Buck and old Joe
Cumberland made the background of their happiness. It was the latter's
request which kept the wedding a matter of the indefinite future. He
would assign no reason for his wish, but Kate guessed it.
All was not well, she knew. Day after day, as the autumn advanced,
Dan went out with the wolf and the wild black stallion and ranged the
hills alone. She did not ask him where or why, for she understood that
to be alone was as necessary to him as sleep is to others. Yet she
could not explain it all and the cold fear grew in her. Sometimes she
surprised a look of infinite pity in the eyes of Buck or her father.
Sometimes she found them whispering and nodding together. At last on
an evening when the three sat before the fire in solemn silence and
Dan was away, they knew not where, among the hills, she could bear it
no longer.
"Do you really think," she burst out, "that the old wildness is still
in Dan?"
"Wild?" said her father gently. "Wild? I don't say he's still
wild--but why is he so late tonight, Kate? The ground's all covered
with snow. The wind's growin' sharper an' sharper. This is a time for
all reasonable folk to stay home an' git comfortable beside the fire.
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