"If you should be delayed, stay the night in town. Above all things, don't let the darkness catch you upon the prairie!"

CHAPTER III

Table of Contents

AT THE SOD HOUSE

SHE enjoyed the horseback ride to Gregory. Although she trembled at times from the sting of the intense cold, the exercise the riding gave her body kept the blood circulating freely, and she made the trip to the little town without event.

Once there, after thawing the cold out of her face and eyes, she proceeded to do her trading, filling the saddlebags to their fullest.

"Which way do you live from town?" inquired the elderly man who waited upon her at the general store where she was doing her trading.

"Seven miles southeast," she replied.

"Indeed!" he cried as if surprised. "But you didn't come from there today—this afternoon? That would be directly against this storm!"

She nodded.

"Well, now, who would have thought you could have made it! 'Tis an awful day without," he cried as he regarded her in wonder.

"It wasn't warm, I admit," she agreed; "but I didn't seem to mind it so much!"

"You will not go back today—rather tonight?"

"Oh, yes."

"But it would be very risky. Look! It's grown dark already!" She looked out and observed that it had really grown almost pitch dark during the few minutes she had lingered inside. She was for a moment at a loss for a reply, then, conscious that the wind would be to her back, she laughed lightly as she said:

"Oh, I shan't mind. It will take me less than forty minutes, and then it'll all be over," and she laughed low and easily again. The man frowned as he pursued:

"I don't like to see you start, a stranger in such a night as this. Since settlement following a trail is rather treacherous. One may leave town on one, but be on some other before they have gone two miles. And while the wind will be to your back, the uncertainty of direction, should you happen to look back or even around, is confusing. One loses sense of the way they are going. I'd suggest that you stick over until morning. It would be safer," he concluded, shaking his head dubiously.

"Oh, I am not afraid," she cried cheerfully. She was ready then, and with her usual dash, she crossed the short board walk, vaulted into the saddle, and a few minutes later the dull clatter of her horse's hoofs died in the distance.