The voice was deep and vibrant. It blended with her dream of romance. Her tyrant father with his villain knights sat their horses on the bank of the river, not daring to attempt the passage, and now that her hero was about to bear her safe to the other shore-- She drew a long breath and relaxed in his arms, her strong, young body now soft and yielding. The horse pawed for a footing and then lurched up the bank with a snort. Her arms tightened around Carrigan’s neck; her lips pressed eagerly to his. “Jac!” How could he know that that word carried her dream away like dead leaves on a wind? She covered her face from him. “We are late already,” she said. CHAPTER IV. THE SONG OF SONGS. The dance-hall was the up-stairs floor of Bridewell’s general merchandise store. From the center of the ceiling was suspended a monstrous gasoline-lamp that flooded the larger part of the dancing floor with dazzling light, but the flicker of the flame sent occasional seas of shadow washing into the corners of the room. A thick line of stools and chairs and empty grocery-boxes made the seats for the throng around the wall. The floor glimmered and shone in mute testimony to the polishing which it had received earlier in the evening when a dozen strong men pulled about the room a heavy bale of hay with two men sitting upon it. Waxed hardwood could not have been more brilliant. The music was supplied by a banjo, a slide trombone, a violin, and a snare drum; and the musicians operated their instruments with undying vigor. Lest they should falter in their efforts from weariness, glasses of liquor stood beside them at all times, supplied by generous cow-punchers who appreciated the soulful music. This stimulus was not applied in vain, for, as the evening wore on, each piece of music was increased slightly but perceptibly in cadence beyond all which had gone before. This applied to the two-steps, which sent the dancers whirling over the floor with such violence that at the end of each dance there was a general stampede for the bar which stretched across the farther end of the room. Here four men worked with frantic haste to quench the thirst of the multitude, and labored in vain. The exercise made the throat of every man as dry as that of Tantalus, and the glasses were snatched up and tossed off as rapidly as they were spun down the length of the bar.