"wouldn't you like to know when i'm going home?"

io welland looked up from beneath her dark lashes at her hostess with a mixture of mischief and deprecation.

"no," said miss van arsdale quietly.

"ah? well, i would. here it is two full weeks since i settled down on you. why don't you evict me?"

miss van arsdale smiled. the girl continued:

"why don't i evict myself? i'm quite well and sane again--at least i think so--thanks to you. very well, then, io; why don't you go home?"

"instinct of self-preservation," suggested the other. "you're better off here until your strength is quite restored, aren't you?"

the girl propped her chin in her hand and turned upon her companion a speculative regard. "camilla van arsdale, you don't really like me," she asserted.

"liking is such an undefined attitude," replied the other, unembarrassed.

"you find me diverting," defined io. "but you resent me, don't you?"

"that's rather acute in you. i don't like your standards nor those of your set."

"i've abandoned them."

"you'll resume them as soon as you get back."

"shall i ever get back?" the girl moved to the door. her figure swayed forward yieldingly as if she would give herself into the keeping of the sun-drenched, pine-soaked air. "enchantment!" she murmured.

"it is a healing place," said the habitant of it, low, as if to herself.

a sudden and beautiful pity softened and sobered io's face. "miss van arsdale," said she with quiet sincerity; "if there should ever come a time when i can do you a service in word or deed, i would come from the other side of the world to do it."

"that is a kindly, but rather exaggerated gratitude."

"it isn't gratitude. it's loyalty. whatever you have done, i believe you were right. and, right or wrong, i--i am on your side. but i wonder why you have been so good to me. was it a sort of class feeling?"

"sex feeling would be nearer it," replied the other. "there is something instinctive which makes women who are alone stand by each other."

io nodded. "i suppose so. though i've never felt it, or the need of it before this. well, i had to speak before i left, and i suppose i must go on soon."

"i shall miss you," said the hostess, and added, smiling, "as one misses a stimulant. stay through the rest of the month, anyway."

"i'd like to," answered io gratefully. "i've written delavan that i'm coming back--and now i'm quite dreading it. do you suppose there ever yet was a woman with understanding of herself?"

"not unless she was a very dull and stupid woman with little to understand," smiled miss van arsdale. "what are you doing to-day?"

"riding down to lunch with your paragon of a station-agent."

miss van arsdale shook her head dubiously. "i'm afraid he'll miss his daily stimulant after you've gone. it has been daily, hasn't it?"

"i suppose it has, just about," admitted the girl. "the stimulus hasn't been all on one side, i assure you. what a mind to be buried here in the desert! and what an annoying spirit of contentment! it's that that puzzles me. sometimes it enrages me."

"are you going to spoil what you cannot replace?" the retort was swift, almost fierce.

"surely, you won't blame me if he looks beyond this horizon," protested io. "life is sure to reach out in one form or another and seize on him. i told him so."

"yes," breathed the other. "you would."

"what were you intending to do with him?"

there was a hint of challenge in the slight emphasis given to the query.

"i? nothing. he is under no obligation to me."

"there you and he differ. he regards you as an infallible mentor." a twinkle of malice crept into the slumbrous eyes. "why do you let him wear made-up bow ties?" demanded io.

"what does it matter?"

"out here, nothing. but elsewhere--well, it does define a man, doesn't it?"

"undoubtedly. i've never gone into it with him."

"i wonder if i could guess why."

"very likely. you seem preternaturally acute in these matters."

"is it because the sears-roebuck mail-order double-bow knot in polka-dot pattern stands as a sign of pristine innocence?"

in spite of herself miss van arsdale laughed. "something of that sort."

io's soft lips straightened. "it's rotten bad form. why shouldn't he be right? it's so easy. just a hint--"

"from you?"

"from either of us. yes; from me, if you like."

"it's quite an intimate interest, isn't it?"

"'but never can battle of men compare with merciless feminine fray'"-- quoted io pensively.

"kipling is a sophomore about women," retorted miss van arsdale. "we're not going to quarrel over errol banneker. the odds are too unfair."

"unfair?" queried io, with a delicate lift of brow.

"don't misunderstand me. i know that whatever you do will be within the rules of the game. that's the touchstone of honor of your kind."

"isn't it good enough? it ought to be, for it's about the only one most of us have." io laughed. "we're becoming very serious. may i take the pony?"

"yes. will you be back for supper?"

"of course. shall i bring the paragon?"

"if you wish."

outside the gaunt box of the station, io, from the saddle sent forth her resonant, young call:

"oh, ban!"

"'tis the voice of the butterfly; hear her declare, 'i've come down to the earth; i am tired of the air'"

chanted banneker's voice in cheerful paraphrase. "light and preen your wings, butterfly."

their tone was that of comrades without a shade of anything deeper.

"busy?" asked io.

"just now. give me another five minutes."

"i'll go to the hammock."

one lone alamo tree, an earnest of spring water amongst the dry-sand growth of the cactus, flaunted its bright verdency a few rods back of the station, and in its shade banneker had swung a hammock for io. hitching her pony and unfastening her hat, the girl stretched herself luxuriously in the folds. a slow wind, spice-laden with the faint, crisp fragrancies of the desert, swung her to a sweet rhythm. she closed her eyes happily ... and when she opened them, banneker was standing over her, smiling.

"don't speak to me," she murmured; "i want to believe that this will last forever."

silent and acquiescent, he seated himself in a camp-chair close by. she stretched a hand to him, closing her eyes again.

"swing me," she ordered.

he aided the wind to give a wider sweep to the hammock. io stirred restlessly.

"you've broken the spell," she accused softly. "weave me another one."

"what shall it be?" he bent over the armful of books which he had brought out.

"you choose this time."

"i wonder," he mused, regarding her consideringly.

"ah, you may well wonder! i'm in a very special mood to-day."

"when aren't you, butterfly?" he laughed.

"beware that you don't spoil it. choose well, or forever after hold your peace."

he lifted the well-worn and well-loved volume of poetry. it parted in his hand to the rossetti sonnet. he began to read at the lines:

"when work and will awake too late, to gaze after their life sailed by, and hold their breath."

io opened her eyes again.

"why did you select that thing?"

"why did you mark it?"

"did i mark it?"

"certainly, i'm not responsible for the sage-blossom between the pages."

"ah, the sage! that's for wisdom," she paraphrased lightly.

"do you think rossetti so wise a preceptor?"

"it isn't often that he preaches. when he does, as in that sonnet--well, the inspiration may be a little heavy, but he does have something to say."

"then it's the more evident that you marked it for some special reason."

"what supernatural insight," she mocked. "can you read your name between the lines?"

"what is it that you want me to do?"

"you mean to ask what it is that mr. rossetti wants you to do. i didn't write the sonnet, you know."

"you didn't fashion the arrow, but you aimed it."

"am i a good marksman?"

"i suppose you mean that i'm wasting my time here."

"surely not!" she gibed. "forming a link of transcontinental traffic. helping to put a girdle 'round the earth in eighty days--or is it forty now?--enlightening the traveling public about the three-twenty-four train; dispensing time-tables and other precious mediums of education--"

"i'm happy here," he said doggedly.

"are you going to be, always?"

his face darkened with doubt. "why shouldn't i be?" he argued. "i've got everything i need. some day i thought i might write."

"what about?" the question came sharp and quick.

he looked vaguely around the horizon.

"oh, no, ban!" she said. "not this. you've got to know something besides cactuses and owls to write, these days. you've got to know men. and women," she added, in a curious tone, with a suspicion of effort, even of jealousy in it.

"i've never cared much for people," he said.

"it's an acquired taste, i suppose for some of us. there's something else." she came slowly to a sitting posture and fixed her questioning, baffling eyes on his. "ban, don't you want to make a success in life?"

for a moment he did not answer. when he spoke, it was with apparent irrelevance to what she had said. "once i went to a revival. a reformed tough was running it. about every three minutes he'd thrust out his hands and grab at the air and say, 'oh, brothers; don't you yearn for jesus?'"

"what has that to do with it?" questioned io, surprised and impatient.

"only that, somehow, the way you said 'success in life' made me think of him and his 'yearn for jesus.'"

"errol banneker," said io, amused in spite of her annoyance, "you are possessed of a familiar devil who betrays other people's inner thoughts to you. success _is_ a species of religion to me, i suppose."

"and you are making converts, like all true enthusiasts. tell, tell me. what kind of success?"

"oh, power. money. position. being somebody."

"i'm somebody here all right. i'm the station-agent of the atkinson and st. philip railroad company."

"now you're trying to provoke me."

"no. but to get success you've got to want it, haven't you?" he asked more earnestly. "to want it with all your strength."

"of course. every man ought to."

"i'm not so sure," he objected. "there's a kind of virtue in staying put, isn't there?"

she made a little gesture of impatience.

"i'll give you a return for your sonnet," he pursued, and repeated from memory:

"what else is wisdom? what of man's endeavor or god's high grace, so lovely and so great? to stand from fear set free, to breathe and wait; to hold a hand uplifted over hate. and shall not loveliness be loved forever?"

"i don't know it. it's beautiful. what is it?"

"gilbert murray's translation of 'the bacchae.' my legal mentors had a lapse of dry-as-dustness and sent it to me."

"'to stand from fear set free, to breathe and wait,'" murmured the girl. "that is what i've been doing here. how good it is! but not for you," she added, her tone changing from dreamy to practical. "ban, i suspect there's too much poetry in your cosmos."

"very probably. poetry isn't success, is it?"

her face grew eager. "it might be. the very highest. but you've got to make yourself known and felt among people."

"do you think i could? and how does one get that kind of desire?" he asked lazily.

"how? i've known men to do it for love; and i've known them to do it for hate; and i've known them to do it for money. yes; and there's another cause."

"what is it?"

"restlessness."

"that's ambition with its nerves gone bad, isn't it?"

again she smiled. "you'll know what it is some day."

"is it contagious?" he asked solicitously.

"don't be alarmed. i haven't it. not now. i'd love to stay on and on and just 'breathe and wait,' if the gods were good."

'"dream that the gods are good,'" he echoed. "the last thing they ever think of being according to my reading."

she capped his line;

"we twain, once well in sunder, what will the mad gods do--'"

she began; then broke off, jumping to her feet. "i'm talking sheer nonsense!" she cried. "take me for a walk in the woods. the desert glares to-day."

"i'll have to be back by twelve," he said. "excuse me just a moment."

he disappeared into the portable house. when he rejoined her, she asked:

"what did you go in there for? to get your revolver?"

"yes."

"i've carried one since the day you told me to. not that i've met a soul that looked dangerous, nor that i'd know how to shoot or when, if i did."

"the sight of it would be taken as evidence that you knew how to use it," he assured her.

for a time, as they walked, she had many questions to put about the tree and bird life surrounding them. in the midst of it he asked her:

"do you ever get restless?"

"i haven't, here. i'm getting rested."

"and at home i suppose you're too busy."

"being busy is no preventive. somebody has said that st. vitus is the patron saint of new york society."

"it must take almost all the time those people have to keep up with the theaters and with the best in poetry and what's being done and thought, and the new books and all that," he surmised.

"i beg your pardon; what was that about poetry and books?"

"girls like you--society girls, i mean--read everything there is, don't they?"

"where do you get that extraordinary idea?"

"why, from knowing you."

"my poor, innocent ban! if you were to try and talk books and poetry, 'shakespeare and the musical glasses,' to the average society girl, as you call her, what do you suppose would happen?"

"why, i suppose i'd give myself away as an ignoramus."

"heaven save you for a woolly lambkin! the girl would flee, shrieking, and issue a warning against you as a high-brow, a prig, and a hopeless bore. they don't read books, except a few chocolate-cream novels. they haven't the time."

"but you--"

"oh, i'm a freak! i get away with it because i'm passably good-looking and know how to dress, and do what i please by the divine right of--well, of just doing it. but, even so, a lot of the men are rather afraid of me in their hearts. they suspect the bluestocking. let 'em suspect! the market is plenty good enough," declared io flippantly.

"then you just took up books as a sort of freak; a side issue?" the disappointment in his face was almost ludicrous.

"no." a quiet gravity altered her expression. "i'll tell you about me, if you want to hear. my mother was the daughter of a famous classical scholar, who was opposed to her marriage because father has always been a man of affairs. from the first, mother brought me up to love books and music and pictures. she died when i was twelve, and poor father, who worshiped her, wanted to carry out her plans for me, though he had no special sympathy with them. to make things worse for him, nobody but mother ever had any control over me; i was spoiled and self-willed and precocious, and i thought the world owed me a good time. dad's business judgment of human nature saved the situation, he thoroughly understood one thing about me, that i'd keep a bargain if i made it. so we fixed up our little contract; i was to go through college and do my best, and after i graduated, i was to have a free hand and an income of my own, a nice one. i did the college trick. i did it well. i was third in my class, and there wasn't a thing in literature or languages that they could stop me from getting. at eighteen they turned me loose on the world, and here i am, tired of it, but still loving it. that's all of me. aren't i a good little autobiographer. every lady her own boswell! what are you listening to?"

"there's a horse coming along the old trail," said banneker.

"who is it?" she asked. "some one following us?"

he shook his head. a moment later the figure of a mounted man loomed through the brush. he was young, strong-built, and not ill-looking. "howdy, ban," he said.

banneker returned the greeting.

"whee-ew!" shrilled the other, wiping his brow. "this sure does fetch the licker outen a man's hide. hell of a wet night at the sick coyote last night. why wasn't you over?"

"busy," replied banneker.

something in his tone made the other raise himself from his weary droop. he sighted io.

"howdy, ma'am," he said. "didn't see there was ladies present."

"good-morning," said io.

"visitin' hereabouts?" inquired the man, eyeing her curiously.

"yes."

"where, if i might be bold to ask?"

"if you've got any questions to ask, ask them of me, fred," directed banneker.

while there was nothing truculent in his manner, it left no doubt as to his readiness and determination.

fred looked both sullen and crestfallen.

"it ain't nothin'," he said. "only, inquiries was bein' made by a gent from a angelica city noospaper last week."

"somebody else meant," asserted banneker. "you keep that in mind, will you? and it isn't necessary that you should mention this lady at all. savvy, fred?"

the other grunted, touched his sombrero to io and rode on.

"has a reporter been here inquiring after me?" asked io.

"not after you. it was some one else."

"if the newspapers tracked me here, i'd have to leave at once."

"they won't. at least, it isn't likely."

"you'd get me out some way, wouldn't you, ban?" she said trustfully.

"yes."

"ban; that fred person seemed afraid of you."

"he's got nothing to be afraid of unless he talks too much."

"but you had him 'bluffed.' i'm sure you had. ban, did you ever kill a man?"

"no."

"or shoot one?"

"not even that."

"yet, i believe, from the way he looked at you, that you've got a reputation as a 'bad man'?"

"so i have. but it's no fault of mine."

"how did you get it?"

"you'll laugh if i tell you. they say i've got a 'killer's' eye."

the girl examined his face with grave consideration. "you've got nice eyes," was her verdict. "that deep brown is almost wasted on a man; some girl ought to have it. i used to hear a--a person, who made a deep impression on me at the time, insist that there was always a flaw in the character of a person with large, soft brown eyes."

"isn't there a flaw in every character?"

"human nature being imperfect, there must be. what is yours; suppressed murderousness?"

"not at all. my reputation is unearned, though useful. just before i came here, a young chap showed up from nowhere and loafed around manzanita. he was a pretty kind of lad, and one night in the sick coyote some of the old-timers tried to put something over on him. when the smoke cleared away, there was one dead and six others shot up, and little brownie was out on the desert, riding for the next place, awfully sore over a hole in his new sombrero. he was a two-gun man from down near the border. well, when i arrived in town, i couldn't understand why every one looked so queerly at my eyes, until mindle, the mail-driver, told me they were exactly like the hair-trigger boy's. cheap and easy way to get a reputation, isn't it?"

"but you must have something back of it," insisted the girl. "are you a good shot?"

"nothing fancy; there are twenty better in town."

"yet you pin some faith to your 'gun,'" she pointed out.

he glanced over his shoulder to right and left. io jumped forward with a startled cry. so swift and secret had been his motion that she hardly saw the weapon before--plack--plack--plack--the three shots had sounded. the smoke drifted around him in a little circle, for the first two shots had been over his shoulder and the third as he whirled. walking back, he carefully examined the trunks of three trees.

"i'd have only barked that fellow, if he'd been a man," he observed, shaking his head at the second mark.

"you frightened me," complained io.

"i'm sorry. i thought you wanted to see a little gun-play. out here it isn't how straight you can shoot at a bull's-eye, but how quick you can plant your bullets, and usually in a mark that isn't obliging enough to be dead in line. so i practice occasionally, just in case."

"very interesting. but i've got luncheon to cook," said io.

they returned through the desert. as he opened the door of the shack for her, banneker, reverting to her autobiographical sketch, remarked thoughtfully and without preliminary:

"i might have known there couldn't be any one else like you."