hed. "Now don't talk any more. You're white and fagged-out. You
need to rest--to sleep."

"Sleep? How impossible!" she murmured.

"Why, your eyes are half shut now.... Anyway, I'll not talk to you. I
want to think."

"Jim!... kiss me--good night," she whispered.

He bent over rather violently, she imagined. His head blotted out the
light of the stars. He held her tightly for a moment. She felt him
shake. Then he kissed her on the cheek and abruptly drew away. How
strange he seemed!

For that matter, everything was strange. She had never seen the stars so
bright, so full of power, so close. All about her the shadows gathered
protectingly, to hide her and Jim. The silence spoke. She saw Jim's face
in the starlight and it seemed so keen, so listening, so thoughtful, so
beautiful. He would sit there all night, wide-eyed and alert, guarding
her, waiting for the gray of dawn. How he had changed! And she was his
wife! But that seemed only a dream. It needed daylight and sight of her
ring to make that real.

A warmth and languor stole over her; she relaxed comfortably; after all,
she would sleep. But why did that intangible dread hang on to her soul?
The night was so still and clear and perfect--a radiant white night of
stars--and Jim was there, holding her--and to-morrow they would ride
away. That might be, but dark, dangling shapes haunted her, back in her
mind, and there, too, loomed Kells. Where was he now? Gone--gone on his
bloody trail with his broken fortunes and his desperate bitterness! He
had lost her. The lunge of that wild mob had parted them. A throb
of pain and shame went through her, for she was sorry. She could not
understand why, unless it was because she had possessed some strange
power to instil or bring up good in him. No woman could have been proof
against that. It was monstrous to know that she had power to turn him
from an evil life, yet she could not do it. It was more than monstrous
to realize that he had gone on spilling blood and would continue to go
on when she could have prevented it--could have saved many poor miners
who perhaps had wives or sweethearts somewhere. Yet there was no help
for it. She loved Jim Cleve. She might have sacrificed herself, but she
would not sacrifice him for all the bandits and miners on the border.

Joan felt that she would always be haunted and would always suffer that
pang for Kells. She would never lie down in the peace and quiet of
her home, wherever that migh