After the meal, when the girls rose to depart, Larry insisted upon accompanying them home.
"I am going along, too," laughed Sydney, "so I'll see that he gets back to camp all right! You might as well let him go, Hope."
"Well, if he is so foolish, after his hard day's ride," she said, with a shrug of the shoulders. "But get him a fresh horse, Sydney. At least we can spare the poor tired animal!"
Sydney and O'Hara both went a short distance away to get the saddle-horse which was feeding quietly on the hillside. Hope led her horse down to the water and while it was drinking Livingston came and stood beside her.
For a moment they remained there quiet, side by side, then the man spoke:
"It is of such as this that life's sweetest moments are made. It seems almost a sacrilege to break the spell, but I cannot always be silent. You know I love you, Hope!"
"Yes," she replied carelessly, "I believe you told me so once before." For an instant he did not speak. "It was here at the camp, another evening like this, wasn't it?" she continued, in quite a matter-of-fact tone.
"I will not believe that you have forgotten it," he exclaimed softly. "It may have sounded foolish to you to hear the words, but I could not help saying them!" He stood so close to her that he could feel her warm breath. "It may be wrong to stand here with you now, alone. How quiet it is! You and I together in a little world of our own! How I love you, my girl, love you! I may not have the right to this much happiness, but there is no moral law that man or God has made to prevent a man from saying to the woman he loves, 'I love you!' Are you—do you care that I have said it?"
"You must not—tell me again," she said, in a voice so forced that it seemed to belong to some other person. Then she turned abruptly and led her horse past him, up the bank of the creek, to Louisa waiting before the tent.