ran, like those which
interrupt the swimmer's perfect joy. The girl was only half as happy
as her lover; but she hid this deep from him,--hid it until that final,
fierce hour of reckoning that her nature had with her,--nay, was bound
to have with her, before the punishment was lifted, and the frozen spot
melted at length from her heart.

So, meanwhile, she made her decree against Bennington. Not Vermont,
but Wyoming, should be her wedding place. No world's voices should be
whispering, no world's eyes should be looking on, when she made her vow
to him and received his vow. Those voices should be spoken and that ring
put on in this wild Cattle Land, where first she had seen him ride into
the flooded river, and lift her ashore upon his horse. It was this open
sky which should shine down on them, and this frontier soil upon which
their feet should tread. The world should take its turn second.

After a month with him by stream and canyon, a month far deeper into the
mountain wilds than ever yet he had been free to take her, a month with
sometimes a tent and sometimes the stars above them, and only their
horses besides themselves--after such a month as this, she would take
him to her mother and to Bennington; and the old aunt over at Dunbarton
would look at him, and be once more able to declare that the Storks had
always preferred a man who was a man.

And so July third was to be engraved inside the wedding ring. Upon the
other ring the Virginian had spent much delicious meditation, all in his
secret mind. He had even got the right measure of her finger without her
suspecting the reason. But this step was the final one in his plan.

During the time that his thoughts had begun to be busy over the other
ring, by a chance he had learned from Mrs. Henry a number of old fancies
regarding precious stones. Mrs. Henry often accompanied the Judge in
venturesome mountain climbs, and sometimes the steepness of the rocks
required her to use her hands for safety. One day when the Virginian
went with them to help mark out certain boundary corners, she removed
her rings lest they should get scratched; and he, being just behind her,
took them during the climb.

"I see you're looking at my topaz," she had said, as he returned them.
"If I could have chosen, it would have been a ruby. But I was born in
November."

He did not understand her in the least, but her words awakened exceeding
interest in him; and they had descended some five mil