Page:J Allan Dunn--The Girl of Ghost Mountain.djvu/72

54 groves of trees and, in the center of this gently sloping bowl, a little lake lay like a frosted silver shield. The scent of flowers came to them, flower faces looked up at them, dim in the dusk. The foot of the circling wall was heaped with talus and this was thick with pines and cedar. On a low slope beyond the lake, backed by a mass of trees, there glowed an orange star.

"Too steady for a fire," said Jackson. "It 's in a winder. D'ye suppose them two wimmen c'ud have built them a house?"

"Let's go and see," said Jackson and they put their horses to a brisk canter. Once again sound halted them, a melody, thinly exquisite, that seemed reaching out to them in welcome.

"The fiddle," said Jackson in a whisper. "Here's where we settle that bet." The air continued, as they rode up it, as one rides up the wind; surely sustained, a haunting tune that was both sad and sweet, played with tender variants by a hand that was sure and firm. It ended on a high, faint note when they were still twenty yards from the light and could see the bulk of a low log-cabin with a stone chimney at one end and a long verandah fronting the lake.

"How you goin' to rouse 'em 'thout stampedin' 'em?" asked Jackson. "They ain't expectin' us no more than no one else. Also," he added whimsically, "I allow that Big One is short-tempered. She might have a gun—an' she might be able to aim straight an' hold steady."

His question was answered for him. Somewhere