And sometimes, in the morning, she would appear--equipped with
rod or gun or basket--to frankly challenge Aaron King to some long ramble
in the hills.
So the days for the young man at the beginning of his life work, and for
the young woman at the beginning of her womanhood, passed. Up and down the
canyon, along the boulder-strewn bed of the roaring Clear Creek, from the
Ranger Station to the falls; in the quiet glades under the alders hung
with virgin's-bower and wild grape; beneath the live-oaks on the
mountains' flanks or shoulders; in dimly lighted, cedar-sheltered gulches,
among tall brakes and lilies; or high up on the canyon walls under the
dark and fragrant pines--over all the paths and trails familiar to her
girlhood she led him--showing him every nook and glade and glen--teaching
him to know, as he had asked, the mountains that she herself so loved.
The time came, at last, when the two men must return to Fairlands. With
Mr. and Mrs. Oakley they were spending the evening at Sibyl's home when
Conrad Lagrange announced that they would leave the mountains, two days
later.
"Then,"--said the girl, impulsively,--"Mr. King and I are going for one
last good-by climb to-morrow.
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