Smilingly he told how he had tried to convince himself that she was not for him.

And how, believing that she loved and would wed his friend, Lawrence Knight, he had come to the far West, to his work, and, if he could, to forget.
"But I could not forget, dear girl," he said.

"I could not escape the conviction that you belonged to me, as I felt that I belonged to you.

I could not banish the feeling that some mysterious higher law--the law that governs the mating of the beautifully free creatures that live in these hills--had mated you and me.

And so, as I worked and tried to forget, I went on dreaming just the same.