Page:Man's Country (1923).pdf/187

 and they left their first quarrel well behind them as they raced each other up the mountain side. Two hours later they looked serenely out upon a placid world from the bald peak itself.

But coming down the mountain, they found, was ever so much swifter and more exciting than going up, and hand in hand, like two children, laughing, shrieking, gamboling, they came—spent and utterly unconscious of the presence of other beings in their world—to where the path branched off and up to their cottage steps. Here they flung themselves panting on the sod, exhausted but still in playful mood. When this playfulness did not subside, there came from above them an embarrassed cough, and Fay, flushing, started up.

Her indignant eyes encountered, on the porch of the cottage, Blakeley, waiting to get his letters signed.

George went up to sign them while Fay remained on the sod, frowning, fuming, kicking an occasional disgusted heel in air. How she hated Blakeley! In him she saw the first personalization of an impersonal rival—a monstrous thing that would take her husband from her if it could.

"Now that's done with!" called George at length to Fay, still sulking on the sod. "Business hours are over."

"Well, I should hope so," responded Fay