it to her, what would happen.  Then he began to speak of Barbee and his new girl, of anything that offered itself to his mind as a lighter topic.  But Helen was in no responsive mood.  It seemed to her that a shadow had crept across the sky; that the warmth had gone out of the sunlight.  A fear crept into her heart, and like many a baseless emotion grew into certainty, that if Alan Howard and Jim Courtot came face to face it would be Alan who fell.  When she saw how straight and virile Howard sat in the saddle; when she marked how full of life and the sheer joy of life he was; when she read in his eyes something of his own dreams for the future; when then she saw the gun always bumping at his hips, she shivered as though cold.  Her own senses grew sharpened; her fancies raced feverishly.  From every boulder, from every bend in the trail, she feared to see the sinister face of Jim Courtot.

Chapter XXV

In the Open

There came that night a crisis.  Half expected it had always been, and yet after the familiar fashion of supreme moments it burst upon them with the suddenness of an explosion.  Howard and Helen were sitting silent upon the cabin doorstep, watching the first stars.  In Sanchia’s near-by tent a candle was burning; they could now and then see her shadow as she moved restlessly about.  Longstreet had been out all day, prospecting.

The first intimation the two star-gazers had of any eventful happening was borne to them by Longstreet’s voice, calling cheerily out of the darkness below the cliffs.  His words were simply ‘Hello, everybody!’ but the whoop from afar was of a joy scarcely less than delirious.  Sanchia ran out of her tent, toppling over her candle; both Helen and Howard sprang up.

‘He has found it!’ cried Helen.  ’Look at that woman.  She is like a spider.’

Longstreet came on down the trail jauntily.  Sanchia, first to reach him, passed her arm through his and held resolutely to his side.  As they came close and into the lamp-light from the cabin door their two faces hid nothing of their two emotions.  Longstreet’s was one of whole-hearted triumph; Sanchia’s of shrewdness and determination.

‘Now,’ cried Longstreet ringingly, ’who says that I didn’t know what I was talking about!’ It was a challenge of the victor, not a mere question.

Before any other reply came Sanchia’s answer.

‘Dear friend,’ she told him hurriedly, ’I always had faith in you.  When others doubted, I was sure.  And now I rejoice in your happiness as——­’

‘Papa!’ warned Helen.  She ran forward to him.  ’Remember and be careful!’

Longstreet went into the cabin.  The others followed him.  Sanchia did not release his arm, though she saw and understood what lay in Helen’s look and Howard’s.  The main issue had arrived and Sanchia meant to make the most of it.