ut their hands to the
fire that was to consume them; but after the first burst of headlong
galloping, she drew down the speed to a hand-canter, and this in turn
to a fast trot, for she dared not risk the far-echoed sound of the
clattering hoofs over the rock.

And as she rode she saw at last the winking eye of red which she longed
for and dreaded. She pulled her black to an instant halt and swung
from the saddle, tossing the reins over the head of the horse to keep
him standing there.

Yet, after she had made half a dozen hurried paces something forced her
to turn and look again at the handsome head of the horse. He stood
quite motionless, with his ears pricking after her, and now as she
stopped he whinnied softly, hardly louder than the whisper of a man.
So she ran back again and threw the reins over the horn of the saddle;
he should be free to wander where he chose through the free mountains,
but as for her, she knew very certainly now that she would never mount
that saddle again, or control that triumphant steed with the touch of
her hands on the reins. She put her arms around his neck and drew his
head down close.

There was a dignity in that parting, for it was the burning of her
bridges behind her. When "King-Maker" Richard of Warwick, betrayed and
beaten on the field, came to his last stand by the forest, he
dismounted and stabbed his favorite charger. Very different was this
wild mountain girl from the armored earl who put kings up and pulled
them down again at pleasure, but her heart swelled as great as the
heart of famous Warwick; he gave up a kingdom, and she gave up her love.

When she drew back the horse followed her a pace, but she raised a
silent hand in the night and halted him; a moment later she was lost
among the boulders.

It was rather slow work to stalk that camp-fire, for the big boulders
cut off the sight of the red eye time and again, and she had to make
little, cautious detours before she found it again, but she kept
steadily at her work. Once she stopped, her blood running cold, for
she thought that she heard a faint voice blown up the canon on the
wind: "McGurk!"

For half a minute she stood frozen, listening, but the sound was not
repeated, and she went on again with greater haste. So she came at
last in view of a hollow in the side of the gorge. Here there were a
few trees, growing in the cove, and here, she knew, there was a small
spring of clear water. Many a time she had