The old man rode along in silence.
"And from what you say," finished Wayland, "he evidently didn't mean any harm to come to the boy; but that is always the way with this cursed system. You're law breaking law-makers, your divine-right-king-crooks out here—don't plan crime. They only plan to have their own way. It's like a man breaking down a dam to get a little water. When the floods burst through the break, he thinks it isn't his fault."
"That's what some of our Scotch kings thought; we took their heads off just the same."
"Well, if we can get our people wakened up, we'll take a few heads off, too, at election time." He touched his pony to a brisk trot across the meadow, following the mule as it dodged in and out among the larches, up over a saddle back and down again thwarting a long bare hollow.
Wayland saw the light come sifting in gold dust. Somehow, the warmth of it swept round him in a consciousness of that night on the Ridge. It was like the snow flakes she talked about, sculpturing the rocks, shaping destiny. Would the day ever come when they two could ride forth adventuring happiness together? The hammer of a woodpecker, the resinous tang of the gold-dust air, the shaking of the evergreen needles like gypsy tambourines—filled him with an absurd sense of the joy of life; and he could never drink the joy of these things without thinking of her; for the consciousness of her presence, of the warm glow of her love, enveloped all now, permeated his being, a life inside his life, blended of his own.
"A don't like the way that mule o' yours keeps lookin' ahead with both ears, Wayland! It's all-fired quiet here, for noon-hour when the streams should be shouting. There is something mighty queer and still in this air. Yon saucy woodpecker has quit drillin'! Hold back a bit! A'm goin' ahead! A've known these mountains longer than you have," and curving through the brushwood, the old frontiersman came out ahead of the pack leader.
The little mule had undoubtedly followed a kind of trail. Though the grasses were saddle-high, punky logs showed the fresh rip of shod horses. Little mossy streams betrayed roiled water and stones over-turned. Then, the path emerged from the trees so abruptly you could have drawn a line along the edge of the timber, out to a great hollowed slope, wind-blown, bare of rocks, clear of trees as if levelled by a giant trowel; hushed, preternaturally hushed, the Ranger thought as he came up abreast and glanced to the top of the long slope where the snows glistened over the edge of the rocks heavy and white.
"This is what we heard last night! See, Wayland, the snow up there has been breakin'! It sags! Got its fore feet forward for a race down one of these days!"
Both men became aware of something portentous and heavy in the silence: it was mid-day; but there was no noon-time shout of disimprisoned waters. Not a crossbill, not a jay, neither eagle nor hawk, showed against the azure fields of sky and snow. A little riffle as of waiting fluttered through the grasses and leaves. Wayland was looking with dumb amazement at the great field of laurel in bloom across the slope; three or four miles of it, leaves of green wax in the sun, flowers passion pale, motionless, waiting; what was it he missed? The insect life; there were neither butterflies nor bees rifling the fields of honey bloom; the flowers, acres and acres of them, stood passion pale, motionless waiting—waiting what? Then, there was a singing in his ears, a weird strange undertone to the hush of the forest behind them. His breath came heavy. The old man was speaking in a muffled voice.
"See, boy, there are three men on the other side! They are signalling."