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A hand was laid on her ar her Almost immediately the soft thud of hoofs was upon them Kut-le seized Rhoda and tossed her to a pony's back

"It was dead easy!" he whispered "They were all asleep! I even took a saddle for you! Now hike!"

Rhoda gripped her pony with her knees as the little fellow cantered unerringly through the darkness after Kut-le She felt a sudden pride and exultation in the security she had developed in the saddle during the travail of her night rides She knew that no man of her acquaintance could ride a horse as she could now And with the exultation she was tre with excitement She knew that none of them could expect mercy if the Navajos discovered their loss in tiambler who stakes his life on a throw of the dice; all the wild thrill of the chase; all the tres that hunt and are hunted, were Rhoda's as the night wind rushed past her face The apathy of illness was gone Tonight she was as wild a thing as the night's birds that brushed across their trail on sweeping wing

When they made camp at dawn Rhoda tumbled into her blanket and was asleep before Alchise finished covering their trail When she woke she found that they were cah up on a ave back into a shallow cave In front, facing the desert, was a heap of rock that for bubbled from the cave floor Here the little party would seeles of the Andes

It was barely noon and the ainst the raarette, while Molly and Cesca worked over the fire Rhoda lunched on the tortillas to which Molly had clung through all the vicissitudes of flight

"Where are the horses?" she asked Kut-le

"Oh, Alchise took them back We must stay here a while till your mob of friends disperses I couldn't feed theet some supplies from them Alchise will fix it up with them"

And here on this dizzy brink of the desert Kut-le did pause as if for a long, long holiday The wisdo did not trouble him at all The call of the desert was an allure to elude capture through his skill and unfailing good fortune