He made for the corrals, and Alan
watched from his door until he saw him departing southward, accompanied
by two men who bore packs on their shoulders. Not until then did
Rossland gather his nerve sufficiently to stop and look back. His
breathless voice carried something unintelligible to Alan. But he did
not return for his coat and hat.
The reaction came to Alan when he saw the wreck he had made of the
table. Another moment or two and the devil in him would have been at
work. He hated Rossland. He hated him now only a little less than he
hated John Graham, and that he had let him go seemed a miracle to him.
He felt the strain he had been under. But he was glad. Some little god
of common sense had overruled his passion, and he had acted wisely.
Graham would now get his message, and there could be no misunderstanding
of purpose between them.
He was staring at the disordered papers on his desk when a movement at
the door turned him about. Mary Standish stood before him.
"You sent him away," she cried softly.
Her eyes were shining, her lips parted, her face lit up with a beautiful
glow. She saw the overturned table, Rossland's hat and coat on a chair,
the evidence of what had happened and the quickness of his flight; and
then she turned her face to Alan again, and what he saw broke down the
last of that grim resolution which he had measured for himself, so that
in a moment he was at her side, and had her in his arms.
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