was anxious to stop in Ashland
and leave Mom Wallis's request that Margaret would spend the next
Sabbath at the camp and see the new curtains. He was thinking what he
should say to her when he saw her in a little while now, and this
interruption to his thoughts was unwelcome. Nevertheless, he could not
get away from that frightened look in the girl's eyes. Where could they
have been going? That fellow was a new-comer in the region; perhaps he
had lost his way. Perhaps he did not know that the road he was taking
the girl led into a region of outlaws, and that the only habitation
along the way was a cabin belonging to an old woman of weird reputation,
where wild orgies were sometimes celebrated, and where men went who
loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

Twice Gardley turned in his saddle and scanned the desert. The sky was
darkening, and one or two pale stars were impatiently shadowing forth
their presence. And now he could see the two riders again. They had come
up out of the mesquite to the top of the mesa, and were outlined against
the sky sharply. They were still on the trail to old Ouida's cabin!

With a quick jerk Gardley reined in his horse and wheeled about,
watching the riders for a moment; and then, setting spurs to his beast,
he was off down the trail after them on one of his wild, reckless rides.
Down through the mesquite he plunged, through the darkening grove, out,
and up to the top of the mesa. He had lost sight of his quarry for the
time, but now he could see them again riding more slowly in the valley
below, their horses close together, and even as he watched the sky took
on its wide night look and the stars blazed forth.

Suddenly Gardley turned sharply from the trail and made a detour through
a grove of trees, riding with reckless speed, his head down to escape
low branches; and in a minute or two he came with unerring instinct back
to the trail some distance ahead of Forsythe and Rosa. Then he wheeled
his horse and stopped stock-still, awaiting their coming.

By this time the great full moon was risen and, strangely enough, was at
Gardley's back, making a silhouette of man and horse as the two riders
came on toward him.

They rode out from the cover of the grove, and there he was across their
path. Rosa gave a scream, drawing nearer her companion, and her horse
swerved and reared; but Gardley's black stood like an image carved in
ebony against the silver of the moon, a