"By George!" he ejaculated, guiltily, and then at sight of Bess's
face he laughed outright.
"A woman packed this," she repeated, fixing woeful, tragic eyes
on him.
"Well, is that a crime?'
"There--there is a woman, after all!"
"Now Bess--"
"You've lied to me!"
Then and there Venters found it imperative to postpone work for
the present. All her life Bess had been isolated, but she had
inherited certain elements of the eternal feminine.
"But there was a woman and you did lie to me," she kept
repeating, after he had explained.
"What of that? Bess, I'll get angry at you in a moment. Remember
you've been pent up all your life. I venture to say that if you'd
been out in the world you d have had a dozen sweethearts and have
told many a lie before this."
"I wouldn't anything of the kind," declared Bess,
indignantly.
"Well--perhaps not lie. But you'd have had the sweethearts--You
couldn't have helped that--being so pretty."
This remark appeared to be a very clever and fortunate one; and
the work of selecting and then of stowing all the packs in the
cave went on without further interruption.
Venters closed up the opening of the cave with a thatch of
willows and aspens, so that not even a bird or a rat could get in
to the sacks of grain. And this work was in order with the
precaution habitually observed by him. He might not be able to
get out of Utah, and have to return to the valley.
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