“That’s wholly unnecessary, for I intend to keep before your eyes in person.”

“Which will be the nicest of all,” said she, smiling.

He continued to gaze at her, to listen to her voice, with a pleasure he made no effort to conceal.  And she, on her part, seemed to surrender herself to the enjoyment of the moment; her eyes remaining longer on his, her tones softening to a slow, tender utterance almost carrying a caress, her face keeping its languorous smile; as if the honey-sweet fragrance from the unseen flowers had invaded her spirit.

A pause came in their talk.  They sat unmoving, without stir of hand or head, quiescent.  Then Lee all at once experienced a feeling of profound compassion for Ruth as he regarded her, a poignant stab in his breast like pain.  Sitting there without movement, with her hands idle upon her lap, with her face a little lifted and her eyes wistfully bent on the great wall opposite, she seemed so young and small to be dwelling at such a place, so helpless, so solitary, that her presence appeared a cruel irony of fate.  Her homesteading was a desperate clutch at security; and her situation was utterly different from that of her friend, Imogene Martin, who viewed the matter as in the nature of a health-seeking holiday, and who was sustained by the knowledge that she had wealthy relations at Kennard to whom she could return.  Far different, indeed.  At the thought of the homesickness that at times Ruth must know, of the lonesomeness of mountain and mesa from which she must suffer, of the deprivations, the hard bareness of the life, the moments of despair, he had a sensation of the bitter unfairness of things and a desire to snatch her safe away from the harsh pass in which she stood.  It would be only right, it would be only just.

When presently she looked about and found his eyes rapt on her face, a quick blush spread over her throat and cheeks.

“I think—­think we should go home now,” she said, with a catch of her breath.

“Yes,” said he, rising.

He leaped the log on which they had been sitting and then put up a hand to help her mount.  Holding his fingers she raised herself upon the tree trunk.  But suddenly the bark gave way; she slipped, lost her balance, and pitched forward.  Lee caught her in his arms.

For an instant she rested there in his clasp, her surprised eyes gazing into his.  A quiver passed over her form.  Her lips were parted, but she had ceased to breathe.  Likewise in Bryant’s breast the breath had stopped.  A fierce passion swept him to hold her always thus, warm and close and secure.  His arms trembled at the thought; at which her eyelashes began to flutter and her breath to come once more, as hurried as the beat of her heart.  And then, yielding utterly to the swirl of mad impulse, he kissed her—­once, twice, and twice again.

Afterward he set her on her feet.

“I guess that ends our friendship,” he said, with a wavering smile.  “Lost my head altogether.  Couldn’t help it.  I looked at you and—­and it just happened.  All my will and sense vanished in an instant.  Bewitched!”