They were again in that green, gloomy, and silent zone of the range, where giant spruces grow, and springs, oozing from the rocks, trickle over the trail. It was very beautiful, but menacing, by reason of its apparently endless thickets cut by stony ridges. It was here she met the two young men, Downing and Travis, bringing forward the surveying outfit, but she paused only to say: "Push along steadily. You are needed on the other side." After leaving the men, and with a knowledge that the remaining leagues of the trail were solitary, Norcross grew fearful. "The fall of a horse, an accident to that brave girl, and we would be helpless," he thought. "I wish Nash had returned with us." Once his blood chilled with horror as he watched his guide striking out across the marge of a grassy lake. This meadow, as he divined, was really a carpet of sod floating above a bottomless pool of muck, for it shook beneath her horse's feet. "Come on, it's all right," she called back, cheerily. "We'll soon pick up the other trail." He wondered how she knew, for to him each hill was precisely like another, each thicket a maze. Her caution was all for him. She tried each dangerous slough first, and thus was able to advise him which way was safest. His head throbbed with pain and his knees were weary, but he rode on, manifesting such cheer as he could, resolving not to complain at any cost; but his self-respect ebbed steadily, leaving him in bitter, silent dejection. At last they came into open ground on a high ridge, and were gladdened by the valley outspread below them, for it was still radiant with color, though not as brilliant as before the rain. It had been dimmed, but not darkened. And yet it seemed that a month had passed since their ecstatic ride upward through the golden forest, and Wayland said as much while they stood for a moment surveying the majestic park with its wall of guardian peaks. But Berrie replied: "It seems only a few hours to me." From this point the traveling was good, and they descended rapidly, zigzagging from side to side of a long, sweeping ridge. By noon they were once more down amid the aspens, basking in a world of sad gold leaves and delicious September sunshine. At one o'clock, on the bank of a clear stream, the girl halted. "I reckon we'd better camp awhile. You look tired, and I am hungry." He gratefully acquiesced in this stop, for his knees were trembling with the strain of the stirrups; but he would not permit her to ease him down from his saddle. Turning a wan glance upon her, he bitterly asked: "Must I always play the weakling before you? I am ashamed of myself. Ride on and leave me to rot here in the grass. I'm not worth keeping alive." "You must not talk like that," she gently admonished him. "You're not to blame." "Yes, I am. I should never have ventured into this man's country." "I'm glad you did," she answered, as if she were comforting a child. "For if you hadn't I should never have known you."