reakfast's ready. I'll have mine later."

* * * * * *

Later in the day Elvine rode out from the ranch house. Nor did she
concern herself with her object, nor her course, beyond a wild desire for
the solitude of the hills. The full torture of the new life, on the
threshold of which she now stood, had not come upon her until after the
effects of her interview with her husband had had time to calm down.
Then to remain in the house, which had become a sort of prison to her,
was made impossible. She must get out. She must break into activity.
She felt that occupation alone could save her reason.

So she struck out for the hills. Their claim of earlier days was upon
her. The hills, and their wooded valleys. Their brooding calm, their
dark shadows, their mysterious silence. These things claimed her mood.

She rode recklessly across the wide spread of Rainbow-Hill Valley. She
had no thought for the horse under her. She would have welcomed the
pitfalls which mighty have robbed her of the dreadful consciousness of
the disaster which had overwhelmed her. She was striving to flee from
thoughts from which she knew there was no escape. She was striving to
lose herself in the activities of the moment.

The switchback of the plain rose and fell under her horse's busy hoofs.
It rose higher, and ever higher, as she approached the western slopes.
She left the fenced pastures behind her, and the last signs of the life
to which she was now committed. Before her the woodlands rose up
shrouded in their dark foliage. The mourning aspect of the pines suited
her temper; she felt as though their drooping boughs were in harmony with
the bereavement of her soul.

She plunged amidst the serried aisles of leafless trunks with something
like welcome for their shadows. She rode on regardless of distance and
direction.

From the crest of a hill she looked down upon narrow mountain creek
surging between borders of pale green foliage. The sound of the waters
came up to her, and the wilderness of it all appealed, as, at that
moment, nothing else could have appealed. She pressed her blowing horse
forward, and rode down to the banks so densely overgrown.

She leaped from the saddle. She relieved her horse of its saddle and
flung herself upon the mossy ground in the shelter of a cluster of
spruce. The humid heat was oppressive. The tumbling waters were unable
to stir the atmosphere. But their music