"
Ah! God had hidden her then. Why not again? And what was that he had said
to her himself, when searching for a word to cover his emotion? "I pray
for you!" Why could he not pray? She had made him pray in the wilderness.
Should he not pray for her who was in peril now? He leaned back in the
hot, uncomfortable car-seat, pulling his hat down closer over his eyes,
and prayed as he had never prayed before. "Our Father" he stumbled through
as far as he could remember, and tried to think how her sweet voice had
filled in the places where he had not known it the other time. Then, when
he was done, he waited and prayed, "Our Father, care for Elizabeth," and
added, "For Jesus' sake. Amen." Thereafter through the rest of his
journey, and for days and weeks stretching ahead, he prayed that prayer,
and sometimes found in it his only solace from the terrible fear that
possessed him lest some harm had come to the girl, whom it seemed to him
now he had deserted in cold blood.
CHAPTER IX
IN A TRAP
Elizabeth rode straight out to the east, crossing the town as rapidly as
possible, going full gallop where the streets were empty. On the edge of
the town she crossed another trail running back the way that they had
come; but without swerving she turned out toward the world, and soon
passed into a thick growth of trees, around a hill.
Not three minutes elapsed after she had passed the crossing of the trails
before the four men rode across from the other direction, and, pausing,
called to one another, looking this way and that:
"What d'ye think, Bill? Shall we risk the right hand 'r the left?"
"Take the left hand fer luck," answered Bill.
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