that Smythe had something to say to her. Had he heard
already? Had the news of yesterday's comedy, that was so near a
tragedy, already spread far and wide over the Park? But that was
scarcely possible, since Haig's men would be silent, and Seth had kept
Williams too busy all day for gossip.

They climbed the rocky slope without more words, clambering over
bowlders and fallen tree trunks, until they reached the summit of the
hill, and flung themselves down, hot and panting, on a great flat rock
that commanded a sweeping view of the Park. At one side more hills
rose, small mountains in themselves, thickly wooded, with white peaks
towering behind. On the other, the valley of the Brightwater lay green
and bronze in the sun, with the white stream curling and curving among
the meadows. Far across the valley, beyond the ridge that divided the
Park in unequal halves--that fateful ridge!--the western range of
mountains glittered, dazzling white.

Marion's eyes at once sought out Thunder Mountain. What would it say
to her to-day? Storm! Its top was half-hidden in a gray-black swirl of
clouds, though the sun was bright on the snow-clad peaks around it.

"What do you see?" asked Smythe, as soon as his lungs would consent to
speech.

"My mountain," she answered, without turning her head.

"Which is that?"

"Thunder Mountain."

"Umph! You're welcome to it!"

She was silent.

"Why your mountain?" he asked presently.

"I don't know."

"But there must be a reason--or something."

"That's just it--something. It's hideous, but it fascinates me. I
can't help thinking that--"

"That what?"

"I don't know."

They laughed together.

"It's got a bad reputation," said Smythe.

"Perhaps that's the reason."

Then she was embarrassed, thinking unexpectedly of another bad
reputation in the Park.

"Perhaps," he answered, smiling at the back of her head, where the
tawny hair curved up adorably from the soft, white neck.

"Tell me about it!" she said at length.

"It's a death trap."

"You mean--men have gone up there?"

"Oh, yes!"

"How?"

"There's a trail, what's left of it. The Warpath, they call it."

"The Warpath?"

"Yes. It was first a war trail, when fighting tribes lived in these
mountains. But even the Indians didn't use it often--only in
midsummer. It's a trail over bare rocks, marked by stones set up at
long intervals. The Indians didn't mark it. They had their own ways of
knowing it. But after the Ind