Here was a natural grotto which at another time would have made her exclaim in delight: a nook, set apart, thresholded in tender grass shot through with those tiny delicate blooms of mountain flowers. On one side a cliff, outjutting, thrusting forward a great overhanging shelf of rock which looked as though it must fall and yet which, obviously, had held securely through the centuries. Three big pine-trees, two of them leaning strangely toward the cliff, as though yearning to lean against the sturdy rock and rest there upon its iron breast. The whole ringed about by a dense copse of brush, thick as a wall and rearing high above her head. Almost a cave made of cliff and growing things, cosy and warm, with its opening fronting the stream which was never silent. Thor ran ahead into the dusky seclusion and barked his invitation to them to follow. A thick, dry mat, under Thor's feet, of fallen pine-needles. Standing tossed his roll inside; he began, with one hand, to work with the knotted rope. Lynette came forward swiftly, saying: "At least I have two hands...." Their hands brushed over the labor. Again the hot blood raced through her, and again sudden anger, anger at herself, flashed through her being. And a tingling, like that which shot through her, was in Bruce Standing's veins. He caught her hand. "Girl!" he said huskily. "Don't!" she cried in alarm. He dropped her hand and rose swiftly to his feet. "You are right," he muttered. "Not yet...." How could this man at a touch make her heart beat like mad? She was afraid ... she knew that she was not afraid of _him_ ... yet she was afraid. "I'm sorry," he said roughly. Actually, marvelling, she saw that the big man looked embarrassed. "Look here, girl: I've come to know you a bit and, thinking what I think, I hold that I know you well! I'll take my chance that you are no petty crook, that you are no coward, that you are no liar! So...." "Then," she cried, jumping to her feet, all eagerness, "do you believe me when I say that I did not shoot you?" His eyes met hers steadily; he answered promptly: "You have told me ... and I believe. _I know!_" A rush of gladness, an intoxication of gladness, swept over her. Her eyes were shining, soft and bright and happy like stars. "But," she said, "if not I, then who?" "Jim Taggart," he said as unhesitatingly as he had spoken before. "Jim told you that he saw, didn't he? That he was Johnny on the spot? Of course he was! And we'd had our plain talk. And he figured it out, that unless that very day I had changed my papers, I still named him in them my old bunk-mate and friend, and that I'd not forget him with a legacy! If I had died under that bullet, Jim Taggart would have had it doped out that he'd stand to win about a hundred thousand dollars! And for a tenth of that he'd crucify Christ!" "But...."