For an hour they chatted pleasantly.  Now, when Thornton got to his feet again, and went to the door to see what promise the night gave of being cloudless and to note the moon already pushing up above the jagged skyline where the trees stood upon the hill tops, she watched him with an interest that was not tinged with the vague suspicion of an hour ago.  She saw that as he stood lounging in the doorway, his hands upon his hips, one shoulder against the rude door jamb, he had to stoop his head a little, and knew that he was a taller, bigger man than she had realized until now.

“If I were as big as you are,” she laughed at him, “I’d be in constant fear of bumping my head in the dark.”

He laughed with her, told her that he was getting used to it, and came back for his hat.

“If you’ll be getting ready,” he told her, “I’ll go out and bring in the horses.  If you’re rested up?”

She assured him that she was, noted again how he stooped for the doorway, and watched him move swiftly away through the shadows cast by the trees about the cabin.  She put on her hat, buckled on the spurs she had dropped on the table, and was ready.  Then, before he could have gone half way to the barn, she heard swift steps coming back.

He had forgotten something; but what?  She looked about her expecting to see his tobacco sack or some such article, a block of matches, maybe, which he had left behind.  But there was nothing.  She lifted the lamp in her hand so that the weak rays searched out the four corners of the cabin.  Then she turned again toward the door.

Out yonder through the clear night came on the tall figure with the long free stride of the man of the outdoors.  In a patch of bright moonlight his head was down as though his mood were one of thoughtfulness, and the shadow of his wide hat hid his face and eyes from her.  In the black shade under the live oak before Harte’s door he lifted his head quickly; here he came for an instant to a dead halt, half turning.  It struck her abruptly that he was tense, that the atmosphere was suddenly charged with uneasiness, that he was listening as a man listens who more than half expects trouble.

“What is it?” she called.  She could not make out more than the vague outline of his figure now as he stood still, his body seeming to merge into the great trunk of the tree.  He did not answer.  Again, head down and hurriedly, he came on.  On through the thinning fringe of shadow and into the full bright moonlight.

A sudden formless fear which in no way could she explain was upon her.  His actions were so strange; they hinted at furtiveness.  He had been so outright and hearty and wholesome a moment ago and now struck her as anything but the big free and easy man who had supped with her.  She drew back a little, her underlip caught between her teeth as was her habit when undue stress was laid upon her nerves, her breath coming a trifle irregularly.  After all she was just a girl and he was a man, big, strong and perhaps brutal, of whom she knew virtually nothing.  And they were very far from any other human beings....