again to the saddle horn,
pulled off her tie, her hat, the pins from her hair.

"I guess you don't know me yet," he remarked dryly, when he had
confiscated every small article which she could let fall as she rode.
"I was trying to treat yuh white, but you don't seem to appreciate it.
Now you can ride hobbled, young lady."

"Oh, I could _kill_ you!" Lorraine whispered between set teeth.

"You mean you'd like to. Well, I ain't going to give you a chance."
His eyes rested on her face with a new expression; an awakening desire
for her, an admiration for the spirit that would not let her weep and
plead with him.

"Say! you ain't going to be a bit hard to marry," he observed, his eyes
lighting with what was probably his nearest approach to tenderness. "I
kinda wish you liked me, now I've got you."

He shook her arm and laughed when she turned her face away from him,
then remounted his horse, Snake moved reluctantly when Al started on.
Lorraine felt hope slipping from her. With her hands tied, she could
do nothing at all save sit there and ride wherever Al Woodruff chose to
lead her horse. He seemed to be making for the head of Spirit Canyon,
on the side toward Bear Top.

As they climbed higher, she could catch glimpses of the road down which
her father had driven almost to his death. She studied Al's back as he
rode before her and wondered if he could really be cold-blooded enough
to kill without compunction whoever he was told to kill, whether he had
any personal quarrel with his victim or not. Certainly he had had no
quarrel with her father, or with Frank.

It was long past noon, and she was terribly hungry and very thirsty,
but she would not tell Al her wants if she starved. She tried to guess
at his plans and at his motive for taking her away like this. He had
no camping outfit, a bulkily rolled slicker forming his only burden.
He could not, then, be planning to take her much farther into the
wilderness; yet if he did not hide her away, how could he expect to
keep her? His motive for marrying her was rather mystifying. He did
not seem sufficiently in love with her to warrant an abduction, and he
was too cool for such a headlong action, unless driven by necessity.
She wondered what he was thinking about as he rode. Not about her, she
guessed, except when some bad place in the trail made it necessary for
him to stop, tie Snake to the nearest bush, lead his own horse past the
obstruction and come back afte