"Don't, Elijah! Don't!" Amy clutched Elijah as if already she felt him slipping from her grasp. "I loved you as you were. I love you as you are. You can never be more dear to me. I don't know, Elijah; I am afraid." She buried her head on his shoulder. "I am afraid I shall not always be everything to you. I am so happy with you now. If I should ever be less happy, it would kill me." "Nonsense. Don't make pictures to get scared at." He drew his watch from his pocket. "I must go now. You know I promised to see Ralph at Ysleta this morning. Goodbye, and don't scare yourself any more." Elijah began to unclasp her arms. They were reluctant rather than resisting. He kissed her with a show of affection which was not absent, only obscured by other things; then he saddled his horse and rode away. Amy stood watching him with hard, dry eyes; with the unconscious superstition of the maiden who with trembling fingers plucks one by one the petals from a prophetic flower. "He loves me, he loves me not." She stood watching for a motion, a gesture which should assure her that her husband's thoughts were of her, even as hers were of him, making herself the wretched plaything of senseless Fate, instead of resting tranquil in the surety that she was its master. Elijah was absorbed in himself. He grew but a speck on the trail to Amy's watching eyes. There was not a motion which she could distort into a recognition of her existence. The last petal had fallen. "He loves me not." CHAPTER THREE