out through the screening leaves of
the dense undergrowth. There was no smoke from the chimney of
the house. The woman, in a blue calico, was sitting on the back
doorstep knitting. Farther away, in fields here and there, a few
men--not a dozen in all--were at work. From a barnyard at the
far edge of the western horizon came the faint sound of a steam
thresher, and she thought she could see the men at work around
it, but this might have been illusion. It was a serene and
lovely panorama of summer and country. Last of all her eyes
sought the glimpse of distant river.

She ate two of her four eggs, put on the underclothes which were
now thoroughly sun-dried, shook out and rebraided her hair. Then
she cast about for some way to pass the time.

She explored the whole top of the rock, but that did not use up
more than fifteen minutes, as it was so small that every part
was visible from every other part. However, she found a great
many wild flowers and gathered a huge bouquet of the audacious
colors of nature's gardens, so common yet so effective. She did
a little botanizing--anything to occupy her mind and keep it
from the ugly visions and fears. But all too soon she had
exhausted the resources of her hiding place. She looked down
into the valley to the north--the valley through which she had
come. She might go down there and roam; it would be something to
do, and her young impatience of restraint was making her so
restless that she felt she could not endure the confines of that
little rock. It had seemed huge; a brief experience of freedom,
a few hours between her and the night's horrors and terrors, and
it had shrunk to a tiny prison cell. Surely she would run no
risk in journeying through that trackless wilderness; she need
not be idle, she could hasten her destiny by following the creek
in its lonely wanderings, which must sooner or later bring it to
the river. The river!

She was about to get the two remaining eggs and abandon her
stronghold when it occurred to her that she would do well to
take a last look all around. She went back to the side of the
rock facing the house.

The woman had suspended knitting and was gazing intently across
the hollow to the west, where the road from the north entered
the landscape. Susan turned her eyes in that direction. Two
horsemen at a gallop were moving southward. The girl was well
screened, but instinctively she drew still further back behind
the bushes--b