e and fall. The
second time that it rose Philip knew that it was standing motionless.
Then it disappeared again. He stared until the rolling heat waves of the
blistered prairie stung his eyes. The object did not rise. Blinking, he
looked at Billinger, and through the sweat and grime of the other's
face he saw the question that was on his own lips. Without a word they
spurred down the slope, and after a time Billinger swept to the right
and Philip to the left, each with his eyes searching the low prairie
grass. The agent saw the thing first, still a hundred yards to his
right. He was off his horse when Philip whirled at his shout and
galloped across to him.

"It's her--the girl I found in the wreck," he said. Something seemed
to be choking him. His neck muscles twitched and his long, lean fingers
were digging into his own flesh.

In an instant Philip was on his feet. He saw nothing of the girl's face,
hidden under a mass of hair in which the sun burned like golden fire. He
saw nothing but the crumpled, lifeless form, smothered under the shining
mass, and yet in this moment he knew. With a fierce cry he dropped
upon his knees and drew away the girl's hair until her lovely face lay
revealed to him in terrible pallor and stillness, and as Billinger stood
there, tense and staring, he caught that face close to his breast, and
began talking to it as though he had gone "Isobel--Isobel--Isobel--" he
moaned. "My God, my Isobel--"

He had repeated the name a hundred times, when Billinger, who began to
understand, put his hand on Philip's shoulder and gave him his water
canteen.

"She's not dead, man," he said, as Philip's red eyes glared up at him.
"Here--water."

"My God--it's strange," almost moaned Philip. "Billinger--you
understand--she's going to be my wife--if she lives--"

That was all of the story he told, but Billinger knew what those few
words meant.

"She's going to live," he said. "See--there's color coming back into
her face--she's breathing." He bathed her face in water, and placed the
canteen to her lips.

A moment later Philip bent down and kissed her. "Isobel--my
sweetheart--" he whispered.

"We must hurry with her to the water hole," said Billinger, laying a
sympathetic hand on Philip's shoulder. "It's the sun. Thank God, nothing
has happened to her, Steele. It's the sun--this terrible heat--"

He almost pulled Philip to his feet, and when he had mounted Billinger
lifted the girl very gently and gav