He went back to his work and old Bunk watched him wonderingly, after which he rode solemnly away. Then the road-making dragged on--clearing away brush, blasting out rock, filling in, grading up, making the crown--but now the road-boss was absent minded and oblivious and his pride in the job was gone. He let the men lag and leave rough ends, and every few moments his eyes would stray away and look down the canyon for the stage. And as the automobiles came up he scanned the passengers hungrily--until at last he saw Drusilla. There was the fluttering of a veil, the flash of startled eyes, a quick belated wave, and she was gone. Denver stood in the road, staring after her blankly, and then he threw down his pick. "Send me back to the Pen'" he said to the guard, "I'm going to apply for parole." CHAPTER XXIX THE INTERPRETATION THEREOF After all his suffering, his oaths, his refusals, his rejection of each friendly offer, Denver had changed his mind in the fraction of a second when he saw Drusilla whirl past. He forgot his mine, the fierce battles, the prophecy--all he wanted was to see her again. Placed on his honor for the trip he started down the road, walking fast when he failed to catch a ride, and early the next morning he reported at the prison to apply for an immediate parole. But luck was against him and his heart died in his breast, for the Board of Prison Directors had met the week before and would not meet again for three weeks. Three weeks of idle waiting, of pacing up and down and cursing the slow passage of time; and then, perhaps, delays and disappointments and obstructions from Bible-Back Murray. He sat with bowed head, then rose up suddenly and wrote a brief letter to Murray. "Get me a pardon," he scrawled, "and I'll give you a quit-claim. This goes, if you do it quick." He put it in the mail, with a special delivery stamp, and watched the endless hours creep by. She was there in Pinal, running her scales, practicing her exercises, singing arias from the operas at night; and he was shut in by the gray concrete walls where the guards looked down from the towers. He could not trust himself now outside of the yard, his nerve was gone and he would head for Pinal like a homing bird to its mate. And then it came, quicker than he had ever thought or hoped for, though he had offered the Silver Treasure in return for it--a full pardon from the Governor, with his citizenship restored and a letter expressing confidence in his innocence. Denver clutched it to his breast and started out across the desert with his eyes on distant Pinal.