e has been indoors all day; the fresh air will
do her good."

"All right," assented Marjorie, well pleased. "Come along, Undine," she
added, rising; "we'll have time for a good gallop before supper."

Undine hesitated.

"Are you sure you can spare me?" she asked, with an anxious glance at
the pale face on the pillow.

"Quite sure, dear. I shall not need anything, and even if I should Mrs.
Graham and Juanita are both within call. So run along, you conscientious
little nurse, and enjoy yourself for the rest of the afternoon."

Undine blushed with pleasure at the compliment, and five minutes later
she and Marjorie were on their way to the stables.

It was one of those glorious autumn days, when the air is like a tonic,
and every object stands out with almost startling clearness.

"The mountains look so near to-day, it seems almost as if we might ride
to them, doesn't it?" remarked Undine, as the two girls trotted out of
the ranch gates on their ponies; Undine sitting as straight, and riding
with almost as much ease as Marjorie herself.

"They are nearly a hundred miles away," said Marjorie, with a glance in
the direction of the great snow-tipped mountains, which certainly did
look very near in that wonderful atmosphere. "We could go there, though,
if we had an automobile. What wonderful things automobiles must be."

"I suppose they are--there were plenty of them in California--but
nothing could be half as nice as a gallop in this wonderful air. A pony
like this is worth all the automobiles in San Francisco." And Undine
bestowed an affectionate pat on the neck of the pretty brown horse she
was riding.

"I believe you love riding as much as I do," said Marjorie,
sympathetically. "I wonder where you learned to ride. I shall never
forget how astonished Father and I were that first day, when we made you
get on a pony just for fun, and you took the reins, and started off as
if you had been accustomed to riding every day of your life."

There was a trace of the old shadow in Undine's face as she answered:

"It's all very strange, and I can't explain it, but it seemed quite
natural, and as if I had done it often before. Even when the pony
jumped, and your father thought I would be frightened, I wasn't. I
seemed to know just what to do, though I couldn't tell how I knew."

"Perhaps you lived on a ranch once," Marjorie suggested. "That would
explain it."

Undine shook her head.

"I don't think so," she said, "for w