“No, I reckon she doesn’t hope much along that line. She has probably gone back to the wilderness for another reason,––one I never suspected until last night. And Lark-child, we won’t talk about that, not at least till I return from the ‘back of beyond’ over there,” and he pointed eastward where shafts of copper light touched the gray veil of the morning.

After his first explosion of amazement Cap Pike regarded the elopement, as he called it, very philosophically, considering his disgust over lost mules and flour and bacon.

“What did I tell you right here last night?” he demanded of Kit. “Soft as velvet and hard as hell,––that’s what I said! She looks to me like a cross between a saint in a picture frame and a love bird in a tree, and her eyes! Yet after all no man can reckon on that blood,––she is only a girl of the hills down there, and the next we hear of her she’ll likely be leaden’ a little revolution of her own.”

The young chap made no reply, but busied himself hastening a scant breakfast in order that the worn mules be got to water before the worst heat of a dry day. Also the losses to the culinary outfit did make problems for the trip.

Cap eyed him askance for a space, and then with a chuckle wilfully misconstrued his silence and lowered his tone.

“I don’t blame you for feeling downhearted on your luck, Bub, for she sure was a looker! But it’s all in a lifetime, and as you ramble along in years, you’ll find that most any hombre can steal them, and take them home, but when it comes to getting a permanent clinch on the female affections–––”

Billie, who was giving a short ration of water to the burro, called across to ask what Kit was laughing at in that hilarious way. She also stated that she did not think it a morning for hilarity, not at all! That wonderful, beautiful, mystery woman might be going to her death!

After the packs were all on, Cap Pike swung the mules of the first wagon into the home trail and passed over the mesa singing rakishly.

Oh-h! Biddy McGee has been after me,
Since I’ve been in the army!

And Billie turned in the saddle to take a last look over the trail where the woman of the emerald eyes had passed in the night.