There were moments, however, in the long days, which could be devoted to reflection; and often Johnson pondered over the strange fate that had brought him under the influence—­an influence which held him now and which he earnestly prayed would continue to hold him—­and into close relationship with a character so different from his own.  A contemplation of his past life was wholly unnecessary, for the realisation had come to him that it was her personality alone that had awakened his dormant sense of what was right and what was wrong, and changed the course of his life.  That his future was full of possibilities, evil as well as good, he was only too well aware; nevertheless, his faith in himself was that of a strong man whose powers of resistance, in this case, would be immeasurably strengthened by constant association with a stronger character.

It was while he was in the midst of these thoughts that the Girl, without letting him see her, quietly drew the blankets of the tepee a little to one side and peered out at him.  She, too, had not been without her moments of meditation.  Not that she regretted for an instant that she had committed herself to him irrevocably but, rather, because she feared lest he should find it difficult to detach himself, soul and body, from the adventurous life he had been leading.  Such painful communings, however, were rare and quickly dismissed as unworthy of her; and now as she looked at him with faith and joy in her eyes, it seemed to her that never before had she seen him appear so resolute and strong, and she rejoiced that he belonged to her.  At the thought a blush spread over her features, and it was not until she had drawn the blankets back into their place that she called from behind them: 

“Are you awake, Dick?”

At the sound of her voice the man quickly arose and, going over to the tepee, he parted the blankets and held them open.  And even as she passed out the greyness of dawn was replaced by silver, and silver by pink tints which lighted up the pale green of the sage brush, the dwarf shrubs and clumps of Buffalo grass around them as well as the darker green of the pines and hemlocks of the foothills in the near distance.

“Another day, Girl,” he said softly.  “See, the dawn is breaking!”

For some moments they stood side by side in silence, the man thinking of the future, the woman serenely happy and lost in admiration of the calm beauty of the scene which, in one direction, at least, differed greatly from anything that she had ever beheld.  Every night previous to the one just passed they had encamped in the great forests; but now they looked upon a vast expanse of level plain which to the north and east, stretched trackless and unbroken by mountain or ravine to an infinitude—­the boundless prairies soon to be mellowed and turned to a golden brown by the shafts of a burning sun already just below the edge of an horizon aglow with opaline tints.