At last they came to the valley floor, over which a devastating fire had run some years before, and which was still covered with fallen trees in desolate confusion. Here the girl made her first mistake. She kept on toward the river, although Wayland called attention to a trail leading to the right up over the low grassy hills. For a mile the path was clear, but she soon found herself confronted by an endless maze of blackened tree-trunks, and at last the path ended abruptly. Dismayed and halting, she said: "We've got to go back to that trail which branched off to the right. I reckon that was the highland trail which Settle made to keep out of the swamp. I thought it was a trail from Cameron Peak, but it wasn't. Back we go." She was suffering keenly now, not on her own account, but on his, for she could see that he was very tired, and to climb up that hill again was like punishing him a second time. When she picked up the blazed trail it was so dark that she could scarcely follow it; but she felt her way onward, turning often to be sure that he was following. Once she saw him fall, and cried out: "It's a shame to make you climb this hill again. It's all my fault. I ought to have known that that lower road led down into the timber." Standing close beside him in the darkness, knowing that he was weary, wet, and ill, she permitted herself the expression of her love and pity. Putting her arm about him, she drew his cheek against her own, saying: "Poor boy, your hands are cold as ice." She took them in her own warm clasp. "Oh, I wish we had never left the camp! What does it matter what people say?" Then she broke down and wailed. "I shall never forgive myself if you--" Her voice failed her. [Illustration: SHE FOUND HERSELF CONFRONTED BY AN ENDLESS MAZE OF BLACKENED TREE-TRUNKS] He bravely reassured her: "I'm not defeated, I'm just tired. That's all. I can go on." "But you are shaking." "That is merely a nervous chill. I'm good for another hour. It's better to keep moving, anyhow." She thrust her hand under his coat and laid it over his heart. "You are tired out," she said, and there was anguish in her voice. "Your heart is pounding terribly. You mustn't do any more climbing. And, hark, there's a wolf!" He listened. "I hear him; but we are both armed. There's no danger from wild animals." "Come!" she said, instantly recovering her natural resolution. "We can't stand here. The station can't be far away. We must go on." VIII THE OTHER GIRL The girl's voice stirred the benumbed youth into action again, and he followed her mechanically. His slender stock of physical strength was almost gone, but his will remained unbroken. At every rough place she came back to him to support him, to hearten him, and so he crept on through the darkness, falling often, stumbling against the trees, slipping and sliding, till at last his guide, pitching down a sharp slope, came directly upon a wire fence.