Bess, tired out and
silent, laid her head in a saddle and went to sleep between the
two dogs. Venters did not close his eyes. The canyon silence
appeared full of the low, continuous hum of insects. He listened
until the hum grew into a roar, and then, breaking the spell,
once more he heard it low and clear. He watched the stars and the
moving shadows, and always his glance returned to the girl's
dimly pale face. And he remembered how white and still it had
once looked in the starlight. And again stern thought fought his
strange fancies. Would all his labor and his love be for naught?
Would he lose her, after all? What did the dark shadow around her
portend? Did calamity lurk on that long upland trail through the
sage? Why should his heart swell and throb with nameless fear? He
listened to the silence and told himself that in the broad light
of day he could dispel this leaden-weighted dread.
At the first hint of gray over the eastern rim he awoke Bess,
saddled the burros, and began the day's travel. He wanted to get
out of the Pass before there was any chance of riders coming
down. They gained the break as the first red rays of the rising
sun colored the rim.
For once, so eager was he to get up to level ground, he did not
send Ring or Whitie in advance. Encouraging Bess to hurry pulling
at his patient, plodding burro, he climbed the soft, steep
trail.
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