Van continued straight onward, with never so much as a turn of his
head, to the horses in the rear. He seemed to have quite forgotten the
two half-frightened women in his wake. Beth had ample opportunity for
observing again the look of strength and grace upon him. However, she
found her attention very much divided between tumultuous joyance in the
mountain grandeur, bathed in the marvelously life-exciting air, and
concern for the outcome of the day. If a faint suggestion of pique at
the manner in which the horseman ignored her presence crept
subconsciously into all her meditations, she did not confess it to
herself.

Elsa's horrid little habit of accepting anything and everything with
the most irresponsible complacency rendered the situation aggravating.
It was so utterly impossible to discuss with such a being even such of
the morning's developments as the relationship of mistress and maid
might otherwise have permitted.

A mile beyond the mouth of the canyon the slight ascent was ended, the
chasm widened, rough slopes succeeded the granite walls, and a charming
little valley, emerald green and dotted with groups of quaking aspen
trees, stretched far towards the wooded mountain barriers, looming
hugely ahead. It was like a dainty lake of grass, abundantly supplied
with little islands.

The sheer enchantment of it, bathed as it was in sun-gold, and
sheltered by prodigious, snow-capped summits, so intensely white
against the intensity of azure, aroused some mad new ecstacy in all
Beth's being. She could almost have done something wild--she knew not
what; and all the alarm subsided from her thoughts. As if in answer to