It was impossible for Betty to escape the emotions that flooded her, but she was the last girl to sit down and accept defeat with folded hands. There was in her a certain vigor of the spirit that craved expression, that held her head up in the face of disaster. At the Quarter Circle D E she was so briskly businesslike that none of the men would have guessed that she was passing through a crisis. Except for moments of abstraction, she gave no evidence of the waves of emotion that inundated her while she was giving orders about the fencing of the northwest forty or the moving of the pigpens. When she was alone, it was worse. Her longing for Hollister became acute. If she could see him, talk with him, his point of view would be changed. New arguments marshaled themselves in her mind. It was ridiculous to suppose that a man’s past--one not of his own choosing, but forced on him--could determine his future so greatly as to make happiness impossible. She would not believe it. Every instinct of her virile young personality rebelled against the acceptance of such a law. Tug’s persistence in renouncing joy had wounded her vanity. But at bottom she did not doubt him. He had stood out because he thought it right, not because he did not love her. In spite of her distress of mind, she was not quite unhappy. A warm hope nestled in her bosom. She loved and was loved. The barrier between them would be torn down. Again they would be fused into that oneness which for a blessed ten minutes had absorbed them. Her father drove over in the rattletrap car. Ostensibly he had come to discuss with her plans for fertilization and crops of the Quarter Circle D E for the coming season. “I took Hollister to town this morning. He wouldn’t stay any longer,” Reed presently mentioned, as though casually. “Oh! Why wouldn’t he stay?” Betty was rather proud of the indifference she contrived to convey in her voice. “Said he didn’t want to keep you away from home.” “Was he keeping me away?” she asked. “Seemed to think so. Wasn’t he?” “I see you know all about it, Dad. What did he tell you?” “I asked him point-blank what the trouble was between you and him. He told me.” A faint crimson streamed into her cheeks. “What did he say it was?” “He’s afraid. Not for himself, but for you.” “I think that’s awf’ly silly of him.” “I’m not so sure about that, Bettykins. If there’s any doubt whatever, he’d better wait till he’s certain.” He let his arm fall across her shoulders with a gentleness she knew to be a caress. “Have you found the man you want, dear? Sure about it?” She smiled ruefully. “I’m sure enough, Dad. He’s the one that seems in doubt.” To this she added a reply to a sentence earlier in his period. “He didn’t say anything to me about waiting. His ‘No, thank you,’ was quite definite, I thought.” Clint’s wrath began to simmer. “If he’s got a notion that he can take or leave you as he pleases--”