals sprinkled about to serve the purposes of their plots. That, of course, is a fallacy and it may be due to the surprising point of view which we find ourselves able to adopt when we are removed far enough by distance or tradition from other people. We have some splendid men here, but the average man in the mountains won't measure up to where he will overshadow the average man of any other region ... I believe. We haven't so many opportunities, perhaps, to show our qualities of goodness and badness ... although some of us can be downright nasty on occasion!"

He ended with an inflection which caused Ann to believe that he was thinking of some specific case of misconduct; she felt herself flush quickly and became suddenly fearful that he might refer directly to Ned. Last night she had poured her misery into a stranger's ears; to-day she could not bear the thought of further discussing her husband's life or condition; she shrank, even, from the idea of being associated with him in the minds of other people and in desperation she veered the subject by asking,

"Is it populated much, the valley, I mean?"

"Not yet. Cattle and horse and some sheep ranches are scattered about. One outfit will use up a lot of that country for grazing purposes, you know. Someday there'll be water and more people ... and less bigness!"

He told her more of the valley, stopping now and then to indicate directions.

"I came from over there yesterday," he said, facing about and pointing into the westward. "Had a funeral beyond those hills. Stopped for dinner with a young friend of mine whose ranch is just beyond that swell yonder.... Fine boy; Bayard, Bruce Bayard."

Ann wanted to ask him more about the rancher, but somehow she could not trust herself; she felt that her voice would be uncertain, for one thing. Some unnamed shyness, too, held her from questioning him now.

They stopped before the hotel and the man said:

"My name is Weyl. I am the clergy of Yavapai. If you are to be here long, I'm sure Mrs. Weyl would like to see you. She is in Prescott for a week or two now."

He put out his hand, and, as she clasped it, Ann said, scarcely thinking:

"I am Ann Lytton. I arrived last night and may be here some time."

She saw a quick look of pain come into his readable eyes and felt his finger tighten on hers.

"Oh, yes!" he said, in a manner that made her catch her breath. "I know.... Your brother, isn't it, the young miner?"

At that the woman started and merely to escape further painful discussion, unthinkingly clouding her own identity, replied,

"Ned, you mean ... yes...."

"Well, if you're to be here long we will see you, surely. And if there's anything I can do for you, please ask it."

"You're very kind," she said, as she turned from him.

In her room she stood silent a moment, palms against her cheeks. Bayard's words came back to her:

"I didn't think you was married ... especially to a thing like that...."

And now this other man concluded that she could not be Ned's wife!

"I must be his wife ... his good wife!" she said, with a stamp of her foot. "If he ever needed one ... it's now...."