him on home with me, hadn't I?"

"Ride back again to-night!" exclaimed Stephen. "What madness! It was
bad enough to make the ride once. She mustn't think of it, must she,
Talbot?" and he turned to his friend for corroboration.

"Certainly not, I should say," returned Talbot, in his quiet but final
way. "I will ride up to Johnson's place and send him down home, and you
can make Katrine comfortable here."

The girl sprang to her feet.

"Why, what an idea!" she said, with a flush on her pale cheeks. "I only
came to you to find Will. Of course I can't stay here all night."

"Your mission will be accomplished, won't it, if Will goes to his wife?"
returned Talbot quietly. "There is no need to risk your life again.
There is no good in it; besides, it will save time if you let Will have
the pony at once to take him back. You can have one of ours in the
morning."

She looked up at him. She admired Talbot exceedingly. His voice was so
invariably gentle and quiet, so different from all the voices that she
heard round her daily. Stephen's, though his resembled it, had not the
same curious accent of refinement. His manner, too, had the same extreme
gentleness; and yet beneath this apparent softness she knew there
existed a courage that equalled any in the whole camp. He looked very
handsome too, she thought, at this moment, as she met a soft smile in
his eyes, and her tones were more hesitating as she repeated--

"I think I ought to return."

"Well, I'm going to despatch Will for you," replied Talbot, turning
away. "I leave it to you, Stephen, to persuade her to stay," and he
walked out. A second later they heard the pony's hoofs going up the
narrow trail past the cabin.

"You can have my room; I'll sleep here on the floor," remarked Stephen.

The girl got up.

"No," she said in her most decided tone. "I'll stay if you let me sleep
here on the floor, or I'll go home. Turn you out of your own comfortable
bed I will not."

"Go home you can't," said Stephen in an equally decided tone, "so I'll
make you up a bed here just in front of the stove."

He went into the next room, and Katrine, left alone, drank up her whisky
and gazed round the cabin. It was not at all an interesting interior,
and had not the faint suggestions of artistic taste that redeemed
Talbot's. A few prints were on the walls, seemingly cut from illustrated
papers and principally consisting of views of cathedrals and school
buildings, which Katrine's eyes