me she had glanced a tiny black dot stood
out against the intense blue sky. But look as she might she could not
find it. It was there no more. It had been for long; but now was not.
Clean as though drawn by a crayon on a freshly washed blackboard, the
unbroken horizon line stretched out in a great circle before her eyes.
With no watcher save the grey wolf staring forth from the stable
doorway, she was alone with her thoughts.

CHAPTER XVI

THE RECKONING

It was later than usual when How Landor returned that evening, and as he
came up the path that led from the stable, he shuffled his feet as one
unconsciously will when very weary. He was wearing his ready-made
clothes and starched collar; but the trousers were deplorably baggy at
the knees from much riding, and his linen and polished shoes were soiled
with the dust of the prairie.

Supper was waiting for him, a supper hot and carefully prepared. Serving
it was a young woman he had not seen for long, a young woman minus the
slightest trace of listlessness, with a dash of red ribbon at belt and
throat, and a reflection of the same colour burning on either cheek. A
young woman, moreover, who anticipated his slightest wish, who took his
hat and fetched his moccasins, and when the meal was over brought the
buffalo robes and stretched them carefully on the gently sloping terrace
just outside the ranch house door. Meanwhile she chatted bubblingly,
continuously; with a suggestion of the light-hearted gaiety of a year
before. To one less intimately acquainted with her than the man, her
companion, she would have seemed again her old girlish self, returned,
unchanged; but to him who knew her as himself there was now and then a
note that rang false, a hint of suppressed excitement in the unwonted
colour, an abnormal energy bordering on the feverish in her every
motion. Not in the least deceived was this impassive, all-observing
human, not in the least in doubt as to the cause of the transformation:
yet through it all he gave no intimation of consciousness of the
unusual, through it all he smiled, and smiled and smiled again. Never
was there a more appreciative diner than he, never a more attentive,
sympathetic listener. He said but little; but that was not remarkable.
He had never done so except when she had not. When he looked at her
there was an intensity that was almost uncanny in his gaze; but that
also was not unusual. There was ever a mystery in the depths of his