He held out his hand. With the recollection of their previous parting, she tremblingly advanced her own. He took it, but did not raise it to his lips. And it was she who found herself half confusedly retaining his hand in hers, until she dropped it with a blush.
“Then is this the reason you give for deserting us as you have deserted Devil's Ford?” she said coldly.
He lifted his eyes to her with a strange smile, and said, “Yes,” wheeled his horse, and disappeared in the forest.
He had left her thus abruptly once before, kissed, blushing, and indignant. He was leaving her now, unkissed, but white and indignant. Yet she was so self-possessed when the party joined her, that the singular rencontre and her explanation of the stranger's sudden departure excited no further comment. Only Jessie managed to whisper in her ear,--
“I hope you are satisfied now that it wasn't me he meant?”
A few days after the girls had returned to San Francisco, they received a letter from their father. His business, he wrote, would detain him in Sacramento some days longer. There was no reason why they should return to Devil's Ford in the heat of the summer; their host had written to beg him to allow them a more extended visit, and, if they were enjoying themselves, he thought it would be well not to disoblige an old friend. He had heard they had a pleasant visit to Mr. Prince's place, and that a certain young banker had been very attentive to Christie.
“Do you know what all this means, dear?” asked Jessie, who had been watching her sister with an unusually grave face.
Christie whose thoughts had wandered from the letter, replied carelessly,--
“I suppose it means that we are to wait here until father sends for us.”
“It means a good deal more. It means that papa has had another reverse; it means that the assay has turned out badly for the mine--that the further they go from the flat the worse it gets--that all the gold they will probably ever see at Devil's Ford is what they have already found or will find on the flat; it means that all Devil's Ford is only a 'pocket,' and not a 'lead.'” She stopped, with unexpected tears in her eyes.
“Who told you this?” asked Christie breathlessly.
“Fairfax--Mr. Munroe,” stammered her sister, “writes to me as if we already knew it--tells me not to be alarmed, that it isn't so bad--and all that.”