Her companion was younger by several years, and so much taller that she seemed almost small in comparison. In his eyes there danced and shone the light of truth and courage and hope, and he walked with the buoyancy of joy and youth. Israfil, Antinous, Apollo,--he might have stood as the model for any of them, or for a fit representation of the words of the wise man, "Rejoice, oh, young man, in thy youth, and let thine heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart."
The relation between the two was problematic. Certainly there was no question of love on either side. Equally certainly there existed between them a rare and exquisite camaraderie, a perfect comprehension that often made words superfluous. A look sufficed.
They toiled up the steep, narrow path until they reached a wide trail, a carriage road that had been laid out and abandoned. It swept around the mountain-side, miles above the little city on the plain, and terminated suddenly at an immense gateway of stone. Here the mountain had been torn asunder, and two palisades of gray-green rock rose grim and terrible for hundreds of feet, while between them, dashing over boulders and trees and the impedimenta of ages, a little stream rushed along in the eternal night at their base. Far away to the west, range upon range piled themselves against the intense blue sky. Beyond a rustic gate, standing across the path that narrowed to a few feet before the wall of stone, a park, sparkling and green in the sunlight, was visible. They stopped and regarded the two gateways,--one the work of nature, the other the feeble counterfeit of man,--and then swinging open the creaking wooden affair, passed into the peaceful valley. A few yards away stood a small log cabin, but the chimney was smokeless, and though the chickens clucked in the yard, and a collie lay on the doorstep, it seemed desolate and deserted.
Passing along an almost invisible trail, they found themselves in the wildest and most remote part of that wild and remote region. They saw a few stray animals, but no human beings. This was one of the few places where mining was not a universal pursuit, and it was too early to do much in the few mines that did exist. There are entire sections in the Rockies that are deserted for more than half the year, and this was one of them. That day there was no one at the signal station. The keeper had gone down to the valley for fresh stores, and to learn something of the terrific disturbances that were said to be threatening the entire Eastern coast with annihilation. Perhaps the owners of the log cabin had made a similar pilgrimage.