r which sat in mine. I say I see her picture now,
tall, straight, sweet, her hands on her lifting bosom, eagerness and
anxiety fighting on her face.

"Ellen, child, Mr. Cowles has something to tell you."

Then some one, in a voice which sounded like mine, but was not mine,
told her--told her the truth, which sounded so like a lie. Some one,
myself, yet not myself, went on, cruelly, blackening all the sweet blue
sky for her. Some one--I suppose it was myself, late free--felt the damp
of an iron yoke upon his neck.

I saw her knees sink beneath her, but she shrank back when I would have
reached out an arm as of old.

"I hate that woman!" she blazed. "Suppose she does love you--do I not
love you more? Let her lose--some one must lose!" But at the next moment
her anger had changed to doubt, to horror. I saw her face change, saw
her hand drop to her side.

"It is not that you loved another girl," she whispered, "but that you
have deceived _me_--here, when I was in your power. Oh, it was not
right! How could you! Oh, how could you!"

Then once more she changed. The flame of her thoroughbred soul came back
to her. Her courage saved her from shame. Her face flushed, she stood
straight. "I hate _you!_" she cried to me. "Go! I will never see you any
more."

Still the bright sun shone on. A little bird trilled in the thicket
near.

CHAPTER XXXV

THE YOKE

When we started to the south on the following morning, I rode far at the
rear, under guard. I recall little of our journey toward Laramie, save
that after a day or two we swung out from the foothills into a short
grass country, and so finally struck the steady upward sweep of a valley
along which lay the great transcontinental trail. I do not know whether
we traveled two days, or three, or four, since all the days seemed night
to me, and all the nights were uniform in torture. Finally, we drove
down into a dusty plain, and so presently came to the old frontier fort.
Here, then, was civilization--the stage coach, the new telegraph wire,
men and women, weekly or daily touch with the world, that prying
curiosity regarding the affairs of others which we call news. To me it
seemed tawdry, sordid, worthless, after that which I had left. The noise
seemed insupportable, the food distasteful. I could tolerate no roof,
and in my own ragged robes slept on the ground within the old stockade.

I was still guarded as a prisoner; I was approached by none and had
conversat