Once more upon the trail, she hurried on more rapidly than before. Dawn was on its way. The jagged peaks of the mountain ahead showed faintly gray against the dark sky.
“Have to hurry,” she told herself. “Have to—”
Her thoughts broke short off and once more she sprang from the trail. Other men were coming. The night seemed filled with them.
This time, finding herself in a narrow grass grown trail that led away at an angle from the hard beaten main trail, she hurriedly tiptoed along it.
“Not another narrow escape like the last one,” she thought.
She had followed this apparently deserted trail for a hundred yards when suddenly she came upon a cabin.
Her first thought was to turn and flee. A second look told her that the place was abandoned. Two panes of glass in the single window were broken and before the door, displaying their last fiery red blossoms, two hollyhocks did sentry duty.
The door stood ajar. For a moment she hesitated before the red sentries.
“Oh, pshaw!” she whispered at last. “You dear old-fashioned guardians of a once happy home, I can pass you without cracking a stem or bruising a blossom.”
Putting out her hands, she parted the tall flowers with gentlest care, then stepped between them. For this simple ceremony, inspired by her love of beauty, she was destined in not so many hours to feel supremely grateful.