treetops. Suddenly she heard
a strange, rumbling sound; an odd giddiness overtook her, and she was
obliged to clutch at a sapling to support herself; she laughed vacantly,
though a little frightened, and looked vaguely towards the summit of the
road; but the wagon had already disappeared. A strange feeling of
nausea then overcame her; she spat out the leaves she had been chewing,
disgustedly. But the sensation as quickly passed, and she once more
sought the trail and began slowly to follow the tracks of the wagon. The
air blew freshly, the treetops began again to rock over her head, and
the incident was forgotten.

Presently she paused; she must have missed the trail, for the wagon
tracks had ended abruptly before a large boulder that lay across the
mountain trail. She dipped into the woods again; here there were other
wagon tracks that confused her. It was like her dogged, stupid father
to miss the trail; she felt a gleam of malicious satisfaction at his
discomfiture. Sooner or later, he would have to retrace his steps and
virtually come back for her! She took up a position where two rough
wheel ruts and tracks intersected each other, one of which must be
the missing trail. She noticed, too, the broader hoof-prints of cattle
without the following wheel ruts, and instead of traces, the long smooth
trails made by the dragging of logs, and knew by these tokens that she
must be near the highway or some woodman's hut or ranch. She began to be
thirsty, and was glad, presently, when her quick, rustic ear caught
the tinkling of water. Yet it was not so easy to discover, and she was
getting footsore and tired again before she found it, some distance
away, in a gully coming from a fissure in a dislocated piece of outcrop.
It was beautifully clear, cold, and sparkling, with a slightly sweetish
taste, yet unlike the brackish "alkali" of the plains. It refreshed and
soothed her greatly, so much that, reclining against a tree, but where
she would be quite visible from the trail, her eyes closed dreamily, and
presently she slept.

When she awoke, the shafts of sunlight were striking almost level into
her eyes. She must have slept two hours. Her father had not returned;
she knew the passage of the wagon would have awakened her. She began to
feel strange, but not yet alarmed; it was only the uncertainty that made
her uneasy. Had her father really gone on by some other trail? Or had he
really hurried on and left her, as he said he wou