“I must push on to the railroad,” he said, and he held the hand she gave him in a firm clasp. “Miss Waynefleet, you saved my life, and I believe I owe you quite as much in other ways. It’s a fact that neither of us can attempt to disregard. I want you to promise that you will, at least, not leave the ranch without telling me.”
Laura flashed a quick glance at him, and perhaps she saw more than he suspected in his insistent gaze, for she strove to draw her hand away. He held it fast, however, while his nerves thrilled and his heart beat 295 furiously. He remembered Violet Hamilton vaguely, but there came upon him a compelling desire to draw this girl to whom he owed so much into his arms and comfort her. They both stood very still a moment, and Nasmyth heard the snapping of the stove with a startling distinctness. Then––and it cost him a strenuous effort––he let her hand go.
“You will promise,” he insisted hoarsely.
“Yes,” answered Laura, “before I go away I will tell you.”
Nasmyth went out into the blackness and the rain, while Laura sat trembling until she heard the beat of his horse’s hoofs. Then she sank lower, a limp huddled figure, in the canvas chair. The stove snapped noisily, and the pines outside set up a doleful wailing, but, except for that, it was very still in the desolate ranch.
Nasmyth rode on until he borrowed a fresh horse from a man who lived a few miles along the trail. There was a cheerful light from the windows as he rode into a little settlement, and the trail to the railroad led through dripping forest and over a towering range, but he did not draw bridle. He was aching all over, and the water ran from his garments, but he scarcely seemed to feel his weariness then, and he pushed on resolutely through the rain up the climbing trail.
He remembered very little of that ride afterwards, or what he thought about during it. The strain of the last few minutes he had passed at Waynefleet’s ranch had left him dazed, and part of his numbness, at least, was due to weariness. Several times he was almost flung from the saddle as the horse scrambled down a slope of rock. Willow-branches lashed him as he pushed through the thickets, and in one place it was only by a grim effort that he drove the frightened beast to ford a flooded creek. Then there was a strip of hillside to be skirted, where the slope was almost sheer beneath 296 the edge of the winding trail, and the rain that drove up the valley beat into his eyes. Still he held on, and two hours after sunrise rode half asleep into the little mining town. There was a train in the station, and, turning the horse over to a man he met, he climbed, dripping as he was, into a car.