"And Tom and I will never forget it, Sheila," said Casey. "I don't know another girl who could have made it after a fall like that in this storm."
"It was perfectly splendid of you!" cried Kitty Wade, with hearty admiration.
Clyde, obeying a sudden impulse, leaned forward and kissed the bruised forehead. Sheila was unused to such endearments. She had no intimates of her own sex; with the women she was courteously distant, repelling and rather despising them. She had felt Clyde's instinctive hostility, and had returned it. Surprised and touched by her action, the tears started to her eyes. Clyde put her arms around the slender, pliant waist.
"Come with me, dear, and get some sleep. You're badly shaken up. We'll sleep in, in the morning."
"But I have to go back," Sheila objected. "Nobody knows I've gone. I have to be back by morning. And then there's Beaver Boy! My heavens! I left him standing outside. Oh, I've got to----"
Casey gently pressed her back as she would have risen.
"I'll stable the horse, old girl; and I'll be at Talapus by daylight to tell them where you are. Don't you worry, now, about anything--not even Sandy. If he's gone back to the hills I'll bet he finds Tom. They'll be all right."
"Do you think so, Casey? And will you do that much for me? I'm awfully sore and tired. Every bone and muscle of me aches."
"You poor little girl." He raised her in his arms. "Come on, girls, and put her to bed. I'll carry her in."
With the first streaks of dawn Casey and Simon mounted and rode for Talapus. But before they had ridden five hundred yards Casey discovered an extraordinary thing. In his ears sounded a sustained, musical murmur, nothing less than the happy laugh of running water.
"By the Lord Harry!" he ejaculated. "There's water in the ditches."
Simon nodded. "Ya-as. _Hiyu chuck_ stop, all same _skookum chuck_," he observed, signifying that there was a full head of it, like a rapid.
The ditches were running to the brim. After the soaking rain of the night the water was not immediately needed, but it showed that the irrigation company's works no longer controlled the supply. When they reached the river they found a swirling, yellow torrent running yeasty-topped, speckled with débris.