Her voice rose high and the hand felt for her mouth. She caught it and held it off, her head bent back straining her eyes for the face above her.
"Running away with him?"
"Yes. I couldn't go without telling you. I had to say good-by."
"Going with him forever, not coming back?"
"No, never!"
"But where—where to?"
"I don't know. In the mountains somewhere. There's a trail here he knows. It branches off to the north and goes up to the places where they get the skins."
"I don't believe you."
"It's true. The horses are waiting outside."
"Lucy, you've gone crazy. Don't—don't"— She clung to the hand she held, grasped upward at the arm. Both were cold and resistant. Her pleading struck back from the hardness of the mind made up, the irrevocable resolution.