But he felt her cheek touch his shoulder, lightly as a feather.
"Yes, I will come back with you." "And you will be ready ?" "I am ready now." The sun-fire of the plains danced in his eyes; a cob-web of golden mist rising out of the earth, beckoning wraiths and undulating visions--the breath of life, of warmth, of growing things--all between him and the hidden cottonwoods; a joyous sea into which he wanted to plunge without another minute of waiting, as he felt the gentle touch of her cheek against his shoulder, and the weight of her hand on his arm.

That she had come to him utterly was in the low surrender of her voice.

She had ceased to fight--she had given to him the precious right to fight for her.
It was this sense of her need and of her glorious faith in him, and of the obligation pressing with it that drove slowly back into him the grimmer realities of the day.

Its horror surged upon him again, and the significance of what Rossland had said seemed fresher, clearer, even more terrible now that he was gone.

Unconsciously the old lines of hatred crept into his face again as he looked steadily in the direction which the other man had taken, and he wondered how much of that same horror--of the unbelievable menace stealing upon her--Rossland had divulged to the girl who stood so quietly now at his side.