So when he rose now, with back-thrown head, he
stretched his arms suddenly out toward those far-seeing stars, and
as suddenly dropped them with an angry shake of his head and one
quick gritting of his teeth that such a thought should have
mastered him even for one swift second--the thought of how
lonesome would be the trail that would be his to follow after that
day.
XXIII
June, tired though she was, tossed restlessly that night. The one
look she had seen in Hale's face when she met him in the car, told
her the truth as far as he was concerned. He was unchanged, she
could give him no chance to withdraw from their long
understanding, for it was plain to her quick instinct that he
wanted none. And so she had asked him no question about his
failure to meet her, for she knew now that his reason, no matter
what, was good. He had startled her in the car, for her mind was
heavy with memories of the poor little cabins she had passed on
the train, of the mountain men and women in the wedding-party, and
Hale himself was to the eye so much like one of them--had so
startled her that, though she knew that his instinct, too, was at
work, she could not gather herself together to combat her own
feelings, for every little happening in the dummy but drew her
back to her previous train of painful thought.
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