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"Neither would I," said her companion.
"You! Well, I don't see that it would make much matter
to you, anyhow. You ain't even a friend of ours."
The young hunter's dark face grew so gloomy over this remark
that Lucy Ferrier laughed aloud.
"There, I didn't mean that," she said; "of course, you are a
friend now. You must come and see us. Now I must push along,
or father won't trust me with his business any more. Good-bye!"
"Good-bye," he answered, raising his broad sombrero, and
bending over her little hand. She wheeled her mustang round,
gave it a cut with her riding-whip, and darted away down the
broad road in a rolling cloud of dust.
Young Jefferson Hope rode on with his companions, gloomy and
taciturn. He and they had been among the Nevada Mountains
prospecting for silver, and were returning to Salt Lake City
in the hope of raising capital enough to work some lodes
which they had discovered. He had been as keen as any of
them upon the business until this sudden incident had drawn
his thoughts into another channel. The sight of the fair
young girl, as frank and wholesome as the Sierra breezes,
had stirred his volcanic, untamed heart to its very depths.
When she had vanished from his sight, he realized that a crisis
had come in his life, and that neither silver speculations
nor any other questions could ever be of such importance to
him as this new and all-absorbing one. The love which had
sprung up in his heart was not the sudden, changeable fancy
of a boy, but rather the wild, fierce passion of a man of
strong will and imperious temper. He had been accustomed
to succeed in all that he undertook. He swore in his heart
that he would not fail in this if human effort and human
perseverance could render him successful.
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