The years slipped away. She was a little child, and her heart
was wailing for the mother whose body lay on the hillside near the
deserted cabin in Brown's Park. What could she do? How could she save
herself from the evil shadow that would blot the sunshine from her life?

Somewhere, in that night of stars and scudding clouds, was God, she
thought. He could save her if He would. But would He? Miracles did not
happen nowadays. And why would He bother about her? She was such a trifle
in the great scheme of things, only a poor ragged girl from the back
country, the daughter of a convict, poor hill trash, as she had once
heard a woman at Glenwood whisper. She was not of any account.

Yet prayers welled out in soundless sobs from a panic-stricken heart. "O
God, I'm only a li'l' girl, an' I growed up without a mother. I'm right
mean an' sulky, but if you'll save me this time from Jake Houck, I'll
make out to say my prayers regular an' get religion first chance comes
along," she explained and promised, her small white face lifted to the
vault where the God she knew about lived.

Drifts floated across the sky blown by currents from the northwest. They
came in billows, one on top of another, till they had obscured most of
the stars. The moon went into eclipse, reappeared, vanished behind the
storm scud, and showed again.

The climate of the Rockies, year in, year out, is the most stimulating on
earth. Its summer breezes fill the lungs with wine. Its autumns are
incomparable, a golden glow in which valley and hill bask lazily. Its
winters are warm with sunshine and cold with the crisp crackle of frost.
Its springs--they might be worse. Any Coloradoan will admit the climate
is superlative. But there is one slight rift in the lute, hardly to be
mentioned as a discord in the universal harmony. Sudden weather changes
do occur. A shining summer sun vanishes and in a twinkling of an eye the
wind is whistling snell.

Now one of these swept over the Rio Blanco Valley. The clouds thickened,
the air grew chill. The thermometer was falling fast.

Houck swung the team up from the valley road to the mesa. Along this they
traveled, close to the sage-covered foothills. At a point where a draw
dipped down to the road, Houck pulled up and dismounted. A gate made of
three strands of barbed wire and two poles barred the wagon trail. For
already the nester was fencing the open range.

As Houck moved forward to the gate the moon disappeared bac