t up here and ride." He dismounted actively.

Beth could have dropped in her tracks for weariness. She was tired to
the marrow of her bones.

"I can't," she answered. "Perhaps--we'd better camp." A hot flush
rushed upward to her very scalp, fortunately, however, unseen.

Van regarded her sternly.

"I've changed my mind. I haven't time to camp out here to-night.
You'll have to ride."

It seemed to Beth that, had it been to save her life, she could
scarcely have climbed to that saddle. To remain on the horse would,
she knew, be far beyond her strength. She continued on her feet only
by the utmost exertion of her will. Someway since Van had found her in
this dreadful place she had lost strength rapidly--perhaps for the
leaning on him. With Van's ultimatum now to confront, she could summon
no nerve or resolution.

Her face paled. "You'd better go on, if you have to be at your claim,"
she said, aware that she could offer no argument, no alternative plan
to his wish for an onward march. "I'm--not used to riding--much. I
can't ride any more tonight."

He knew she told the truth, knew how gladly she would have continued
riding, knew what a plight of collapse she must be approaching to
submit to a thought of remaining here till morning. He could not go
and leave her here. The thought of it aroused him to something like
anger. He realized the necessity of assuming a rougher demeanor.

"Damn it, Kent," he said, "you're no less lost than you were before.
You know I can't go off and leave you. And I want to get ahead."

She only knew she could not ride, come what might.

"You didn't say so, a little while ago," she ventured, half
imploringly. "I'm sorry I'm so nearly dead. If you must go on----"

That cut him to the heart. How could he be a brute?

"I ought to go!" he broke in unguardedly. "I mean I've got to
think--I've got work to do in the morning. Don't you suppose you could
try?"

The moonlight was full on his face. All the laughter she knew so well
had disappeared from his eyes. In its place she saw such a look of
yearning and worry--such a tenderness of love as no woman ever yet saw
and failed to comprehend. She divined in that second that he knew who
she was--she felt it, through all her sense of intuition and the fiber
of her soul. She understood his insistence on the march, the saving
march, straight onward without a halt. She loved him for it. She had
loved him with wild intensit