he jewel in that other ring which he had
given her. The crimson fire in the opal seemed to mingle with that in
his heart, and his arm lifted her during a moment from the saddle as he
held her to him. But in her heart the love of him was troubled by that
cold pang of loneliness which had crept upon her like a tide as the day
drew near. None of her own people were waiting in that distant town to
see her become his bride. Friendly faces she might pass on the way; but
all of them new friends, made in this wild country: not a face of her
childhood would smile upon her; and deep within her, a voice cried for
the mother who was far away in Vermont. That she would see Mrs. Taylor's
kind face at her wedding was no comfort now.

There lay the town in the splendor of Wyoming space. Around it spread
the watered fields, westward for a little way, eastward to a great
distance, making squares of green and yellow crops; and the town was but
a poor rag in the midst of this quilted harvest. After the fields to the
east, the tawny plain began; and with one faint furrow of river lining
its undulations, it stretched beyond sight. But west of the town rose
the Bow Leg Mountains, cool with their still unmelted snows and their
dull blue gulfs of pine. From three canyons flowed three clear forks
which began the river. Their confluence was above the town a good two
miles; it looked but a few paces from up here, while each side the river
straggled the margin cottonwoods, like thin borders along a garden walk.
Over all this map hung silence like a harmony, tremendous yet serene.

"How beautiful! how I love it!" whispered the girl. "But, oh, how big it
is!" And she leaned against her lover for an instant. It was her spirit
seeking shelter. To-day, this vast beauty, this primal calm, had in it
for her something almost of dread. The small, comfortable, green hills
of home rose before her. She closed her eyes and saw Vermont: a village
street, and the post-office, and ivy covering an old front door, and her
mother picking some yellow roses from a bush.

At a sound, her eyes quickly opened; and here was her lover turned in
his saddle, watching another horseman approach. She saw the Virginian's
hand in a certain position, and knew that his pistol was ready. But the
other merely overtook and passed them, as they stood at the brow of the
hill.

The man had given one nod to the Virginian, and the Virginian one to
him; and now he was already below them o