Now, from the gainsaying of his lesser revenge--the proving to Billy Knapp the futility of his objections--Lafond conceived the desire for a greater. There entered into his life one of those absorbing passions which are to be encountered in all their intensity only in such men as he--passions which come to be ruling motives in the lives of those who harbor them; gathering to themselves all lesser forces which are spread more evenly over saner existences; losing their first burning intensity, perhaps, but becoming thereby only the more sustained, cool, and deadly; so that at the last they lie unnoticed in the background of the man's ordinary life, coloring, influencing every act--a religion to which, without anger, but without relenting, he bends every long-planned effort of even his trivial and daily deeds. You may not understand this, unless you have known a half-breed; but it is true. Interrupted in the midst of his flow of anger, and deprived of the immediate solace of shooting things at his enemies, Lafond fell into a sulking fit. During the rest of the day he brooded. After dark that night he wound his way silently through the grasses, crept up behind the solitary sentinel considered necessary in this peaceful country, stabbed the man in the back, and returned to camp. Thus his way was clear. Then he took from the wagons three slabs of bacon, a small sack of coffee, a large supply of powder, lead, and caps, a blanket, and a frying-pan and cup. With these he mounted the hill, past the dead sentinel, to the ponies. Two of the latter he drew apart from the herd. One of them he saddled; the other he packed with his supplies. Then the half-breed led them silently westward for a good half-mile. Then he mounted and rode away. VI THE WOMAN AND THE MAN The wagon-train under the command of Billy Knapp, and Alfred, and Jim Buckley had a very hard trip before they were done with it. The only difficulty they did not encounter was lack of water. There was too much of that. Several times the party had to camp in one spot for days while the wagons were laboriously warped across rivers of mud and quicksand, with steep, slippery clay banks. How little Prue stood the journey so well, neither her father, her mother, nor the men of the party were able to divine; but she did, and, what is more, she seemed to think it great fun. So cheerful was she, and so sunny, that the men came to grudge each other her company. And as for Mrs. Prue and the doctor, who could help loving the patient sweetness of the one, or the pathetic, gentle, impracticable kindness of the other? Yes, it was a hard journey; but somehow the feeling was not entirely of joy and relief when the stockade of Frenchman's Creek shimmered across the broad, flat foot-hills. There they separated. The dangers were over.