"If this isn't the valley, I'm through for this year," she said. "And
I've got to-day and to-morrow to explore it." She wondered at her
indifference--at her strange lack of excitement at this, the crucial
moment of her long quest, even as she had wondered at her absence of
fear, believing as she did, that Bethune was still in the hills. The
feeling inspired by the outlaw had been a feeling of rage, rather than
terror, and had rapidly crystallized in her outraged mind into an
abysmal soul-hate. She knew that, should the man accost her again, she
would kill him--and not for a single instant did she doubt her ability
to kill him. Vaguely, as she stood looking out over the valley, she
wondered if he were following her--if at that moment he were lying
concealed, somewhere among the surrounding rocks or patches of scrub?
Yet, she was conscious of no feeling of fear. She even attempted no
concealment as, standing there upon the bare rock, she drew her
father's map and photographs from her pocket and subjected them to a
long and minute scrutiny. And then, still holding them in her hand,
gazed once more over the valley. "To 'a,' to 'b,'" she repeated. "What
is there that daddy would have designed as 'a,' and 'b?'" Suddenly,
her glance became fixed upon a point up the valley that lay just
within her range of vision. With puckered eyes and hat-brim drawn low
upon her forehead, she stared steadily into the distance. She knew
that she had never before seen this valley, and yet the place seemed,
somehow, strangely familiar. With a low cry she bent over one of the
photographs. Her hands trembled violently as her eyes once more flew
to the valley. Yes, there it was, spread out before her just the way
it was in the photograph--the rock-strewn ground--she could even
identify the various rocks with the rocks in the picture. There was
the lone tree, and the long rock wall, higher at its upper end,
and--yes, she could just discern it--the zigzag crack in the rock
ledge! Jamming the papers into her pocket she leaped into the saddle
and dashed toward a fringe of scrub that marked the course of a coulee
which led downward into the valley. Over its edge, and down its
brush-choked course, slipping, sliding, scrambling, she urged her
horse, reckless of safety, reckless of anything except that her weary,
and at times it had seemed her hopeless, search was about to end. She
had stood where her daddy had stood when he took that photograph--had
seen with her own eyes--the jagged crack in the rock wall!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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