tremulous utterance.

The ceremony ended, the onlookers came forward with pleasant words on
their lips, pleasant smiles on their faces. The children filed by his

couch, bashful yet sympathetic; the women murmured, the young men grasped
his hand. Mescal flitted by with downcast eye, with shy smile, but no

word.
"Your fever is gone," said August Naab, with his hand on Hare's cheek.

"It comes and goes suddenly," replied Hare. "I feel better now, only I'm
oppressed. I can't breathe freely. I rant air, and I'm hungry."

"Mother Mary, the lad's hungry. Judith, Esther, where are your wits?
Help your mother. Mescal, wait on him, roe to his comfort."

Mescal brought a little table and a pillow, and the other girls soon
followed with food and drink; then they hovered about, absorbed in caring

for him.
"They said I fell among thieves," mused Hare, when he was once more

alone. "I've fallen among saints as well." He felt that he could never
repay this August Naab. "If only I might live!" he ejaculated. How

restful was this cottage garden! The green sward was a balm to his eyes.
Flowers new to him, though of familiar springtime hue, lifted fresh faces

everywhere; fruit-trees, with branches intermingling, blended the white
and pink of blossoms. There was the soft laughter of children in the

garden. Strange birds darted among the trees. Their notes were new, but
their song was the old delicious monotone--the joy of living and love of

spring. A green-bowered irrigation ditch led by the porch and unseen
water flowed gently, with gurgle and tinkle, with music in its hurry.

Innumerable bees murmured amid the blossoms.
Hare fell asleep. Upon returning drowsily to consciousness he caught

through half-open eyes the gleam of level shafts of gold sunlight low
down in the trees; then he felt himself being carried into the house to

be laid upon a bed. Some one gently unbuttoned his shirt at the neck,
removed his shoes, and covered him with a blanket. Before he had fully

awakened he was left alone, and quiet settled over the house. A
languorous sense of ease and rest lulled him to sleep again. In another

moment, it seemed to him, he was awake; bright daylight streamed through
the window, and a morning breeze stirred the faded curtain.

The drag in his breathing which was always a forerunner of a
coughing-spell warned him now; he put on coat and shoes and went outside,

where his cough attacked him, had its sway, and left him.
"Good-morning," sang out August Naab's cheery voice. "Sixteen hours of

sleep, my lad!"
"I did sleep, didn't I? No wonder I feel well this morning. A

peculiarity of my illness is that one day I'm down, the next day up."
"With the goodness of God, my lad, we'll gradually increase the days up.

Go in to breakfast. Afterward I want to talk to you. This'll be a busy
day for me, shoeing the horses and packing supplies. I want to start for

home to-morrow."
Hare pondered over Naab's words while he ate. The suggestion in them,

implying a relation to his future, made him wonder if the good Mormon
intended to take him to his desert home. He hoped so, and warmed anew to

this friend. But he had no enthusiasm for himself; his future seemed
hopeless.

Naab was waiting for him on the porch, and drew him away from the cottage
down the path toward the gate

"I want you to go home with me."
"You're kind--I'm only a sort of beggar--I've no strength left to work my

way. I'll go--though it's only to die."
"I haven't the gift of revelation--yet somehow I see that you won't die

of this illness. You will come home with me. It's a beautiful place, my
Navajo oasis. The Indians call it the Garden of Eschtah. If you can get

well anywhere it'll be there."
"I'll go but I ought not. What can I do for you?

"No man can ever tell what he may do for another. The time may come--
well, John, is it settled?" He offered his huge broad hand.

"It's settled--I--" Hare faltered as he put his hand in Naab's. The
Mormon's grip straightened his frame and braced him. Strength and

simplicity flowed from the giant's toil-hardened palm. Hare swallowed
his thanks along with his emotion, and for what he had intended to say he

substituted: "No one ever called me John. I don't know the name. Call
me Jack."

"Very well, Jack, and now let's see. You'll need some things from the
store. Can you come with me? It's not far."

"Surely. And now what I need most is a razor to scrape the alkali and
stubble off my face."

The wide street, bordered by cottages peeping out of green and white
orchards, stretched in a straight line to the base of the ascent which

led up to the Pink Cliffs. A green square enclosed a gray church, a
school-house and public hall. Farther down the main thoroughfare were

several weather-boarded whitewashed stores. Two dusty men were riding
along, one on each side of the wildest, most vicious little horse Hare

had ever seen. It reared and bucked and kicked, trying to escape from
two lassoes. In front of the largest store were a number of mustangs all

standing free, with bridles thrown over their heads and trailing on the
ground. The loungers leaning against the railing and about the doors

were lank brown men very like Naab's sons. Some wore sheepskin "chaps,"
some blue overalls; all wore boots and spurs, wide soft hats, and in

their belts, far to the back, hung large Colt's revolvers.
'We'll buy what you need, just as if you expected to ride the ranges for

me to-morrow," said Naab. "The first thing we ask a new man is, can he
ride? Next, can he shoot?"

"I could ride before I got so weak. I've never handled a revolver, but I
can shoot a rifle. Never shot at anything except targets, and it seemed

to come natural for me to hit them."
"Good. We'll show you some targets--lions, bears, deer, cats, wolves.

There's a fine forty-four Winchester here that my friend Abe has been
trying to sell. It has a long barrel and weighs eight pounds. Our

desert riders like the light carbines that go easy on a saddle. Most of
the mustangs aren't weight-carriers. This rifle has a great range; I've

shot it, and it's just the gun for you to use on wolves and coyotes.
You'll need a Colt and a saddle, too."

"By-the-way," he went on, as they mounted the store steps, "here's the
kind of money we use in this country." He handed Hare a slip of blue

paper, a written check for a sum of money, signed, but without register
of bank or name of firm. "We don't use real money," he added. "There's

very little coin or currency in southern Utah. Mast of the Gentiles
lately come in have money, and some of us Mormons have a bag or two of

gold, but scarcely any
it gets into circulation. We use these checks, which go from man to man

sometimes for six months. The roundup of a check means sheep, cattle,
horses, grain, merchandise or labor. Every man gets his real money's

value - without paying out an actual cent."
"Such a system at least means honest men," said Hare, laughing his

surprise.
They went into a wide door to tread a maze of narrow aisles between boxes

and barrels, stacks of canned vegetables, and piles of harness and dry
goods; they entered an open space where several men leaned on a counter.

"Hello, Abe," said Naab; "seen anything of Snap?"
"Hello, August. Yes, Snap's inside. So's Holderness. Says he rode in

off the range on purpose to see you." Abe designated an open doorway from
which issued loud voices. Hare glanced into a long narrow room full of

smoke and the fumes of rum. Through the haze he made out a crowd of men
at a rude bar. Abe went to the door and called out: "Hey, Snap, your dad

wants you. Holderness, here's August Naab."
A man staggered up the few steps leading to the store and swayed in. His

long face had a hawkish cast, and it was gray, not with age, but with the
sage-gray of the desert. His eyes were of the same hue, cold yet burning