WHERE THE TRAIL DIVIDES By WILL LILLIBRIDGE Author of "BEN BLAIR," Etc. With Frontispiece in Colors By The Kinneys 1907 CONTENTS I. PRESENTIMENT II. FULFILMENT III. DISCOVERY IV. RECONSTRUCTION V. THE LAND OF LICENCE VI. THE RED MAN AND THE WHITE VII. A GLIMPSE OF THE UNKNOWN VIII. THE SKELETON WITHIN THE CLOSET IX. THE VOICE OF THE WILD X. THE CURSE OF THE CONQUERED XI. THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE XII. WITHIN THE CONQUEROR'S OWN COUNTRY XIII. THE MYSTERY OF SOLITUDE XIV. FATE, THE SATIRIST XV. THE FRUIT OF THE TREE OF KNOWLEDGE XVI. THE RECKONING XVII. SACRIFICE XVIII. REWARD XIX. IN SIGHT OF GOD ALONE CHAPTER I PRESENTIMENT The man was short and fat, and greasy above the dark beard line. In addition, he was bowlegged as a greyhound, and just now he moved with a limp as though very footsore. His coarse blue flannel shirt, open at the throat, exposed a broad hairy chest that rose and fell mightily with the effort he was making. And therein lay the mystery. The sun was hot--with the heat of a cloudless August sun at one o'clock of the afternoon. The country he was traversing was wild, unbroken--uninhabited apparently of man or of beast. Far to his left, just visible through the dancing heat rays, indistinct as a mirage, was a curling fringe of green trees. To his right, behind him, ahead of him was not a tree nor a shrub nor a rock the height of a man's head; only ungrazed, yellowish-green sun-dried prairie grass. The silence was complete. Not even a breath of wind rustled the grass; yet ever and anon the man paused glanced back the way he had come, listened, his throat throbbing with the effort of repressed breathing, in obvious expectation of a sound he did not hear; then, for the time relieved, forged ahead afresh, one hand gripping the butt of an old Springfield rifle slung over his shoulder, the other, big, unclean, sunbrowned, swinging like a pendulum at his side. Ludicrous, unqualifiedly, the figure would have been in civilisation, humorous as a clown in a circus; but seeing it here, solitary, exotic, no observer would have laughed. Fear, mortal dogging fear, impersonate, supreme, was in every look, every action. Somewhere back of that curved line where met the earth and sky, lurked death. Nothing else would have been adequate to arouse this phlegmatic human as he was now aroused. The sweat oozed from his thick neck in streams and dripped drop by drop from the month-old stubble which covered his chin, but apparently he never noticed it. Now and then he attempted to moisten his lips; but his tongue was dry as powder, and they closed again, parched as before.