It was a slow progress, for she had to step lightly and
carefully for fear of the slippers. He took her bare arm and helped
her; he would never have thought of it under ordinary conditions, but
since she had put on this gown she was greatly changed to him, no
longer the wild, free rider of the mountain-desert, but a
defenseless, strangely weak being. Her strength was now something
other than the skill to ride hard and shoot straight and quick.
So they came to the schoolhouse and reached the long line of buggies,
buckboards, and, most of all, saddled horses. They crowded the
horse-shed where the school children stabled their mounts in the
winter weather. They were tethered to the posts of the fence; they
were grouped about the trees.
It was a prodigious gathering, and a great affair for the
mountain-desert. They knew this even before they had set foot within
the building.
They stopped here and adjusted their masks carefully. They were made
from a strip of black lining which Jack had torn from one of the coats
in the trunk which lay far back in the hills.
Pages:
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174