The Hunted Woman

of an hour had seen a complete and miraculous revolution within him. It was a change so unusual and apparently so impossible that he could not grasp the situation and the fact all at once. B

ld Joanne that she interested him more just now than his book. Again he repeated to himself that it had not been a surrender-but an obliteration. With a pair of lovely eyes looking quietly into him, he had wiped the slate

d Joanne to stop at his cabin and eat partridges with him. He learned that the Tête Jaune train could not go on until the next day, and after Mrs. Otto had made him ta

r her eyes and understanding the page which he had so long hidden. He had as much as confessed to her that she had come to change him-to complete what he had only half created. It had

a place like Tête Jaune, the rail-end, a place of several thousand men, with its crude muscle and brawn and the seven passions of man. It was an impossible place for a young and beautiful woman unprotected. If Joanne had known any one among the engineers or contractors, or had she possessed a letter of introduction to them, the tense

to the cabin door. It was Joanne's voice that roused him. Sweet and

r eyes were a deeper, more wonderful blue as she looked up at him, and

atoes when I looked up to find a pair of the fiercest, reddest moustaches I have ever seen, ornamenting the doorway. The man had two

ghter as she nodded at the door. On

ure did startle him some!" He kicked Stevens' lost property out with the toe of his boot and turned to Joanne, showing

sat down close, and thrust the point of his hunt

go I'm going wit

umped up with the pan of potatoes, leaving the one still speared on t

re of myself up at this terrible Tête Jaune?" she a

that it will be less troublesome for me to see that no insults are offered you than fo

hen she turned to him. Her blue ey

" she whispered. "And you mean th

usand

id that you were largely made up of two emotions-your contempt for woman and your love of adventure; that it would be impossible for you not to see a flaw in one, and th

e. To me it has all been a colossal joke. I have enjoyed the hundreds of columns aimed at me by excited women through the press. They have all asked the same question: Why do you not write of the good things in women instead of always the bad? I have never given them an answer. But I answer you now-here. I have not picked upon the weaknesses of women because I despise them. Those weaknesses-the destroying frailties of womankind-I have driven over rough-sh

in two bright spots. Her lips forme

d have put the things I have thought into written words." She drew a deep breath, and went on, her eyes

od there, her back to the table, drew John Aldous to her side, forced the

r lips were framing words beyond t

g-to find-