Well, that was the end of it! As far as he was concerned, Dorothy Ray had ceased to exist; the past had ceased to exist, the pleasant past, with its deceitful mists and bewildering sunbeams. Things out here were crude, but they were real! He got on his feet and turned about once more. Between Mt. Washington and the range was a fertile ranch; broad fields of vivid alfalfa, big barns, pastures dotted with cattle; a line of light-green cottonwoods ran along the borders of the creek. What was that about the wilderness blossoming like the rose? He turned again and looked toward the barren hillocks. Even they, dead and inhospitable as they appeared at a little distance, afforded nourishment for cactus and painter's-brush, prickly poppy and hardy vetches. Dorothy Ray might do as she pleased,—his fortune might go where it would! That need not be the end of all things. Life, to be sure, might seem a little like a game of chess after the loss of the Queen! Pretty tough work it was likely to be to save the game, but none the less worth while for all that. He wondered what his next move would be,—and meanwhile, before recommencing the game, why not seize the most obvious outlet for his newly roused energies, by tearing down the hill at a break-neck gallop and clearing the wire fence at a bound!
"Took you for a jack-rabbit!" said a gruff voice close at hand, as he landed on his two feet by the dusty roadside.
"Not a bad thing to be," Wakefield panted, falling in step with the speaker, who was walking toward the town at a brisk pace.
"Not unless the dogs are round," the stranger demurred.
"Dogs! A jack-rabbit would never know how game he was, if it wasn't for the dogs!"
"Any on your track?" asked the man with a grin. "Looked like it when you come walluping down the mounting!"
"A whole pack of them," Wakefield answered. "Didn't you see anything of them?"
"Can't say I did."
"You're not so smart as you look, then;" and they went jogging on like comrades of a year's standing.
The new acquaintance appeared to be a man of sixty or thereabouts. A crowbar and shovel which he carried over his shoulder seemed a part of his rough laborer's costume. He had a shrewd, good sort of face, and a Yankee twang to his speech.