Refreshed by the delicious meal, the party prepared to start on. But they did not travel as before. While Ashton was considerately washing out the dusty nostrils of the horses with water from his canteen, Isobel decided to drive with Mrs. Blake. Declaring that it would be like old times to sit a cowboy saddle, the big engineer lengthened the girl's stirrup leathers and swung on to the pony. This left Rocket to his owner. At first Ashton seemed inclined to be stiff with his new road-mate. But as they jogged along, side by side, over the hills and across the sagebrush flats, Blake restricted his talk to impersonal topics and spared his companion from any allusion to their past difficulties. Throughout the ride, however, the two men maintained a certain reserve towards each other, and at no time approached the cordial intimacy that developed between the girl and Mrs. Blake before the end of their first mile together. After telling merrily about her dual life as summer cowgirl and winter society maiden, Isobel drifted around, by seemingly casual association of ideas, to the troublesome question of irrigation on Dry Mesa, and from that to Blake and his work as an engineer. "I do so hope Mr. Blake finds that there is no project practicable," she went on. "He has warned me that if there seems to be any chance to work out an irrigation scheme on our mesa he is bound to try to do it." "And he would do it," added Mrs. Blake with quiet confidence. "Then I hope and pray he will find there is no chance, because Daddy would have to oppose him. That would be such a pity! He and I have read so much about Mr. Blake's work that we have come to regard him as our--as one of our heroes." Mrs. Blake smiled. It was very apparent, despite the quietness and repression of her high-bred manner, that she was very much in love with her husband. The girl continued in a meekly deferential tone: "So you will not mind my worshiping him. He is a hero, a real hero! Isn't he?" The words were spoken with an earnestness and sincerity that won Mrs. Blake to a like candor. "You are quite right," she said. "Lafayette may have told you how Mr. Blake and I were wrecked on the most savage coast of Africa. He saved me from wild beasts and tropical storms, from fever and snakes,--from death in a dozen horrible forms. Then, when he had saved me--and won me, he gave me up until he could prove to himself that he was worthy of me." "He did?" cried the girl. "But of course!--of course!" "Yet that was nothing to the next proof of his strength and manhood," went on the proud wife. "He destroyed a monster more frightful than any lion or tropical snake--he overcame the curse of drink that had come down to him from--one of his parents." "From--from his--" whispered the girl, her averted face white and drawn with pain.