igh-flung peaks of the mountains, their loftier reaches
rearing naked and craggy above the dark green girdle of pines. Slowly
and majestically, hardly more than a speck against the blue, an eagle
soared. It was a good world--courage and perseverance made things work
out right. It was cowardly to despair--to become disheartened. She
would find her father's mine--but, first she would prove that Bethune
was a scoundrel of the deepest dye. And she would prove, she admitted
to herself she wanted to prove, that Vil Holland was all his friends
believed him to be. But, she blushed with shame--what must he think of
her? Of her defense of Bethune, of her deliberate rudeness, and worst
of all, of her night ride with the horse-thieves? He knew she had
suspected him--had even accused him. Would he ever regard her as other
than a silly fool? Vividly she pictured him as he had looked lashing
his way to her through the wildly crowding horse herd, determined,
capable, masterful--and wondered vaguely what her answer would have
been had he made love to her as Bethune had done? She smiled at the
thought of Vil Holland, the unsmiling, the outspoken, the
self-sufficient Vil Holland making love!

Upon the summit of a high ridge she paused and gazed down into the
little valley where she had located the false claim. A few moments
more and she would know to a certainty the identity of the prowler who
had repeatedly searched her cabin. Certain as she was whose stakes she
would find marking the claim, it was with a rapidly beating heart that
she urged her horse into the valley and across the creek toward the
rock wall. Yes, there was a stake! And another! And there was the plot
of ground she had laboriously broken at the foot of the wall. She
swung from the saddle and examined the spot. The rock fragments she
had selected from her father's samples were gone! And now to find the
notice! As she turned to search for the other stakes, her glance
rested upon an object that held her rooted in her tracks. For a moment
her heart stopped beating as she stared at the little patch of gray
buckskin that lay limp and neglected where it had fallen. Slowly she
walked to it, stooped, and recovered it from the ground. It was a
gauntleted riding glove--Vil Holland's. She could not be mistaken,
she had seen that glove upon the hand of its owner too many times,
with its deep buckskin fringe, and the horseshoe embroidered in red
and green silk upon its back.

For a