Now you’d better come in and try to make amends with poor Mr. Hamar. What a foolish thing to make him suffer by going off on a wild horse that ran away! Perhaps you don’t know he risked his life for you. He tried to catch your horse and was thrown and kicked in the face by his own wretched beast and left lying unconscious for hours in the desert. Finally an Indian came along and picked him up and helped him back to the station.”

In fact, Milton Hamar planned and enacted this drama with a passing Indian’s help, when he found Hazel had run off and left an ugly whip mark on his cheek, which must be explained to the family.

“He may bear that dreadful scar for life!” her aunt added. “He’ll think you’re ungrateful if you don’t go at once and apologize.”

For answer, Hazel, brushing away the tears before her aunt saw, swept past her and locked herself in her own private stateroom.

She rushed to the window, standing partly open and guarded with a screen, and pressed her face against the upper part of the glass. The train had made a curve across the prairie, and the station was still visible, though far away. She was sure she could see the missionary’s tall figure with hat in hand watching her as she disappeared from his sight.

On an impulse she caught up a long white crepe scarf that lay on her berth and, snatching the screen from the window, threw the scarf out to the wind. Almost instantly a flutter of white came from the figure on the platform, and her heart quickened with joy. They’d sent a message from heart to heart across the wide plains, and the wireless telegraphy of hearts was established. Tears rushed to blot the last flutter of white from the receding landscape. Then a hill loomed bright and shifting and in a moment cut off the station and the little group from her sight. Hazel knew she was back in the world of commonplace things again, with only a memory for her company, amidst a background of unsympathetic relatives.

She refreshed herself in a leisurely way, for she dreaded to talk as she knew she would and dreaded still more to meet Hamar. But she knew she must go and tell her father about her experiences. Presently she came out to them with eyes only brighter for the tears and a soft wild-rose flush on her wind-browned cheeks.

They clamored at once, of course, for the details of her experience and began by rehearsing again how hard Mr. Hamar tried to save her, risking his life to stop her horse.

Hazel said nothing but gave one steady clear look at the disfigured face of the man who led them to believe this. And that was her only recognition of his would-be heroism. In that look she managed to show her utter disbelief and contempt, though her aunt and perhaps even her father and brother thought her gratitude too deep for words before them.

The girl passed over the matter of the runaway with a brief word, saying the horse decided to run and she lost the reins, which of course explained her inability to control him. She made light of her ride, however, before her aunt and told the story briefly until she came to the canyon and the coyotes howling. She praised her rescuer, though here, too, she was brief and avoided any description of the ride back. She simply said the missionary showed himself a gentleman in every way and gave her every care and attention her own family would have under the circumstances, making the way pleasant with stories of the country and the people. She said he was a man of unusual culture and refinement, she thought, yet devoted to his work. Then she changed the subject by asking about plans for their future trip and indicated no further interest in her experience.

But all the while she was conscious of Milton Hamar’s piercing eyes watching her, and she knew that as soon as an opportunity presented itself he’d continue the hateful encounter he began on the plain. She decided mentally to avoid any such encounter if possible. To that end, Hazel excused herself immediately after lunch, saying she needed a good sleep to make up for her long ride.

But she didn’t give herself to sleep when she took refuge in her little apartment again. She gazed out at the passing landscape, beautiful with varied scenery, all blurred with tears as she thought of how a little while before she was out in its wide free space with someone who loved her.

How that thought thrilled her and brought fresh joy each time it repeated itself! She wondered over its miracle. She never dreamed love was like this. She scarcely believed it now. She was stirred to the depths by her unusual experience, almost feeling the strange circumstances that brought this man into her acquaintance were abnormal. Thus said common sense, warning her that tomorrow or the next day or next week the thrill would be gone and she’d think of the stranger-missionary as one curious detail of her Western trip.