Kitabı oku: «The Cattle-Baron's Daughter», sayfa 20
XXVIII
LARRY RIDES TO CEDAR
A soft wind swept the prairie, which was now bare of snow. Larry rode down the trail that led through the Cedar Bluff. He was freely sprinkled with mire, for spring had come suddenly, and the frost-bleached sod was soft with the thaw; and when he pulled up on the wooden bridge to wait until Breckenridge, who appeared among the trees, should join him, the river swirled and frothed beneath. It had lately burst its icy chains, and came roaring down, seamed by lines of foam and strewn with great fragments of half-melted snow-cake that burst against the quivering piles.
“Running strong!” said Breckenridge. “Still, the water has not risen much yet, and as I crossed the big rise I saw two of Torrance’s cow-boys apparently screwing up their courage to try the ford.”
“It might be done,” said Larry. “We have one horse at Fremont that would take me across. The snow on the ranges is not melting yet, and the ice will be tolerably firm on the deep reaches; but it’s scarcely likely that we will want to swim the Cedar now.”
“No,” said Breckenridge, with a laugh, “the bridge is good enough for me. By the way, I have a note for you.”
“A note!” said Larry, with a slight hardening of his face, for of late each communication that reached him had brought him fresh anxieties.
“Well,” said Breckenridge drily, “I scarcely think this one should worry you. From the fashion in which it reached me I have a notion it’s from a lady.”
There was a little gleam in Larry’s eyes when he took the note, and Breckenridge noticed that he was very silent as they rode on. When they reached Fremont he remained a while in the stable, and when at last he entered the house Breckenridge glanced at him questioningly.
“You have something on your mind,” he said. “What have you been doing, Larry?”
Grant smiled curiously. “Giving the big bay a rub down. I’m riding to Cedar Range to-night.”
“Have you lost your head?” Breckenridge stared at him. “Muller saw the Sheriff riding in this morning, and it’s more than likely he is at the Range. You are wanted rather more badly than ever just now, Larry.”
Grant’s face was quietly resolute as he took out the note and passed it to his companion. “I have tried to do my duty by the boys; but I am going to Cedar to-night.”
Breckenridge opened the note, which had been written the previous day, and read, “In haste. Come to the bluff beneath the Range – alone – nine to-morrow night.”
Then, he stared at the paper in silence until Grant, who watched him almost jealously, took it from him. “Yes,” he said, though his face was thoughtful, “of course, you must go. You are quite sure of the writing?”
Grant smiled, as it were, compassionately. “I would recognize it anywhere!”
“Well,” said Breckenridge significantly, “that is perhaps not very astonishing, though I fancy some folks would find it difficult. The ‘In haste’ no doubt explains the thing, but it seems to me the last of it does not quite match the heading.”
“It is smeared – thrust into the envelope wet,” Larry said.
Breckenridge rose, and walked, with no apparent purpose, across the room. “Larry,” he said, “Tom and I will come with you. No – you wait a minute. Of course, I know there are occasions on which one’s friends’ company is superfluous – distinctly so; but we could pull up and wait behind the bluff – quite a long way off, you know.”
“I was told to come alone.” Larry turned upon him sharply.
Breckenridge made a gesture of resignation. “Then I’m not going to stay here most of the night by myself. It’s doleful. I’ll ride over to Muller’s now.”
“Will it be any livelier there?”
Breckenridge wondered whether Larry had noticed anything unusual in his voice, and managed to laugh. “A little,” he said. “The fräulein is pretty enough in the lamplight to warrant one listening to a good deal about Menotti and the franc tireurs. She makes really excellent coffee, too,” and he slipped out before Grant could ask any more questions.
Darkness was just closing down when the latter rode away. There was very little of the prairie broncho in the big horse beneath him, whose sire had brought the best blood that could be imported into that country, and he had examined every buckle of girth and headstall as he fastened them. He also rode, for lightness, in a thin deerskin jacket which fitted him closely, with a rifle across his saddle, gazing with keen eyes across the shadowy waste when now and then a half-moon came out. Once he also drew bridle and sat still a minute listening, for he fancied he heard the distant beat of hoofs, and then went on with a little laugh at his credulity. The Cedar was roaring in its hollow and the birches moaning in a bluff, but as the damp wind that brought the blood to his cheeks sank, there was stillness save for the sound of the river, and Grant decided that his ears had deceived him.
It behooved him to be cautious, for he knew the bitterness of the cattle-men against him, and the Sheriff’s writ still held good; but Hetty had sent for him, and if his enemies had lain in wait in every bluff and hollow he would have gone.
While he rode, troubled by vague apprehensions, which now and then gave place to exultation that set his heart throbbing, Hetty sat with Miss Schuyler in her room at Cedar Range. An occasional murmur of voices reached them faintly from the big hall below where Torrance and some of his neighbours sat with the Sheriff over their cigars and wine, and the girls knew that a few of the most daring horsemen among the cow-boys had their horses saddled ready. Hetty lay in a low chair with a book she was not reading on her knee, and Miss Schuyler, glancing at her now and then over the embroidery she paid almost as little attention to, noticed the weariness in her face and the anxiety in her eyes. She laid down her needle when Torrance’s voice came up from below.
“What can they be plotting, Hetty?” she said. “Horses ready, that most unpleasant Sheriff smiling cunningly as he did when I passed him talking to Clavering, and the sense of expectancy. It’s there. One could hear it in their voices, even if one had not seen their faces, and when I met your father at the head of the stairs he almost frightened me. Of course, he was not theatrical – he never is – but I know that set of his lips and look in his eyes, and have more than a fancy it means trouble for somebody. I suppose he has not told you anything – in fact, he seems to have kept curiously aloof from both of us lately.”
Hetty turned towards her with a little spot of colour in her cheek and apprehension in her eyes.
“So you have noticed it, too!” she said very slowly. “Of course, he has been busy and often away, while I know how anxious he must be; but when he is at home he scarcely speaks to me – and then, there is something in his voice that hurts me. I’m ’most afraid he has found out that I have been talking to Larry.”
Miss Schuyler smiled. “Well,” she said, “that – alone – would not be such a very serious offence.”
The crimson showed plainer in Hetty’s cheek and there was a faint ring in her voice. “Flo,” she said, “don’t make me angry – I can’t bear it to-night. Something is going to happen – I can feel it is – and you don’t know my father even yet. He is so horribly quiet, and I’m afraid of as well as sorry for him. It is a long while ago, but he looked just as he does now – only not quite so grim – during my mother’s last illness. Oh, I know there is something worrying him, and he will not tell me – though he was always kind before, even when he was angry. Flo, this horrible trouble can’t go on for ever!”
Hetty had commenced bravely, but she faltered as she proceeded, and Miss Schuyler, who saw her distress, had risen and was standing with one hand on her shoulder when the maid came in. She cast a hasty glance at her mistress, and appeared, Flora Schuyler fancied, embarrassed, and desirous of concealing it.
“Mr. Torrance will excuse you coming down again,” she said. “He may have some of the Sheriff’s men and one or two of the cow-boys in, and would sooner you kept your room. Are you likely to want me in the next half-hour?”
“No,” said Hetty. “No doubt you are anxious to find out what is going on.”
The maid went out, and Miss Schuyler fixed anxious eyes on her companion. “What is the matter with the girl, Hetty?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Did you notice anything?”
“Yes. I think she had something on her mind. Any way, she was unexplainably anxious to get away from you.”
Hetty smiled somewhat bitterly. “Then she is only like the rest. Everybody at Cedar is anxious about something now.”
Flora Schuyler rose, and, flinging the curtains behind her, looked out at the night. The moon was just showing through a rift in the driving cloud, and she could see the bluff roll blackly down to the white frothing of the river. She also saw a shadowy object slipping through the gloom of the trees, and fancied it was a woman; but when another figure appeared for a moment in the moonlight the first one came flitting back again.
“I believe the girl has gone out to meet somebody in the bluff,” she said.
Hetty made a little impatient gesture. “It doesn’t concern us, any way.”
Miss Schuyler sat down again and made no answer, though she had misgivings, and five or ten minutes passed silently, until there was a tapping at the door, and the maid came in, very white in the face. She clutched at the nearest chair-back, and stood still, apparently incapable of speech, until, with a visible effort, she said: “Somebody must go and send him away. He is waiting in the bluff.”
Hetty rose with a little scream, but Flora Schuyler was before her, and laid her hand upon the maid’s arm.
“Now, try to be sensible,” she said sternly. “Who is in the bluff?”
The girl shivered. “It is not my fault – I didn’t know what they wanted until the Sheriff came. I tried to tell him, but Joe saw me. Go right now, and send him away.”
Hetty was very white and trembling, but Flora Schuyler nipped the maid’s arm.
“Keep quiet, and answer just what we ask you!” she said. “Who is in the bluff?”
“Mr. Grant,” said the girl, with a gasp. “But don’t ask me anything. Send him away. They’ll kill him. Oh, you are hurting me!”
Flora Schuyler shook her. “How did he come there?”
“I took Miss Torrance’s letter, and wrote the rest of it. I didn’t know they meant to do him any harm, but they made me write. I had to – he said he would marry me.”
The maid writhed in an agony of fear, but she stood still shivering when Hetty turned towards her with a blanched face that emphasized the ominous glow in her dark eyes.
“You wicked woman!” she said. “How dare you tell me that?”
“I mean Mr. Clavering. Oh – !”
The maid stopped abruptly, for Flora Schuyler drove her towards the door. “Go and undo your work,” she said. “Slip down at the back of the bluff.”
“I daren’t – I tried,” and the girl quivered in Miss Schuyler’s grasp. “If I could have warned him I would not have told you; but Joe saw me, and I was afraid. I told him to come at nine.”
It was evident that she was capable of doing very little just then, and Flora Schuyler drew her out into the corridor.
“Go straight to your room and stay there,” she said, and closing the door, glanced at Hetty. “It is quite simple. This woman has taken your note-paper and written Larry. He is in the bluff now, and I think she is right. Your friends mean to make him prisoner or shoot him.”
“Stop, and go away,” said Hetty hoarsely. “I am going to him.”
Flora Schuyler placed her back to the door, and raised her hand. “No,” she said, very quietly. “It would be better if I went in place of you. Sit down, and don’t lose your head, Hetty!”
Hetty seized her arm. “You can’t – how could I let you? Larry belongs to me. Let me go. Every minute is worth ever so much.”
“There are twenty of them yet. He has come too early,” said Flora Schuyler, with a glance at the clock. “Any way, you must understand what you are going to do. It was Clavering arranged this, but your father knew what he was doing and I think he knows everything. If you leave this house to-night, Hetty, everybody will know you warned Larry, and it will make a great difference to you. It will gain you the dislike of all your friends and place a barrier between you and your father which, I think, will never be taken away again!”
Hetty laughed a very bitter laugh, and then grew suddenly quiet.
“Stand aside, Flo,” she said. “Nobody but Larry wants me now.”
Miss Schuyler saw that she was determined, and drew aside. “Then,” she said, with a little quiver in her voice, “because I think he is in peril you must go, my dear. But we must be very careful, and I am coming with you as far as I dare.”
She closed the door, and then her composure seemed to fail her as they went out into the corridor; and it was Hetty who, treading very softly, took the lead. Flitting like shadows, they reached the head of the stairway, and stopped a moment there, Hetty’s heart beating furiously. The passage beneath them was shadowy, but a blaze of light and a jingle of glasses came out of the half-opened door of the hall, where Torrance sat with his guests; and while they waited, they heard his voice and recognized the vindictive ring in it. Hetty trembled as she grasped the bannister.
“Flo,” she said, “they may come out in a minute. We have got to slip by somehow.”
They went down the stairway with skirts drawn close about them, in swift silence, and Hetty held her breath as she flitted past the door. There was a faint swish of draperies as Flora Schuyler followed her, but the murmur of voices drowned it; and in another minute Hetty had opened a door at the back of the building. Then, she gasped with relief as she felt the cold wind on her face, and, with Miss Schuyler close behind her, crept through the shadow of the house towards the bluff. When the gloom of the trees closed about them, she clutched her companion’s shoulder.
“No,” she said hoarsely, “not that way. Joe is watching there. We must go right through the bluff and down the opposite side of it.”
They floundered forward, sinking ankle-deep in withered leaves and clammy mould, tripping over rotting branches that ripped their dresses, and stumbling into dripping undergrowth. There was no moon now, and it was very dark, and more than once Flora Schuyler valiantly suppressed the scream that would have been a vast relief to her, and struggled on as silently as she could behind her companion; but it seemed to her that anybody a mile away could have heard them. Then, a little trail led them out of the bluff on the opposite side to the house, and the roar of the river grew louder as they hastened on, still in the gloom of the trees, until something a little blacker than the shadows behind it grew into visibility; and when it moved a little, Flora Schuyler touched Hetty’s arm.
“Yes,” she said. “It is Larry. If I didn’t know the kind of man he is, I would not let you go. Kiss me, Hetty.”
Hetty stood still a second, for she understood, and then very quietly put both hands on Flora Schuyler’s shoulders and kissed her.
“It can’t be very wrong; and you have been a good friend, Flo,” she said.
She turned, and Flora Schuyler, standing still, saw her slim figure flit across a strip of frost-bleached sod as the moon shone through.
XXIX
HETTY DECIDES
It was in a pale flash of silvery light that Larry saw the girl against the gloom of the trees. The moaning of the birches and roar of the river drowned the faint sound her footsteps made, and she came upon him so suddenly, statuesque and slender in her trailing evening dress and etherealized by the moonlight, that as he looked down on the blanched whiteness of her upturned face, emphasized by the dusky hair, he almost fancied she had materialized out of the harmonies of the night. For a moment he sat motionless, with the rifle glinting across his saddle, and a tightening grip of the bridle as the big horse flung up its head, and then, with a sudden stirring of his blood, moved his foot in the stirrup and would have swung himself down if Hetty had not checked him.
“No!” she said. “Back into the shadow of the trees!”
Larry, seeing the fear in her face, touched the horse with his heel, and wheeled it with its head towards the house. He could see the warm gleam from the windows between the birches. Then, he turned to the girl, who stood gasping at his stirrup.
“You sent for me, dear, and I have come. Can’t you give me just a minute now?” he said.
“No,” said Hetty breathlessly, “you must go. The Sheriff is here waiting for you!”
Larry laughed a little scornful laugh, and slackening the bridle, sat still, looking down on her very quietly.
“I don’t understand,” he said. “You sent for me!”
“No,” the girl again gasped. “Oh, Larry, go away! Clavering and the others who are most bitter against you are in the house.”
Instinctively Larry moved his hand on the rifle and glanced towards the building. He could see it dimly, but no sound from it reached him, and Hetty, looking up, saw his face grow stern.
“Still,” he persisted, with a curious quietness, “somebody sent a note to me!”
“Yes,” said Hetty, turning away from him, “it was my wicked maid. Clavering laid the trap for you.”
The man sat very still a moment, and then bent with a swift resoluteness towards his companion.
“And you came to warn me?” he said. “Hetty, dear, look up.”
Hetty glanced at him and saw the glow in his eyes, but she clenched her hand, and would have struck the horse in an agony of fear if Larry had not touched him with his heel and swung a pace away from her.
“Oh,” she gasped, “why will you waste time! Larry, they will kill you if they find you.”
Once more the little scornful smile showed upon Grant’s lips, but it vanished and Hetty saw only the light in his eyes.
“Listen a moment, dear,” he said. “I have tried to do the square thing, but I think to-night’s work relieves me of the obligation. Hetty, can’t you see that your father would never give you to me, and you must choose between us sooner or later? I have waited a long while, and would try to wait longer if it would relieve you of the difficulty, but you will have to make the decision, and it can’t be harder now than it would be in the future. Promise me you will go back to New York with Miss Schuyler, and stay with her until I come for you.”
Hetty trembled visibly, and the moonlight showed the crimson in her cheeks; but she looked up at him bravely. “Larry,” she said, “you are sure – quite sure – you want me, and will be kind to me?”
The man bent his head solemnly. “My dear, I have longed for you for eight weary years – and I think you could trust me.”
“Then,” and Hetty’s voice was very uneven, though she still met his eyes. “Larry, you can take me now.”
Larry set his lips for a moment and his face showed curiously white. “Think, my dear!” he said hoarsely. “It would not be fair to you. Miss Schuyler will take you away in a week or two, and I will come for you. I dare not do anything you may be sorry for; and they may find you are not in the house. You must go home before my strength gives way.”
The emotion she had struggled with swept Hetty away. “Go home!” she said passionately. “They wanted to kill you – and I can never go back now. If I did, they would know I had warned you – and believe – Can’t you understand, Larry?”
Then, the situation flashed upon Grant, and he recognized, as Hetty had done, that she had cast herself adrift when she left the house to warn him. He knew the cattle-baron’s vindictiveness, and that his daughter had committed an offence he could not forgive. That left but one escape from the difficulty, and it was the one his own passions, which he had striven to crush down, urged him to.
“Then,” he said in a strained voice, “you must come with me. We can be married to-morrow.”
Hetty held up her hands to him. “I am ready. Oh, be quick. They may come any minute!”
Larry swept his glance towards the house, and saw a shaft of radiance stream out as the great door opened. Then, he heard Flora Schuyler’s voice, and, leaning downwards from the saddle, grasped both the girl’s hands.
“Yes,” he said, very quietly, “they are coming now. Spring when I lift you. Your foot on my foot – I have you!”
It was done. Hetty was active and slender, the man muscular, and both had been taught, not only to ride, but master the half-wild broncho by a superior daring and an equal agility, in a land where the horse is not infrequently roped and thrown before it is mounted. But Larry breathed hard as, with his arm about her waist, he held the girl in front of him, and felt her cheek hot against his lips. The next moment he pressed his heels home and the big horse swung forward under its double burden.
A shout rang out behind them, and there was a crackling in the bluff. Then, a rifle flashed, and just as a cloud drove across the moon, another cry rose up:
“Quit firing. He has the girl with him!”
Larry fancied he could hear men floundering behind him amidst the trees, and a trampling of hoofs about the house, but as he listened another rifle flashed away to the right of them on the prairie, and a beat of hoofs followed it that for a moment puzzled him. He laughed huskily.
“Breckenridge! He’ll draw them off,” he said. “Hold fast! We have got to face the river.”
It was very evident that he had not a second to lose. Mounted men were crashing recklessly through the bluff and more of them riding at a gallop across the grassy slope; but the darkness hid them as it hid the fugitives, and the big horse held on, until there was a plunge and a splashing, and they were in the river. Larry slipped from the saddle, and Hetty saw him floundering by the horse’s head as she thrust her foot into the stirrup.
“Slack your bridle,” he said sharply. “The beast will bring us through.”
The command came when it was needed, for Hetty was almost dismayed, and its curtness was bracing. There was no moon now, but she could dimly see the white swirling of the flood, and the gurgling roar of it throbbed about her hoarse and threatening, suggesting the perils the darkness hid. Her light skirt trailed in the water, and a shock of icy cold ran through her as one shoe dipped under. Larry was on his feet yet, but there was a fierce white frothing about him, and when in another pace or two he slipped down she broke into a stifled scream. The next moment she saw his face again faintly white beneath her amidst the sliding foam, and fancied that he was swimming or being dragged along. The horse, she felt, had lost its footing, and had its head up stream. How long this lasted she did not know, but it seemed an interminable time, and the dull roar of the water grew louder and deafened her, while the blackness that closed in became insupportable.
“Larry!” she gasped. “Larry, are you there!”
A faintly heard voice made answer, and Grant appeared again, shoulder-deep in the flood, while the dipping and floundering of the beast beneath her showed that the hoofs had found uncertain hold; but that relief only lasted a moment, and they were once more sliding down-stream, until, when they swung round in an eddy, the head that showed now and then dimly beside her stirrup was lost altogether, and in an agony of terror the girl cried aloud.
There was no answer, but after a horrible moment or two had passed a half-seen arm and shoulder rose out of the flood, and the sudden drag on the bridle that slipped from her fingers was very reassuring. The horse plunged and floundered, and once more Hetty felt her dragging skirt was clear of the water.
“Through the worst!” a voice that reached her faintly said, and they were splashing on again, the water growing shallower all the time until they scrambled out upon the opposite bank. Then, the man checking the horse, stood by her stirrup, pressing the water from the hem of her skirt, rubbing the little open shoe with his handkerchief, which was saturated. Even in that hour of horror Hetty laughed.
“Larry,” she said, “don’t be ridiculous. You couldn’t dry it that way in a week. Lift me down instead.”
Larry held up his hands to her, for on that side of the river the slope to the level was steep, and when he swung her down the girl kissed him lightly on either cheek.
“That was because of what we have been through, dear,” she said. “There was a horrible moment, when I could not see you anywhere.”
She stopped and held up her hand as though listening, and Larry laughed softly as a faint drumming of hoofs came back to them through the roar of the flood.
“Breckenridge! He must have Muller or somebody with him, and they are chasing him,” he said. “I didn’t know he was following me, but he is gaining us valuable time, and we will push on again. Your friends will find out they are following the wrong man very soon, but we should get another horse at Muller’s before they can ride round by the bridge.”
They scrambled up the slope, and after Hetty mounted Larry ran with his hand on the stirrup for a while, until once more he made the staunch beast carry a double load. He was running again when they came clattering up to Muller’s homestead and the fräulein, who was apparently alone, stared at them in astonishment when she opened the door. The water still dripped from Larry, and Hetty’s light, bedraggled dress clung about her, while the moisture trickled from her little open-fronted shoes. She was hatless, and loosened wisps of dusky hair hung low about her face, which turned faintly crimson under the fräulein’s gaze.
“Miss Torrance!” exclaimed the girl.
“Well,” said Larry quietly, “she will be Mrs. Grant to-morrow if you will lend me a horse and not mention the fact that you have seen us when Torrance’s boys come round. Where is your father?”
Miss Muller nodded with comprehending sympathy. “He two hours since with Mr. Breckenridge go,” she said. “There is new horse in the stable, and you on the rack a saddle for lady find.”
Larry was outside in a moment, and a smile crept into the fräulein’s blue eyes. “He is of the one thing at the time alone enabled to think,” she said. “It is so with the man, but a dress with the water soaked is not convenient to ride at night in.”
She led Hetty into her own room, and when Larry, who had spent some time changing one of the saddles, came back, he stared in astonishment at Hetty, who sat at the table. She now wore, among other garments that were too big for her, a fur cap and coarse, serge skirt. There was a steaming cup of coffee in front of her.
“Now, that shows how foolish one can be,” he said. “I was clean forgetting about the clothes; but we must start again.”
Hetty rose up, and with a little blush held out the cup. “You are wet to the neck, Larry, and it will do you good,” she said. “If you don’t mind – we needn’t wait until Miss Muller gets another cup.”
Larry’s eyes gleamed. “I have run over most of Europe, but they grow no wine there that was half as nice as the tea we made in the black can back there in the bluff. Quite often in those days we hadn’t a cup at all.”
He drank, and forthwith turned his head away, while a quiver seemed to run through him; but when Hetty moved towards him the fräulein laughed.
“It nothing is,” she said. “It is, perhaps, the effect tobacco have, but the mouth is soft in a man.”
Then, as Larry turned towards them she laid her hands on Hetty’s shoulders, and kissed her gravely. “You have trust in him,” she said. “It is of no use afraid to be. I quick take a man like Mr. Grant when he ask me.”
The next moment they were outside, and when he helped her to the saddle, Hetty glanced shyly at her companion. “The fräulein is right,” she said. “But, Larry, will you tell me – where we are going?”
“To Windsor. I have still good friends there. That is the prosaic fact, but there is ever so much behind it. We can’t see the trail just now, dear, but we are riding out into the future that has all kinds of brightness in store.”
A silvery gleam fell on the girl as a billow of cloud rolled slowly from a rift of blue, and she laughed almost exultantly.
“Larry,” she said, “it is coming true. Of course, it’s a portent. There’s the darkness going and the moon shining through. Oh, I have done with misgiving now!”
She shook the bridle, and swept from him at a gallop, and the thaw-softened sod was whirling in clods behind them when Larry drew level with her. He knew it was not prudent, but the fever in his blood mastered his reason, and he sent the stockrider’s cry ringing across the levels as they sped on through the night. The damp wind screamed by them, lashing their hot cheeks, the beat of hoofs swelled into a roar as they swept through a shadowy bluff, and driving cloud and rift of indigo flitted past above. Beneath, the long, frost-bleached levels, gleaming silvery grey now under the moon, flitted back to the drumming hoofs, while willow clump and straggling birches rose up, and rushed by, blurred and shadowy.
They were young, and the cares that must be faced again on the morrow had, for a brief space, fallen from them. They had bent to the strain to the breaking point, and now it had gone, everything was forgotten but the love each bore the other. All senses were merged in it, and while the exaltation lasted there was no room for thought or fear. It was, however, the man who remembered first, for a few dark patches caught his eye when they went at a headlong gallop down the slope.
“Pull him!” he cried hoarsely. “’Ware badger holes! Swing to the right-wide!”
The girl swerved, but she still held on with loose bridle, until Larry, swaying in his saddle, clutched at it. Then, as he swung upright, half a length ahead, with empty hands, she flung herself a trifle backwards and there was a brief struggle; but it was at a trot they climbed the opposite slope.
“Now,” she said, with a happy little laugh, “we are sensible once more; but, while I knew it couldn’t last, I wanted to gallop on for ever. Larry, I wonder if we will ever feel just the same again? There are enjoyments that can’t come to anyone more than once.”
