to do a thing in the world. Just give yourself to me and let me take
care of you. Rhoda, dear, dear heart!"

"I can't marry unless I'm well," insisted Rhoda, "and I never shall be
well again. I know that you all thought it was for the best, bringing
me down to the desert, but just as soon as I can manage it without
hurting Katherine's and Jack's feelings too much, I'm going back to New
York. If you only knew how the big emptiness of this desert country
adds to my depression!"

"If you go back to New York," persisted DeWitt, "you are going back as
my wife. I'm sick of seeing you dependent on hired care. Why, Rhoda
dear, is it nothing to you that, when you haven't a near relative in
the world, I would gladly die for you?"

"Oh!" cried the girl, tears of weakness and pity in her eyes, "you know
that it means everything to me! But I can't marry any one. All I want
is just to crawl away and die in peace. I wish that that Indian hadn't
come upon me so promptly. I'd just have gone to sleep and never
wakened."

"Don't! Don't!" cried DeWitt. "I shall pick you up and hold you
against all the world, if you say that!"

"Hush!" whispered Rhoda, but her smile was very tender. "Some one is
coming through the orchard."

DeWitt reluctantly released the slender hands and leaned back in his
chair. The sun had crossed the peach orchard slowly, breathlessly. It
cast long, slanting shadows along the beautiful alfalfa fields and