"I am forbidden."
His answer was gentle, but its very gentlenessbreathed of his battle

over himself, of allegiance to something beyond earthly duty. "We'll
drive the cattle to Silver Cup," he decided, "and then go home. I give

up Seeping Springs. Perhaps this valley and water will content
Holderness."

When they reached the oasis Hare was surprised to find that it was the
day before Christmas. The welcome given the long-absent riders was like

a celebration. Much to Hare's disappointment Mescal did not appear; the
homecoming was not joyful to him because it lacked her welcoming smile.

Christmas Day ushered in the short desert winter; ice formed in the
ditches and snow fell, but neither long resisted the reflection of the

sun from the walls. The early morning hours were devoted to religious
services. At midday dinner was served in the big room of August Naab's

cabin. At one end was a stone fireplace where logs blazed and crackled.
In all his days Hare had never seen such a bountiful board. Yet he was

unable to appreciate it, to share in the general thanksgiving.
Dominating all other feeling was the fear that Mescal would come in and

take a seat by Snap Naab's side. When Snap seated himself opposite with
his pale little wife Hare found himself waiting for Mescal with an

intensity that made him dead to all else. The girls, Judith, Esther,
Rebecca, came running gayly in, clad in their best dresses, with bright

ribbons to honor the occasion. Rebecca took the seat beside Snap, and
Hare gulped with a hard contraction of his throat. Mescal was not yet a

Mormon's wife! He seemed to be lifted upward, to grow light-headed with
the blessedassurance. Then Mescal entered and took the seat next to

him. She smiled and spoke, and the blood beat thick in his ears.
That moment was happy, but it was as nothing to its successor. Under the

table-cover Mescal's hand found his, and pressed it daringly and gladly.
Her hand lingered in his all the time August Naab spent in carving the

turkey--lingered there even though Snap Naab's hawk eyes were never far
away. In the warm touch of her hand, in some subtle thing that radiated

from her Hare felt a change in the girl he loved. A few months had
wrought in her some indefinable difference, even as they had increased

his love to its full volume and depth. Had his absence brought her to
the realization of her woman's heart?

In the afternoon Hare left the house and spent a little while with
Silvermane; then he wandered along the wall to the head of the oasis, and

found a seat on the fence. The next few weeks presented to him a
situation that would be difficult to endure. He would be near Mescal,

but only to have the truth forced cruelly home to him every sane moment--
that she was not for him. Out on the ranges he had abandoned himself to

dreams of her; they had been beautiful; they had made the long hours seem
like minutes; but they had forged chains that could not be broken, and

now he was hopelessly fettered.
The clatter of hoofs roused him from a reverie which was half sad, half

sweet. Mescal came tearing down the level on Black Bolly. She pulled in
the mustang and halted beside Hare to hold out shyly a red scarf

embroidered with Navajo symbols in white and red beads.
"I've wanted a chance to give you this," she said, "a little Christmas

present."
For a few seconds Hare could find no words.

"Did you make it for me, Mescal?" he finally asked. "How good of you!
I'll keep it always."

"Put it on now--let me tie it--there!"
"But, child. Suppose he--they saw it?"

"I don't care who sees it."
She met him with clear, level eyes. Her curt, crisp speech was full of

meaning. He looked long at her, with a yearning denied for many a day.
Her face was the same, yet wonderfully changed; the same in line and

color, but different in soul and spirit. The old sombre shadow lay deep
in the eyes, but to it had been added gleam of will and reflection of

thought. The whole face had been refined and transformed.
"Mescal! What's happened? You're not the same. You seem almost happy.

Have you--has heaven you up?"
"Don't you know Mormons better than that? The thing is the same--so far

as they're concerned."
"But Mescal--are you going to marry him? For God's sake, tell me."

"Never." It was a woman's word, instant, inflexible, desperate. With a
deep breath Hare realized where the girl had changed.

"Still you're promised, pledged to him! How'll you get out of it?"
"I don't know how. But I'll cut out my tongue, and be dumb as my poor

peon before I'll speak the word that'll make me Snap Naab's wife."
There was a long silence. Mescal smoothed out Bolly's mane, and Hare

gazed up at the walls with eyes that did not see them.
Presently he spoke." I'm afraid for you. Snap watched us to-day at

dinner."
"He's jealous."

"Suppose he sees this scarf?"
Mescal laughed defiantly. It was bewildering for Hare to hear her.

"He'll--Mescal, I may yet come to this." Hare's laugh echoed Mescal's as
he pointed to the enclosure under the wall, where the graves showed bare

and rough.
Her warm color fled, but it flooded back, rich, mantling brow and cheek

and neck.
"Snap Naab will never kill you," she said impulsively.

"Mescal."
She swiftly turned her face away as his hand closed on hers.

"Mescal, do you love me?"
The trembling of her fingers and the heaving of her bosom lent his hope

conviction. "Mescal," he went on, "these past months have been years,
years of toiling, thinking, changing, but always loving. I'm not the man

you knew. I'm wild-- I'm starved for a sight of you. I love you! Mescal,
my desert flower!"

She raised her free hand to his shoulder and swayed toward him. He held
her a moment, clasped tight, and then released her.

"I'm quite mad!" he exclaimed, in a passion of self-reproach." What a
risk I'm putting on you! But I couldn't help it. Look at me-- Just

once--please-- Mescal, just one look. ... Now go."
The drama of the succeeding days was of absorbing interest. Hare had

liberty; there was little work for him to do save to care for Silvermane.
He tried to hunt foxes in the caves and clefts; he rode up and down the

broad space under the walls; he sought the open desert only to be driven
in by the bitter, biting winds. Then he would return to the big

living-room of the Naabs and sit before the burning logs. This spacious
room was warm, light, pleasant, and was used by every one in leisure

hours. Mescal spent most of her time there. She was engaged upon a new
frock of buckskin, and over this she bent with her needle and beads.

When there was a chance Hare talked with her, speaking one language with
his tongue, a far different one with his eyes. When she was not present

he looked into the glowing red fire and dreamed of her.
In the evenings when Snap came in to his wooing and drew Mescal into a

corner, Hare watched with covert glance and smouldering jealousy.
Somehow he had come to see all things and all people in the desert glass,

and his symbol for Snap Garb was the desert-hawk. Snap's eyes were as
wild and piercing as those of a hawk; his nose and mouth were as the beak

of a hawk; his hands resembled the claws of a hawk; and the spurs he
wore, always bloody, were still more significant of his ruthless nature.

Then Snap's courting of the girl, the cool assurance, the unhastening
ease, were like the slow rise, the sail, and the poise of a desert-hawk

before the downward lightning-swift swoop on his quarry.
It was intolerable for Hare to sit there in the evenings, to try to play

with the children who loved him, to talk to August Naab when his eye
seemed ever drawn to the quiet couple in the corner, and his ear was

unconsciously strained to catch a passing word. That hour was a
miserable one for him, yet he could not bring himself to leave the room.

He never saw Snap touch her; he never heard Mescal's voice; he believed
that she spoke very little. When the hour was over and Mescal rose to

pass to her room, then his doubt, his fear, his misery, were as though