At the touch of her fingers his pulses throbbed. But once more he tried to make her understand.
"No, I've had luck all the way through. Do you remember that night at the cabin—before we went up the cañon?"
"Yes."
"Some one shot at me as I ran into the cabin. I was so frightened that I piled all the furniture against the door and hid in the cellar. It was always that way with me. I used to jump if anybody rode up unexpectedly at the ranch. Every little thing set my nerves fluttering."
"But it isn't so now."
"No, not so much."
"That's what I'm telling you," she triumphed. "You came out here from a soft life in town. But you've grown tough because you set your teeth to go through no matter what the cost. I wish I could show you how much I ... admire you. Dad feels that way, too. So does Ned."
"But I don't deserve it. That's what humiliates me."
"Don't you?" She poured out her passionate protest. "Do you think I don't know what happened back there at the prospect hole? Do you think I don't know that you put Dan Meldrum down in the pit—and him with a gun in his hand? Was it a coward that did that?"
"So you knew that all the time," he cried.
"I heard him calling you—and I went close. Yes, I knew it. But you would never have told me because it might seem like bragging."
"It was easy enough. I wasn't thinking of myself, but of you. He saw I meant business and he wilted."
"You were thinking about me—and you forgot to be afraid," the girl exulted.
"Yes, that was it." A wave of happiness broke over his heart as the sunlight does across a valley at dawn. "I'm always thinking of you. Day and night you fill my thoughts, hillgirl. When I'm riding the range—whatever I do—you're with me all the time."
"Yes."
Her lips were slightly parted, eyes eager and hungry. The heart of the girl drank in his words as the thirsty roots of a rosebush do water. She took a long deep breath and began to tremble.
"I think of you as the daughter of the sun and the wind. Some day you will be the mother of heroes, the wife of a man—"
"Yes," she prompted again, and the face lifted to his was flushed with innocent passion.
The shy invitation of her dark-lashed eyes was not to be denied. He flung away discretion and snatched her into his arms. An inarticulate little sound welled up from her throat, and with a gesture wholly savage and feminine her firm arms crept about his neck and fastened there.
––––––––
Chapter XXVI
The Sins of the Fathers
They spoke at first only in that lovers' Esperanto which is made up of fond kisses and low murmurs and soft caresses. From these Beulah was the first to emerge.
"Would you marry a girl off the range?" she whispered. "Would you dare take her home to your people?"
"I haven't any people. There are none of them left but me."
"To your friends, then?"
"My friends will be proud as punch. They'll wonder how I ever hypnotized you into caring for me."
"But I'm only a hillgirl," she protested. "Are you sure you won't be ashamed of me, dear?"
"Certain sure. I'm a very sensible chap at bottom, and I know when I have the best there is."
"Ah, you think that now because—"
"Because of my golden luck in winning the most wonderful girl I ever met." In the fling of the fire glow he made a discovery and kissed it. "I didn't know before that you had dimples."
"There are lots of things you don't know about me. Some of them you won't like. But if you love me, perhaps you'll forgive them, and then—because I love you—maybe I'll grow out of them. I feel to-night as if anything were possible. The most wonderful thing that ever happened to me has come into my life."
"My heart is saying that, too, sweetheart."
"I love to hear you say that I'm—nice," she confided. "Because, you know, lots of people don't think so. The best people in Battle Butte won't have anything to do with me. I'm one of the Rutherford gang."
The light was full on his face, so that she saw the dawning horror in his eyes.
"What is it? What are you thinking?" she cried.
He gave a little groan and his hands fell slackly from her. "I'd forgotten." The words came in a whisper, as if he spoke to himself rather than to her.
"Forgotten what?" she echoed; and like a flash added: "That I'm a Rutherford. Is that what you mean?"
"That you are the daughter of Hal Rutherford and that I'm the son of John Beaudry."
"You mean that you would be ashamed to marry a Rutherford," she said, her face white in the fire glow.
"No." He brushed her challenge aside and went straight to what was in his mind. "I'm thinking of what happened seventeen years ago," he answered miserably.
"What did happen that could come between you and me to-night?"
"Have you forgotten, too?" He turned to the fire with a deep breath that was half a sob.
"What is it? Tell me," she demanded.
"Your father killed mine at Battle Butte."
A shiver ran through her lithe, straight body. "No ... No! Say it isn't true, Roy."
"It's true. I was there ... Didn't they ever tell you about it?"
"I've heard about the fight when Sheriff Beaudry was killed. Jess Tighe had his spine injured in it. But I never knew that dad ... You're sure of it?" she flung at him.
"Yes. He led the attackers. I suppose he thought of it as a feud. My father had killed one of his people in a gun fight."
She, too, looked into the fire. It was a long time before she spoke, and then in a small, lifeless voice. "I suppose you ... hate me."
"Hate you!" His voice shook with agitation. "That would make everything easy. But—there is no other woman in the world for me but you."
Almost savagely she turned toward him. "Do you mean that?"
"I never mean anything so much."
"Then what does it matter about our fathers? We have our own lives to live. If we've found happiness we've a right to it. What happened seventeen years ago can't touch us—not unless we let it."
White-lipped, drear-eyed, Roy faced her hopelessly. "I never thought of it before, but it is true what the Bible says about the sins of the fathers. How can I shake hands in friendship with the man who killed mine? Would it be loyal or decent to go into his family and make him my father by marrying his daughter?"
Beulah stood close to him, her eyes burning into his. She was ready to fight for her love to a finish. "Do you think I'm going to give you up now ... now ... just when we've found out how much we care ... because of any reason under heaven outside ourselves? By God, no! That's a solemn oath, Roy Beaudry. I'll not let you go."
He did not argue with her. Instead, he began to tell her of his father and his mother. As well as he could remember it he related to her the story of that last ride he had taken with John Beaudry. The girl found herself visioning the pathetic tenderness