"Oh, don't, don't!" I cried.
"Dan, put her down!" commanded Polly.
The only reply was a gay laugh as we bounded away. Dan slackened a moment and settled me, holding one arm tight about me, and then we went on that loping gait that seems like the motion of long swells. It almost took my breath away.
The sun had set in vague levels of dun, purple clouds, now making a gradual darkening of the atmosphere, though it did not betoken any coming storm. All about was softened, not like a fog, but a tenuous veil. The stubble stretched out like a sea, and seemed to light the path, but presently we came to the coarse prairie grass, at which Chita gave a snort of disdain. On and on we flew. It was unlike anything in my narrow experience. I had no thought, no care, no fear, it was exhilarating, fascinating. Were we riding into the night and the unknown? For the pale yellow edges of the level bars had vanished, it was all smooth darkness over to the westward. And then a narrow golden crescent hung out in the sky. All the eastward was growing bluer with the suggestion of infinite space.
It was afterward, many a time, that I recalled this wild ride, the weird loneliness, the penetrating silence in which one feels what bated breath means.
"So, girlie, so," said a soft voice that recalled Norman, and Chita slackened her pace, came to a standstill.
"Are you afraid?" He almost pressed the breath out of me.
There was a cry of some wild animal. It seemed to smite the night like blows, growing fainter at the end, but I shivered.
Dan drew me up closer. I could feel his heart beat against my back.
"No, I am not afraid." Somehow I was not with him.