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hen take your choice! Come with me and repeat all that you have said in the presence of that man, or leave this ranch forever. For if I live I shall go to him tonight, and tell the whole story." The old man cast a single glance at his mistress, shrugged his shoulders, and, without a word, left the room. But in ten minutes they were on their way to the county town. Day was breaking over the distant Burnt Ridge--a faint, ghostly level, like a funeral pall, in the dim horizon--as they drew up before the gaunt, white-painted pile of the hospital building. Josephine uttered a cry. Dr. Duchesne's buggy was before the door. On its very threshold they met the doctor, dark and irritated. "Then you heard the news?" he said, quickly. Josephine turned her white face to the doctor's. "What news?" she asked, in a voice that seemed strangely deep and resonant. "The poor fellow had another attack last night, and died of exhaustion about an hour ago. I was too late to save him." "Did he say anything? Was he conscious?" asked the girl, hoarsely. "No; incoherent! Now I think of it, he harped on the same string as he did the night of the operation. What was it he said? you remember." "'You'll have to kill me first,'" repeated Josephine, in a choking voice. "Yes; something about his dying before he'd tell. Well, he came back to it before he went off--they often do. You seem a little hoarse with your morning ride. You should take care of that voice of yours. By the way, it's a good deal like your brother's." ***** The Chatelaine of Burnt Ridge never married. THROUGH THE SANTA CLARA WHEAT CHAPTER I It was an enormous wheat-field in the Santa Clara valley, stretching to the horizon line unbroken. The meridian sun shone upon it without glint or shadow; but at times, when a stronger gust of the trade winds passed over it, there was a quick slanting impression of the whole surface that was, however, as unlike a billow as itself was unlike a sea. Even when a lighter zephyr played down its long level, the agitation was superficial, and seemed only to momentarily lift a veil of greenish mist that hung above its immovable depths. Occasional puffs of dust alternately rose and fell along an imaginary line across the field, as if a current of air were passing through it, but were otherwise inexplicable. Suddenly a faint shout, apparently somewhere in the vicinity of the line, brought out a perfectly clear respo
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