ifferent gender, recurring again and
again:

"If she was n't guilty of something, why did she run?"

And why had she? More, why had she been willing to give ten dollars in
payment for the mere changing of a tire? And why had she not offered
some explanation of it all? It was a problem which almost wiped out
for Robert Fairchild the zest of the new life into which he was going,
the great gamble he was about to take. And so thoroughly did it
engross him that it was not until a truck had come to a full stop
behind him, and a driver mingled a shout with the tooting of his horn,
that he turned to allow its passage.

"Did n't hear you, old man," he apologized. "Could you give a fellow a
lift?"

"Guess so." It was friendly, even though a bit disgruntled; "hop on."

And Fairchild hopped, once more to sit on the tailboard, swinging his
legs, but this time his eyes saw the ever-changing scenery without
noticing it. In spite of himself, Fairchild found himself constantly
staring at a vision of a pretty girl in a riding habit, with dark-brown
hair straying about equally dark-brown eyes, almost frenzied in her
efforts to change a tire in time to elude a pursuing sheriff. Some
way, it all did n't blend. Pretty girls, no doubt, could commit
infractions of the law just as easily as ones less gifted with good
looks. Yet if this particular pretty girl had held up a pay wagon, why
did n't the telephoned notice from Denver state the fact, instead of
referring to her as a man? And if she had n't committed some sort of
depredation against the law, why on earth was she willing to part with
ten dollars, merely to save a few moments in changing a tire and thus
elude a sheriff? If there had been nothing wrong, could not a moment
of explanation have satisfied any one of the fact? Anyway, were n't
the officers looking for a man instead of for a woman? And yet:

"If she was n't guilty of something, why did she run?"

It was too much for any one, and Fairchild knew it. Yet he clung
grimly to the mystery as the truck clattered on, mile after mile, while
the broad road led along the sides of the hills, finally to dip
downward and run beside the bubbling Clear Creek,--clear no longer in
the memory of the oldest inhabitant; but soiled by the silica from ore
deposits that, churned and rechurned, gave to the stream a whitish,
almost milk-like character, as it twisted in and out of the tortuous
canon on its turbulent journey to the s