"It wasn't injustice, it was discipline, and it was good for both of us. We must come to confidence through misunderstandings and false charges very frequently in this life. Never mind that; I was telling you about that evening on the side of the hill. I had been sitting with my back to a rock, watching the brush for Mark Thorn, but I was thinking more of you than of him. For he meant only death, and you were life. But I thought that I had lost you that day." She drew nearer to him as they stood, in the unequivocal consolation of her presence, in the most comforting refutation of that sad hour's dark forebodings. "I thought that, until I stood up and started down the slope to go my lone-handed way. The sun struck me in the face then, and it was yellow over the valley, and the wind was glad. I knew then, when I looked out over it, that it held something for me, that it was my country, and my home. The lines of gray old Joaquin Miller came to me, and lifted my heart in a new vision. I said them over to myself: Lo! these are the isles of the watery miles That God let down from the firmament. Lo! Duty and Love, and a true man's trust; Your forehead to God and your feet in the dust-- only, there were two lines which I did not repeat, I dared not repeat, even in my heart. My vision halted short of their fulfillment." "What are the words--do you remember them?" she asked. "Yes; I can repeat them now, for my vision is broader, it is a better dream: Lo! Duty and Love, and a sweet babe's smiles, And there, O friend, are the Fortunate Isles." He pressed her closer, and kissed her hair. They stood, unmindful of the waiting ambulance, their vision fusing in the blue distances of the land their hearts held dear. It was home. "Come on, Alan"--she started from her reverie and drew him by the hand--"there's Mrs. Chadron on the porch, waiting for _hasta luego_." "For _hasta luego_," said he. ----- [A] For a little while. End of Project Gutenberg's The Rustler of Wind River, by G. W. Ogden