th.

"Then quickly--quickly!"

Yet even when it was done she detained him; even when he put a big key
into her hand.

"_Must_ this go further--before the magistrates--after you have found
him?"

Harkness hardened.

"The offence is the same. I'm afraid it must."

"It will make it very unpleasant for me," sighed Moya, "when I come up
here. And when I've found him for you--and undone anything that was
done--though I don't admit that anything was--I--well, I really think
you _might_!"

"Might what?"

"Withdraw the charge!"

"But those tracks weren't his. Mr. Rigden made them. He shouldn't have
done that."

"Of course he shouldn't--if he did."

"But of course he _did_, Miss Bethune. I've known Mr. Rigden for years;
we used to be very good friends. I shouldn't speak as I do unless I
spoke by the book. But--why on earth did he go and do a thing like
that?"

Moya paused.

"If I tell you will you never tell a soul?"

"Never," said the rash sergeant.

"Then he was imposed upon. The wretch pretended he--had some claim--I
cannot tell you what. I can tell you no more."

It was provokingly little to have to keep secret for lifetime; yet
Harkness was glad to hear even this.

"It was the only possible sort of explanation," said he.

"But it won't explain enough for the world," sighed Moya, so meaningly
that the sergeant asked her what she did mean.

"I must really get off," he added.

"Then I'll be plain with you," cried the girl. "Either you must withdraw
this charge, and pretend that those tracks were genuine, or I can never
come up here to live!"

And she looked her loveliest to emphasise the threat.

"I must see Mr. Rigden about that," was, however, all that Harkness
would vouchsafe.

"Very well! That's only fair. Meanwhile--I--_trust you_, Sergeant
Harkness. And I never yet trusted the wrong man!"

That was Moya's last word.

It is therefore a pity that it was not strictly true.

* * * * *

It was a wonderful ride they had together, that ride between the
police-barracks and the station, and from drowsy afternoon into cool
sweet night. The crickets chirped their welcome on the very boundary,
and the same stars came out that Moya had seen swept away in the
morning, one by one again. Then the moon came up with a bound, but hung
a little as though caught in some pine-trees on the horizon, that seemed
scratched upon its disc. And Moya remarked that they were very nea