Page:MacLeod Raine - The Sheriff's Son.djvu/341

 "So you knew that all the time," he cried.

"I heard him calling you—and I went close. Yes, I knew it. But you would never have told me because it might seem like bragging."

"It was easy enough. I was n't thinking of myself, but of you. He saw I meant business and he wilted."

"You were thinking about me—and you forgot to be afraid," the girl exulted.

"Yes, that was it." A wave of happiness broke over his heart as the sunlight does across a valley at dawn. "I'm always thinking of you. Day and night you fill my thoughts, hillgirl. When I'm riding the range—whatever I do—you 're with me all the time."

"Yes."

Her lips were slightly parted, eyes eager and hungry. The heart of the girl drank in his words as the thirsty roots of a rosebush do water. She took a long deep breath and began to tremble.

"I think of you as the daughter of the sun and the wind. Some day you will be the mother of heroes, the wife of a man—"

"Yes," she prompted again, and the face lifted to his was flushed with innocent passion.

The shy invitation of her dark-lashed eyes