When we reached the end of the slew, we turned south and crossed the creek just above the pond which we called Plum Pudd’n’ Pond, from the number of bitterns that lived there.  It disappeared when I drained the marsh in the ’eighties.  Then, though, it spread over several acres of ground, the largest body of water in Monterey County.  We splashed through the west end of it, and Rowena looked out over it as it lay shining in the glare of the great prairie fire, which had now swept half-way down the marsh, roaring like a tornado and sending its flames fifty feet into the air.  I could not help thinking what my condition would have been if I had tried to cross it and been mired in the bog, and like any good stockman, I was hoping that my cattle had got safe across in their rush for home and safety.

“What water is that?” asked Rowena as we crossed.

“Plum Pudd’n’ Pond,” I told her.

“Is it deep?” she said.

“Pretty deep in the middle.”

“Over your head?”

“Oh, yes!”

“I reckoned it was,” said she.  “I was huntin’ fur it when you found me.”

“That was after you saw the fire,” I said.

“No,” said she.  “It was before.”

In my slow way I pondered on why she had been hunting water over her head, and sooner than is apt to be the case with me I understood.  The despair in her face as she turned and looked at the shining water told me.  She had refused to accept my offer to be her protector, because she saw how it hurt me; but she was now ready to balance the books—­if it ever does that—­by taking shelter in the depths of the pool!  And this all for the pleasure of that smiling scoundrel!

“I hope God will damn him,” I said; and am ashamed of it now.

“What good would that do?” said she wearily.  “This world’s hard enough, Jake!”

3

We got to my house, and I helped her in.  I told her to wait while I went to look at the fire to see whether my stacks were in danger, and to put out and feed the horse.  Then I went back, and found her sitting where I had left her, and as I went in I heard again that little moan of pain.

The house was as light as day, without a lamp.  The light from the fire shone against the western wall of the room almost as strong as sunlight, and as we sat there we could hear the roar of the fire rising in the gusts of the wind, dying down, but with a steady undertone, like the wind in the rigging of a ship.  I got some supper, and after saying that she couldn’t eat, Rowena ate ravenously.

She had gone away from Blue-grass Manor, whipped forth by Mrs. Mobley’s abuse, days and days before, living on what she had carried with her until it was gone, drinking from the brooks and runs of the prairie, and then starving on rose-haws, and sleeping in stacks until I had found her looking for the pool.  If people could only have known!  Presently she moaned again, and I made her lie down on the bed.