WHEN she again felt sure of her strength she began to unsaddle Cooney. The cinches bothered her stiffened fingers, but she had them worked loose at last, and lifted the heavy saddle off, smiling grimly at her own strength. When she took off the blanket she warmed her hands a moment in its heat. Then she stripped off the bridle, and the little horse, after a moment's mouthing to rest his jaws from the bit, fell to grazing. As he seemed inclined to stay by her, she broke a switch from one of the nearby bushes and cut him sharply. Even after this he galloped off but a little way, with astonished, resentful shakings of his head. She had wanted him to be on his way back over the miles he had come before the thing was done.

She glanced shrewdly about her. She was far away from the cabin, a night's ride at Cooney's best trail pace, and in a region rough and untraveled, except as an occasional way to the lower valleys. There were no trails about her, no dead camp fires, no trees rimmed by the axe or scarred by a "blaze." There was life enough of a sort; jays called harshly, and squirrels barked their alarm; and half a dozen grouse eyed her from a few yards' distance, with a sort of half-timid stupidity. But there was no life to touch hers. She walked about the chosen thicket, admiring its denseness, not notable in any way, but casual, improbable to the searching eye.

"The hardest thing!" It was satire now, and she murmured it as such, done with all fighting. It was good to anticipate the thing, the restfulness of extinction—or not, as that might be. That was no matter. She was beaten in this life. It was good to know that in a moment she would feel as little as Randall Teevan—or as much. She unconsciously drew herself up at the thought of facing that withered fop.

She rejoiced in the warming air. She would take a long breath of it, and then the triumphant exit. She stepped a few paces forward to peer about a low-growing spruce that had shaded her. She had a last fancy for following the echo of her shot to the farther valley wall.

As she lifted the curtain boughs the sun dazzled her. She would see its golden points, she thought, when she shut her eyes in the thicket. She shut them quickly now, to prove this, and saw the myriad dancing lights.

As she opened her eyes again and turned to draw back into the wood there was imprinted curiously on her recovering vision a silhouette of the lake cabin. She shut them quickly again, dreading memories she was forever done with, and laughing in the certainty that the cabin was miles away. Then she looked again, blinking dazedly in the sunlight, and the cabin loomed before her across the clearing.

As she stared desperately, her mind roused to frantic denials, her eyes straining to banish this monstrous figment, the door of the cabin opened and Ewing came out. She sprang forward with an impulse to shatter the illusion by some quick movement. But her eyes still beheld him, bareheaded, turning his face up to the sun. He stretched his arms and drew deep breaths. He had never seemed so tall. His look had a kind of triumph in it.

She swayed under the shock of the thing, feeling herself grow faint. Cooney had betrayed her. Some time in the night, at one of those confusing bends in the trail, he had turned. He had brought her home.

Ewing's head had turned as she moved; his eyes were on her. She saw the rapt gladness in his face and beheld him approach her across the clearing. She managed another step or two and gained the support of a felled tree. As Ewing came up she essayed a little smile of nonchalance.

"Cooney—" she begun. The word came itself, but she felt easier under the sound of her own voice and went on—"Cooney came with me. I didn't go at all. I rode—but you see—" She beamed on him with explanatory embarrassment—"I took an early morning ride—it was so pleasant—and I thought I was lost—indeed I did, and I took off his saddle. I left it right there—" She pointed with the literal exactness of a child in its narrative of adventure—"right there behind that tree, and then I found I was—found I was closer to home than I thought."

He had not seemed to hear her, but stood looking narrowly, as if she were still far away. Gradually his eyes widened, as if he were drawing her close to him. He took a step toward her, with arms half raised.

"I'm so ashamed—" he muttered; "but you—you let me think that."

His voice brought her to sudden agonized alarm. The blood ebbed from her face and she almost staggered toward him."Did you do it—do that?" she whispered, ready to fall.

"No; I found out in time. I found out everything—everything you didn't tell me." He was shaken with longing, yet shamed into restraint before her.

"I'm so ashamed—I came as soon as I could to tell you. I rode all night to be here, to tell you as soon as I could."

"You didn't do it—you didn't do it?" she insisted pitifully.

"I stopped in time." She muttered this over and over, and at last the truth struggled into her chilled brain.

"You dear, dear fool!" she said with a little sobbing laugh.

Again his arms were half raised to her, but she turned swiftly and ran to Cooney, who had fallen to grazing a little way off, throwing her arms about his neck and weeping out incoherent words of endearment.

Ewing gathered his strength, like a wrestler who has been pressed to the ground, but lifts himself with infinite effort, and went resolutely toward her. Gently he unclasped her arms from Cooney's neck.

THE END