Page:MacLeod Raine - The Sheriff's Son.djvu/126

 pictures of each other. They gathered wild flowers. They talked as eagerly as children. Somehow the bars were down between them. The girl had lost the manner of sullen resentment that had impressed him yesterday. She was gay and happy and vivid. Wild roses bloomed in her cheeks. For this young man belonged to the great world outside in which she was so interested. Other topics than horses and cattle and drinking-bouts were the themes of his talk. He had been to theaters and read books and visited large cities. His coming had enriched life for her.

The trail took them past a grove of young aspens which blocked the mouth of a small cañon by the thickness of the growth.

"Do you see any way in?" Beulah asked her companion.

"No. The trees are like a wall. There is not an open foot by which one could enter."

"Is n't there?" She laughed. "There's a way in just the same. You see that big rock over to the left. A trail drops down into the aspens back of it. A man lives in the gulch, an ex-convict. His name is Dan Meldrum."

"I expect he is n't troubled much with visitors."