ing herself on their acquirement, but the consciousness that
she had achieved them lay graciously round her heart, gave the soft
satisfaction to her musings that comes to one who has accomplished a
duty. With all modesty she felt the gratification of the being who
approaches his Destiny. She had advanced a step in her journey as a
woman.

A hail from the bank above broke upon her reverie, but when she saw it
was David, she sat up smiling. That he should find out her hiding
place without word or sign from her was an action right and fitting.
It was a move in the prehistoric game of flight and pursuit, in which
they had engaged without comprehension and with the intense earnestness
of children at their play. David dropped down beside her, a spray of
wild roses in his hand, and began at once to chide her for thus
stealing away. Did she not remember they were in the country of the
Pawnees, the greatest thieves on the plains? It was not safe to stray
alone from the camp.

Susan smiled:

"The Pawnees steal horses, but I never heard anyone say they stole
girls."

"They steal anything they can get," said the simple young man.

"Oh, David,"--now she was laughing--"so they might steal me if they
couldn't get a horse, or a blanket, or a side of bacon! Next time I go
wandering I'll take the bacon with me and then I'll be perfectly safe."

"Your father wouldn't like it. I've heard him tell you not to go off
this way alone."

"Well, who could I take? I don't like to ask father to go out into the
sun and Daddy John was asleep, and Leff--I didn't see Leff anywhere."

"I was there," he said, dropping his eyes.

"You were under the wagon reading Byron. I wouldn't for the world take
you away from Byron."

She looked at him with a candid smile, her eyes above it dancing with
delighted relish in her teasing.

"I would have come in a minute," he said low, sweeping the surface of
the spring with the spray of roses. Susan's look dwelt on him, gently
thoughtful in its expression in case he should look up and catch it.

"Leave Byron," she said, "leave the Isles of Greece where that lady,
whose name I've forgotten, 'loved and sung,' and walk in the sun with
me just because I wanted to see this spring! Oh, David, I would never
ask it of you."

"You know I would have loved to do it."

"You would have been polite enough to do it. You're always polite."

"I would have done it because I wanted to," said the victim with