"I have known that you would tell me this, sometime Mr. King," said Myra Willard. "I knew it, I think, before you, yourself, realized; and I, too, am glad--glad for my girl, because I know what such a love will mean to her. But why--why has she gone like this? Where has she gone? Oh, my girl, my girl!" For a moment, the distracted woman was on the point of breaking down; but with an effort of her will, she controlled herself.
"It's clear enough what has sent her away," growled Conrad Lagrange, with a warning glance to the artist. "Some one has filled her mind with the notion that her friendship with Aaron has been causing talk. I think there's no doubt as to where she's gone."
"You mean the mountains?" asked Myra Willard, quickly.
"Yes. I'd stake my life that she has gone straight to Brian Oakley. Think! Where else _would_ she go?"
"She has sometimes borrowed a saddle-horse from your neighbor up the road, hasn't she, Miss Willard?" asked Aaron King.
Conrad Lagrange spoke quickly; "Don't let them think anything unusual has happened. We'll go over to your house and wait for you there."
Fifteen minutes later, Myra Willard returned. Sibyl had borrowed the horse; asking them if she might keep it until the next day. She did not say where she was going. She had left about four o'clock.
"That will put her at Brian's by nine," said the novelist.
"And I will arrive there about the same time," added Aaron King, eagerly. "It's now five-thirty. She has an hour's start; but I'll ride an hour harder."
"With an automobile you could overtake her," said Myra Willard.
"I know," returned the artist, "but if I take a horse, we can ride back together."
He started through the grove, toward the other house, on a run.
By the time Aaron King had found a saddle-horse and was ready to start on his ride, it was six o'clock.
Granting that Conrad Lagrange was right in his supposition that the girl had left with the intention of going to Brian Oakley's, the artist could scarcely, now, hope to arrive at the Ranger Station until some time after Sibyl had reached the home of her friends--unless she should stop somewhere on the way, which he did not think likely. Once, as he realized how the minutes were slipping away, he was on the point of reconsidering his reply to Myra Willard's suggestion that he take an automobile. Then, telling himself that he would surely find Sibyl at the Station and thinking of the return trip with her, he determined to carry out his first plan.
