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“I was only getting at my purse and my revolver,” he said, showing them. “I’ve got to get some stores at the Ferry by daylight.”

Mornie sighed. “I’m giving you great trouble, Rand, I know; but it won’t be for long.”

He muttered something, took her hand again, and bade her “good-night.” When he reached the door, he looked back. The light was shining full upon her face as she lay there, with her babe on her breast, bravely “looking ahead.”

IV.

THE CLOUDS PASS.

It was early morning at the Ferry. The “up coach” had passed, with lights unextinguished, and the “outsides” still asleep. The ferryman had gone up to the Ferry Mansion House, swinging his lantern, and had found the sleepy-looking “all night” bar-keeper on the point of withdrawing for the day on a mattress under the bar. An Indian half-breed, porter of the Mansion House, was washing out the stains of recent nocturnal dissipation from the bar-room and veranda; a few birds were twittering on the cotton-woods beside the river; a bolder few had alighted upon the veranda, and were trying to reconcile the existence of so much lemon-peel and cigar-stumps with their ideas of a beneficent Creator. A faint earthly freshness and perfume rose along the river banks. Deep shadow still lay upon the opposite shore; but in the distance, four miles away, Morning along the level crest of Table Mountain walked with rosy tread.

The sleepy bar-keeper was that morning doomed to disappointment; for scarcely had the coach passed, when steps were heard upon the veranda, and a weary, dusty traveller threw his blanket and knapsack to the porter, and then dropped into a vacant arm-chair, with his eyes fixed on the distant crest of Table Mountain. He remained motionless for some time, until the bar-keeper, who had already concocted the conventional welcome of the Mansion House, appeared with it in a glass, put it upon the table, glanced at the stranger, and then, thoroughly awake, cried out,–

“Ruth Pinkney–or I’m a Chinaman!”

The stranger lifted his eyes wearily. Hollow circles were around their orbits; haggard lines were in his checks. But it was Ruth.

He took the glass, and drained it at a single draught. “Yes,” he said absently, “Ruth Pinkney,” and fixed his eyes again on the distant rosy crest.

“On your way up home?” suggested the bar-keeper, following the direction of Ruth’s eyes.

“Perhaps.”

“Been upon a pasear, hain’t yer? Been havin’ a little tear round Sacramento,–seein’ the sights?”

Ruth smiled bitterly. “Yes.”

The bar-keeper lingered, ostentatiously wiping a glass. But Ruth again became abstracted in the mountain, and the barkeeper turned away.

How pure and clear that summit looked to him! how restful and steadfast with serenity and calm! how unlike his own feverish, dusty, travel-worn self! A week had elapsed since he had last looked upon it,–a week of disappointment, of anxious fears, of doubts, of wild imaginings, of utter helplessness. In his hopeless quest of the missing Mornie, he had, in fancy, seen this serene eminence haunting his remorseful, passion-stricken soul. And now, without a clew to guide him to her unknown hiding-place, he was back again, to face the brother whom he had deceived, with only the confession of his own weakness. Hard as it was to lose forever the fierce, reproachful glances of the woman he loved, it was still harder, to a man of Ruth’s temperament, to look again upon the face of the brother he feared. A hand laid upon his shoulder startled him. It was the bar-keeper.

“If it’s a fair question, Ruth Pinkney, I’d like to ask ye how long ye kalkilate to hang around the Ferry to-day.”

“Why?” demanded Ruth haughtily.

“Because, whatever you’ve been and done, I want ye to have a square show. Ole Nixon has been cavoortin’ round yer the last two days, swearin’ to kill you on sight for runnin’ off with his darter. Sabe? Now, let me ax ye two questions. FIRST, Are you heeled?”