h, seemed more of companionship to
her than the presence of people who laughed and talked. They wearied her
at times. When she was able to walk out, she liked to go alone; even Max
she had sent back when he followed her.

But she never went far. Sometimes she would sit for an hour by the stream,
watching the water slip past the pebbles and the grasses, and on to its
turbulent journey toward a far-off rest in the Pacific. And again, she
would watch some strange miner dig and wash the soil in his search for the
precious "yellow." But her walks were ever within the limits of the busy
diggings; all her old fondness for the wild places seemed sleeping--like
her ambitions.

"She needs change now. Get her away from here," advised the doctor, who no
longer felt that she needed medicines, but who could not, with all his
skill, build her up again into the daring, saucy 'Tana, who had won the
game of cards from the captain that night at the select party at Sinna
Ferry.

But when Overton, after much hesitation, broached the subject of her going
away, she did look at him with a touch of the old defiance in her face,
and after a bit said:

"I guess the camp will have to be big enough for you and me, too, a few
days longer. I haven't made up my mind as to when I want to go."

"But the summer will not last long, now. You must commence to think of
where you want to go; for when the cold weather comes, 'Tana, you can't
remain here."

"I can if I want to," she answered.

After one troubled, helpless look at her pale face, he walked out of the
cabin; and Lyster, who had wanted to ask the result of the interview,
could not find him all that evening. He had gone somewhere alone, up on
the mountain.

She had answered him with a great deal of cool indifference; but when the
two cousins entered her room, she was on the bed with her face buried in
the pillows, weeping in an uncontrollable manner that filled them with
dismay. The doctor decided that while Dan was a good fellow in most ways,
he evidently had not a soothing influence on 'Tana, possibly not realizing
the changed mental condition laid on her by her sickness. The doctor
further made up his mind that, without hurting Dan's feelings, he must
find some other mouthpiece for his ideas concerning her or reason with her
himself.

But, so far, she would only say she was not ready to go yet. Dan, wishing
to make her stay comfortable as possible, went quietly to all the
settlements