But to Walter Stone no such bitterness had come, this soldierly, wise caballero escorting his adorable señorita on an errand of mercy. His was the heart of Youth, eternal and undaunted Youth. And Beauty was hers, of the spirit as well as of the flesh. And Love....
"Why, Louise! There are tears on your lashes, my colleen!"
"But I am singing, uncle." And she smiled through her tears.
"I wish I could. I don't know. I think I'm getting to be grown up--just like a woman. It--it makes me--think of lots of things. Let's ride." And her silver spurs flashed.
Boyar, taken quite by surprise, grunted as he leaped down the Moonstone Trail. He resented this undeserved punishment by plunging sideways across the road. Again came the flash of the silver spurs, and Walter Stone heard Louise disciplining the pony.
"Just a woman. Just like a woman," murmured the rancher. "Now, Boyar, and some others of us, will never quite understand what that means." And with rein and voice he lifted the pinto Rally to a lope.
At the crossroads in the valley stood the local jail, or "coop," as it was more descriptively called. Unpainted, isolated, its solitary ugliness lacked even the squalid dignity commonly associated with the word "jail." The sun pelted down upon its bleached, unshaded roof and sides. The burning air ran over its warped shingles like a kind of colorless fire.
The boy Collie, half-dreaming in the suffocating heat of the place, started to his feet as the door swung open. He had heard horses coming. They had stopped. He could hardly realize that the sunlight was swimming through the close dusk of the place. But the girl of Moonstone Cañon, reining Boyar round, was real, and she smiled and nodded a greeting.
"This is Mr. Stone, my uncle," she said. "He wants to talk with you."
With a glance that noted each unlovely detail of the place, the broken iron bed, the cracked pitcher, and the unspeakable blankets, Louise touched her pony and was gone.
Collie rubbed his eyes, blinking in the sun as he stood gazing after her.
Walter Stone, standing near the doorway, noted the lad's clear, healthy skin, his well-shaped head with its tumble of wavy black hair, and the luminous dark eyes. He felt an instant sympathy for the boy, a sympathy that he masked with a business-like brusqueness. "Well, young man?"