erate as he certainly felt their situation to be, for a moment or
two Hamlin was unable to cast aside the influence of the girl, or
concentrate his thoughts on some plan for escape. It may have been the
gentle pressure of her hand upon his sleeve, but her voice continued to
ring in his ears. He had never been a woman's man, nor was he
specially interested in this woman beside him. He had seen her fairly,
with his first appreciative glance, when he had climbed into the stage
on the preceding day. He had realized there fully the charm of her
face, the dark roguish eyes, the clear skin, the wealth of dark hair.
Yet all this was impersonal; however pretty she might be, the fact was
nothing to him and never could be. Knowing who she was, he
comprehended instantly the social gulf stretching unbridged between
them. An educated man himself, with family connections he had long ago
ceased to discuss, he realized his present position more keenly than he
otherwise might. He had enlisted in the army with no misunderstanding
as to what a private's uniform meant. He had never heretofore supposed
he regretted any loss in this respect, his nature apparently satisfied
with the excitement of active frontier service, yet he vaguely knew
there had been times when he longed for companionship with women of the
class to which he had once belonged. Fortunately his border stations
offered little temptation in this respect, and he had grown to believe
that he had actually forgotten. That afternoon even--sweetly fair as
Miss McDonald undoubtedly appeared--he had looked upon her without the
throb of a pulse, as he might upon a picture. She was not for him even
to admire--she was Major McDonald's daughter, whom he had been sent to
guard. That was all then.

Yet he knew that somehow it was different now--the personal element had
entered unwelcomed, into the equation. Sitting there in the dark,
Gonzales' body crumpled on the floor at his feet, and Moylan lying
stiff and cold along the back seat, with this girl grasping his sleeve
in trust, she remained no longer merely the Major's daughter--she had
become _herself_. And she did not seem to care and did not seem to
realize that there were barriers of rank, which under other
circumstances must so utterly separate them. She liked him, and
frankly told him so, not as she would dismiss an inferior with
kindness, but as though he was an equal, as though he was a gentleman.
Somehow the very to