dark mountains. She was daring, resourceful, used to horses
and trails and taking care of herself; and she did not need anyone to
tell her that she had gone far enough. It had been her hope to come up
with Jim. Always he had been repentant. But this time was different. She
recalled his lean, pale face--so pale that freckles she did not know he
had showed through--and his eyes, usually so soft and mild, had glinted
like steel. Yes, it had been a bitter, reckless face. What had she said
to him? She tried to recall it.

The night before at twilight Joan had waited for him. She had given
him precedence over the few other young men of the village, a fact she
resentfully believed he did not appreciate. Jim was unsatisfactory in
every way except in the way he cared for her. And that also--for he
cared too much.

When Joan thought how Jim loved her, all the details of that night
became vivid. She sat alone under the spruce-trees near the cabin. The
shadows thickened, and then lightened under a rising moon. She heard the
low hum of insects, a distant laugh of some woman of the village, and
the murmur of the brook. Jim was later than usual. Very likely, as
her uncle had hinted, Jim had tarried at the saloon that had lately
disrupted the peace of the village. The village was growing, and
Joan did not like the change. There were too many strangers, rough,
loud-voiced, drinking men. Once it had been a pleasure to go to the
village store; now it was an ordeal. Somehow Jim had seemed to be
unfavorably influenced by these new conditions. Still, he had never
amounted to much. Her resentment, or some feeling she had, was reaching
a climax. She got up from her seat. She would not wait any longer for
him, and when she did see him it would be to tell him a few blunt facts.

Just then there was a slight rustle behind her. Before she could turn
someone seized her in powerful arms. She was bent backward in a bearish
embrace, so that she could neither struggle nor cry out. A dark face
loomed over hers--came closer. Swift kisses closed her eyes, burned her
cheeks, and ended passionately on her lips. They had some strange power
over her. Then she was released.

Joan staggered back, frightened, outraged. She was so dazed she did not
recognize the man, if indeed she knew him. But a laugh betrayed him. It
was Jim.

"You thought I had no nerve," he said. "What do you think of that?"

Suddenly Joan was blindly furious. She could have killed him