When the Canyon Gates Are Shut If Aaron King had questioned what it was that had held him in the cedar thicket until Brian Oakley's heavy hand broke the spell, he would probably have answered that it was his artistic appreciation of the beautiful scene.

But--deep down in the man's inner consciousness--there was a still, small voice--declaring, with an insistency not to be denied, that--for him--there was a something in that picture that was not to be put into the vernacular of his profession.
Had he acted without his habitual self-control, the day following the Ranger's visit, he would, again, have gone fishing--up Clear Creek--at least, to the pool where that master trout had broken his leader.

But he did not.

Instead, he roamed aimlessly about the vicinity of the camp--explored the sycamore grove; climbed a little way up the mountain spur, and down again; circled the cienaga; and so came, finally, to the ruins of the house and barn on the creek side of the orchard.
Not far from the lonely fireplace with its naked chimney, a little, old gate of split palings, in an ancient tumble-down fence, under a great mistletoe-hung oak, at the top of a bank--attracted his careless attention.

From the gate, he saw what once had been a path leading down the bank to a spring, where the tiny streamlet that crossed the road a hundred yards away, on its course to Clear Creek, began.