Then he buried the memory of Fay Larkin.

Next day Shefford threw himself with all the boy left in him into the work and play of the village.  He helped the women and made games for the children.  And he talked or listened.  In the early evening he called on Ruth, chatted awhile, and went on to see Joan, and from her to another.  When the valley became shrouded in darkness he went unseen down the path to Mary’s lonely home.

She was there, a white shadow against the black.

When she replied to his greeting her voice seemed full, broken, eager to express something that would not come.  She was happier to see him than she should have been, Shefford thought.  He talked, swiftly, eloquently, about whatever he believed would interest her.  He stayed long, and finally left, not having seen her face except in pale starlight and shadow; and the strong clasp of her hand remained with him as he went away under the pinyons.

Days passed swiftly.  Joe Lake did not return.  The Indian rode in and out of camp, watered and guarded the pack-burros and the mustangs.  Shefford grew strong and active.  He made gardens for the women; he cut cords of fire-wood; he dammed the brook and made an irrigation ditch; he learned to love these fatherless children, and they loved him.

In the afternoons there was leisure for him and for the women.  He had no favorites, and let the occasion decide what he should do and with whom he should be.  They had little parties at the cottages and picnics under the cedars.  He rode up and down the valley with Ruth, who could ride a horse as no other girl he had ever seen.  He climbed with Hester.  He walked with Joan.  Mostly he contrived to include several at once in the little excursions, though it was not rare for him to be out alone with one.

It was not a game he was playing.  More and more, as he learned to know these young women, he liked them better, he pitied them, he was good for them.  It shamed him, hurt him, somehow, to see how they tried to forget something when they were with him.  Not improbably a little of it was coquetry, as natural as a laugh to any pretty woman.  But that was not what hurt him.  It was to see Ruth or Rebecca, as the case might be, full of life and fun, thoroughly enjoying some jest or play, all of a sudden be strangely recalled from the wholesome pleasure of a girl to become a deep and somber woman.  The crimes in the name of religion!  How he thought of the blood and the ruin laid at the door of religion!  He wondered if that were so with Nas Ta Bega’s religion, and he meant to find out some day.  The women he liked best he imagined the least religious, and they made less effort to attract him.

Every night in the dark he went to Mary’s home and sat with her on the porch.  He never went inside.  For all he knew, his visits were unknown to her neighbors.  Still, it did not matter to him if they found out.  To her he could talk as he had never talked to any one.  She liberated all his thought and fancy.  He filled her mind.