“Winter fire?  That’s capital!  You are not going back to Santa Barbara, Madge?”

“I haven’t promised that—­I haven’t promised anything.”

“No; I have done all the promising.”

“You did so of your own free will.”

“And of my own free will shall keep my promises.  No, don’t let us leave any remnants of our lunch.  Should we get lost you will want something more substantial than fine speeches.”

“I shall indeed.”

Graydon filled from the spring the bottle which had contained milk; and then packing his little hamper he led the way downward, over and through obstacles which often involved no little difficulty, and sometimes almost danger.

“May I help you all I please?” he asked.

“Yes, when I can’t help myself.”

Then he began to rejoice over the ruggedness of the way, which made it proper to take her hand so often, and at times even to lift her over a fallen tree.

“What fun it is!” cried Madge.

“The best I ever had,” he replied, promptly.  But they had not realized the difficulty of their attempt; for when little more than half-way to the foot of the mountain they came to a ledge down which there appeared no place for safe descent.  As they were skirting this precipice perilously near the edge, he holding Madge’s hand, some loose debris gave way beneath his feet.

Instead of instinctively clinging to Madge’s hand, even in the act of falling he threw it up and around a small tree, which she grasped, and regained her footing, while he went down and disappeared.

At first she was so appalled that she could do no more than clutch the tree convulsively and look with blank horror at the spot where she had seen him last.  Then came the thought, “His life may now depend upon me.”

The distance he had fallen would not be necessarily fatal, and below the ledge there were low scrubby trees that might have broken the impetus of his descent.  She called in tones that might have evoked an answer even from the lips of death; then, with a resolution in her pallid face which nothing could daunt, she sought to reach her side.

At first Graydon was utterly unconscious.  At last, like a dim light entering a darkened room, thought and memory began to revive.  He remembered that he had been at Madge’s side, and had fallen; he had grasped at branches of trees as he passed through them, and then all had become dark.  He tried to speak, to call his companion, but found be could not.  He almost doubted whether he was alive in the flesh.  If he were he must have received some terrible injury that had caused a strange paralysis.

His confused thoughts finally centred wholly on Madge.  Had she fallen?  The thought of her, perhaps injured, possibly lying unconscious or dead near him, and he helpless, caused a dull, vague dread, like a cold tide, to overwhelm his very soul.  He tried to move, to spring up, but only his mind appeared free.  Then he thought he recognized her voice calling in the distance.  Soon, with alternations of hope and fear, he heard her steps and voice draw nearer.  She had evidently found a way down the ledge, and was coming along its base toward him—­coming swiftly, almost recklessly.