ur. Along the creek the aspens danced and played and
shivered in bright golden raiment; through the bushes there was a
glimpse of vivid scarlet where the leaves of a dwarf maple were as
bright as snow-plants. A little grove of gracefully slender poplars
trembled in yellow against the azure above. The clear, thin sunlight
pricked out colours until it made the woods a riot of them, greens dark
and light, the grey of sage, the white of a granite seam, the black of a
lava rock, and in the creek spray a brilliant vari-coloured rainbow
sheen. They two, riding side by side, while the broad trail permitted,
passed over the ridge and out of sight of the house. Immediately the
solitudes shut down about them with titanic walls. They rode down into a
long, shadowy hollow, out through a tiny verdant meadow fringed with the
rusty brown of sunflower leaves, and on up to the crest of the second
ridge. Already they were alone in the world, a man and his mate, with
only infinity and its concrete symbols embracing them, ancient and
ageless trees, limitless sky, mile after mile of ridge and precipice and
barren peak. And upon them and about them and within them the utter
serene hush of the Sierra.

With every swinging step of the horses taking them on, a new gladness
blossomed in King's heart. For they were pushing ever further into the
portion of the world which he knew best, loved best. The present left
him nothing to wish for; he had Gloria, and Gloria had elected to come
with him. Until high noon they would wind along, for the most part
climbing pretty steadily with the old trail--Indian trail, miners'
trail, trail which even to-day seems to lead from the first generation
of the twentieth century straight back into the heart of 1850 and
beyond. Here men did not penetrate save at long intervals; here was true
solitude. And soon, when they should leave this trail to travel as
straight a line as the broken country would allow toward Gus Ingle's
caves, they would enter a region given over entirely to the wild's own
bright-eyed, shy inhabitants.

There were red spots in Gloria's cheeks when they started. King sought
to guess at what might be the emotions of a young girl going on with
Gloria's present emotional adventure--vain task of a mere man seeking to
fathom those troubled feminine depths!--marking that she was a little
nervous and distrait.

"I know the place Gus Ingle tried to describe," he said, "as well as I
know my old hat. Or a