“Is that all that you have ever read?” he asked compassionately.

“O, no!  We got papers sometimes.  Father would come home with a whole paper wrapped around some bundle.  Once there was a beautiful story about a girl; but the paper was torn in the middle, and I never knew how it came out.”

There was great wistfulness in her voice.  It seemed to be one of the regrets of her girlhood that she did not know how that other girl in the story fared.  All at once she turned to him.

“Now tell me about your life,” she said.  “I’m sure you have a great deal to tell.”

His face darkened in a way that made her sorry.

“O, well,” said he as if it mattered very little about his life, “I had a nice home—­have yet, for the matter of that.  Father died when I was little, and mother let me do just about as I pleased.  I went to school because the other fellows did, and because that was the thing to do.  After I grew up I liked it.  That is, I liked some studies; so I went to a university.”

“What is that?”

“O, just a higher school where you learn grown-up things.  Then I travelled.  When I came home, I went into society a good deal.  But”—­and his face darkened again—­“I got tired of it all, and thought I would come out here for a while and hunt, and I got lost, and I found you!” He smiled into her face.  “Now you know the rest.”

Something passed between them in that smile and glance, a flash of the recognition of souls, and a gladness in each other’s company, that made the heart warm.  They said no more for some time, but rode quietly side by side.

They had come to the end of the valley, and were crossing the bench.  The distant ranch could quite distinctly be seen.  The silver moon had come up, for they had not been hurrying, and a great beauty pervaded everything.  They almost shrank from approaching the buildings and people.  They had enjoyed the ride and the companionship.  Every step brought them nearer to what they had known all the time was an indistinct future from which they had been joyously shut away for a little time till they might know each other.

CHAPTER VII

BAD NEWS

They found rest for the night at the ranch house.  The place was wide and hospitable.  The girl looked about her with wonder on the comfortable arrangements for work.  If only her mother had had such a kitchen to work in, and such a pleasant, happy home, she might have been living yet.  There was a pleasant-faced, sweet-voiced woman with gray hair whom the men called “mother.”  She gave the girl a kindly welcome, and made her sit down to a nice warm supper, and, when it was over, led her to a little room where her own bed was, and told her she might sleep with her.  The girl lay down in a maze of wonder, but was too weary with the long ride to keep awake and think about it.

They slept, the two travellers, a sound and dreamless sleep, wherein seemed peace and moonlight, and a forgetting of sorrows.