o silence. He felt the quiver of the
pine needles outside, trembling to the touch of wind and night. The
sense of her nearness, of her trust, of the warm living fire of her
love swept over him unstemmed; and, when she turned and looked in his
eyes, he caught her in his arms and held her there with a fierce
tenderness, her face thrown back, the veins of her throat pulsing to
the touch of wind and night, her lips parted, her lashes hiding her
eyes.

"Tell me that you are mine," he whispered.

She did not answer for a moment. Then she lifted her eyes. He drank
their light as a thirsty man might drink waters of life. Neither
spoke. The rustling wind passed whispering. The June dark enveloped
them in the warm caress of the night. By the dim flare of the library
lamp he saw her lips trembling.

"Tell me," he commanded.

"Do I need to tell you?"

"Yes, yes! I must have a seal of memory for the dark future," and his
tongue poured forth such utterances as he had not dreamed men could use
but in prayer. "I must know from your own lips."

He felt the tremor, felt the two hands rise to frame his face, felt the
catch and take of breath, heard the broken notes of gold.

"Then, take it," she said.

He bent over her lips in an exquisite torture that could neither give
nor take enough till she struggled to free herself, when he crushed her
the closer, and kissed the closed eyes and the forehead and the hair
and the pulsing throat. Then he opened his arms.

She sank on the morris chair and hid her face in her hands. They
neither of them spoke nor heard very much but the pounding of their own
hearts. Wayland gazed out in the dark at the shiny flood-tides of the
river. She had not meant--she had meant always to be free; she had not
meant to mingle her life currents in the destiny of others.

The door opened suddenly. It was old Calamity, red-shawled and
stooping.

"Missa Vellam say not for vait no longer, Mademoiselle! She aw' right.
She say t'ank you now for to go home!"

Eleanor rose with a shuddering sigh

"Come then, Calamity," she said.

Wayland walked with her to the ranch house, the old half-breed woman
pattering behind. The gray dawn-light lay on the river mistily. At
the gate, she turned.

"Has Mr. Matthews come back yet, Calamity?"

Calamity gave a vigorous shake of her head.

"I am going up to the Rim Rocks at once to see what's become of him.
Go on in, Calamity; I want to speak to Miss M