And then with his senses awhirl he leaned from the saddle and felt her warm, soft hand in his, and gazed dizzily into the unsounded depths of the trout pools shaded by grapevines, to which his fancy had likened her eyes. His hand shook and his heart leaped, and his soul cried out for her; and all that he could say was: "How do you do, Miss Selden!" He saddled White Ann, and over the hills they rode together. Commonplaces passed between them until the wilderness enveloped them. Then as they sat their horses and gazed down a precipitous slope to the river, she asked: "Just why have you kept away from us all these weeks?" He reddened. "I'll tell you frankly," he said: "I was a fool. I was moping because you had not ridden to see me. You had come so often before. And I woke up only today. Today for the first time I realized that, since Old Man Selden has opened his door to me, it is my place to go to you." "Of course," she said demurely. He cleared his throat uncomfortably. "Some time ago," he told her, "I realized that you sought me out in the first place for a purpose." He paused, and the look he cast at her was eager, though guarded carefully. "Yes?" she questioned. "Yes," he went on. "I realized that. And also that you _continued_ to come because that purpose was not yet fulfilled, and because conditions made it necessary for you to look me up." "Yes, I understand--" as he had come to a stop, rather helplessly. "Well, just that," he floundered. "And then Selden changed his tactics, and I could go to you. So you--you didn't come to me any more." "Fairly well elucidated," she laughed, "if repetition makes for clearness. Well, you understand now--so let's forget it." "I want you to understand that it wasn't because I didn't wish to come. It was just thick-headedness." "So you have said. Yes, I understand." The gaze of her black eyes was far away--far away over the deep, rugged cañon, over the hills that climbed shelf after shelf to the mystic snow-topped mountains, far away into a country that is not of the earth earthy. Under her drab flannel shirt her full bosom rose and fell with the regularity of her perfect breathing. Her man's hat lay over her saddle horn. Like some reigning goddess of the wilderness she sat and overlooked the domain that was hers unchallenged; and the profile of her brow, and the long, black, drooping lashes, tore at the heart-strings of the man until he suffered. "I can't stand that!" he cried out in his soul; and a pressure of the reins brought Poche close to White Ann's side. "Jessamy!" said the man huskily. "Jessamy!" He could say no more, for his voice failed him, and a haze swam before his eyes as when he had lost control of himself on the hillside. "Jessamy!" he managed to cry again; and then, for lack of words, he spread his arms out toward her.