vigorously through the slender, flexible wrist.
His light gleamed upon the curve of a soft cheek, pallid as marble against the faint blue shadow line of the vein throbbing in her temple. Her hair, trimmed in a boyish bob, straggled over eyes and forehead in fine-spun tendrils of golden bronze. The delicate skin of her face was grimed and scratched, and in the palm of her bared hand he found the crimson trickle of a deep, jagged cut. Gingerly he raised her from the snow, and the man, accustomed to dealing with men, marveled at the trifle of weight in his arms.
He was unbuttoning the pocket where he carried his first-aid kit, when he heard a low sigh and felt a quick, stirring movement against his shoulder. Crouched on one foot, he supported the limp figure, and waited breathlessly. He watched the droop of her red nether lip under slowly parting teeth, observed a twitching of her eyelids, and then saw the long lashes suddenly lift. And with the pocket-lamp still shining in her face, he found himself at very close quarters with a pair of velvet eyes, dark blue as violets that looked straight into his.
"Yes--I'll try," he heard her say in a straggling, far-off whisper.
Her eyes were fixed upon him, but there was something in the quality of her gaze to tell him that she was not yet aware of his being there. Awkwardly, her hand crept upward and clutched tightly upon his shoulder, as though a reviving consciousness needed some tangible support to cling to. He waited unmoving, and all at once the light of intelligence flickered from the depths of suddenly distending pupils.
A rose bloom of color dyed her cheeks, and her breath came quick and sharp. She stared intently, with wonderment mounting swiftly to confusion and alarm. "It's--who--where am I?" she stammered. Her hand dropped from his shoulder, and she pushed away from him with a gasping cry.
Somehow she got upon her feet, and turned blindly as though to flee into the forest. With her first step, however, she stumbled, and would have fallen. But Dexter sprang after her, and caught her firmly in his arms. She relaxed with a weary, hopeless gesture, and this time did not try to break his grasp.
"The horse," she faltered--"ran away--and we went down in the stones."
"Knocked you out for a couple of minutes." Dexter surveyed her with the impersonal curiosity of a surgeon. "You're able to stand--after a fashion," he remarked. He lifted up her hands, one and then the other, and nodded judicially. "No broken arms or legs. Ribs? See if you feel any twinges?"She wriggled obediently, and shook her head. "No. I think I'll be all right in a minute."

"Don't try to run again," he advised her. "It would be silly."

She glanced 

 Prev. P 33/195 next