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“On passing Hebby’s door, that gaudy diamond flashed before me. I’ll leave the theft an unsolved mystery.

“When I was forced to reveal my presence to Hebler, I felt that I had balled things up hopelessly and that the only avenue of escape lay in flight—my long suit.

“My only solace in all this bungling mess I have made is that I have brought Jo and Marta together.

“With you at the ranch and Hebler in town, I don’t know how I could make my getaway but for Larry. I have telephoned him and he is to meet me near here, and by the time my little carrier dove delivers this, I shall be en route—for France. I’m weary of movies, and life is a delusion anyway.

“I admit it was wrong to deceive you—after the necessity for so doing had passed. You were kind—in intent; still, you might have been a wee bit nicer, don’t you think?

“Regretfully,

“PENELOPE.”

“P. S. Does it hurt now that I use your mother’s name?”

He read this letter as one who dreams and is but half conscious that it is a dream. He read it again and again, each time grasping bit by bit the realization of its contents and what they meant to him.

“She was right,” he thought. “I didn’t know what love meant. I do now—now that I missed it. I’ve lost her more surely than if she were a ‘hardened, young criminal.’ I shall never try to find her.”

It was hardly sunrise when he went down to the office.

“I should like to speak to Mr. Lamont when he comes down,” he said to the clerk.

“He has gone,” was the reply. “He came down before his call and has gone to the train.”

“Maybe it is just as well,” thought Kurt. “There is really no message I could send to her.”

“See the picture last night?” asked the clerk chattily. “The Thief, or Meg O’ The Prairies. Great picture!”

“Yes; I saw it,” replied Kurt dismally.

“I always go to see Bobbie Burr. She’s my favorite. There was a girl here the other day who was a dead ringer for her. She had dinner with Lamont here. I read in a magazine that she gets a big salary. I forget the figures, but it was more per week than some folks earn in a lifetime.”

Kurt’s heart registered more downward beats.

He hung about the office until the dining-room was open and then went in and perfunctorily consumed some food. Later he called up an acquaintance and asked the loan of his car. It was sent around to the hotel, and he was just about to start for the ranch when a well-known voice behind him said:

“May I ride out to Top Hill with you?”

For a moment the blood left his heart and then returned so rapidly it left him quite pale.

“Larry said you were here. I came back on the train just now. I want to go to the ranch for—my things. Will you take me?”

“Yes,” he said abstractedly.

* * *

* * *

CHAPTER XVII

“Kurt!”

He looked up with a start. As on that first ride, long ago, his eyes had been fixed on the road ahead.

“Let’s talk a bit,” she said. “What did you think—”

“I was such a fool,” he replied bitterly. “I should have known that you were not what you pretended you were. You must believe me when I tell you that I loved you from that first night we were up here in the hills. I didn’t know how great my love was, though, until I knew I had lost you.”

“I thought, or tried to think, you should have known I was not a thief,” said Pen, with a soft tone in her voice, “but Larry said that only showed what a good actress I am. I told Larry all about it this morning, and he said no self-respecting man would ask a thief to marry him, not if he knew she was a thief before he loved her.”

“I didn’t read your letter,” he said, “until after I had seen the picture of ‘The Thief’ last night. So I was prepared for its contents. I read, and not entirely between the lines, that you did not care.”

“I didn’t think I did—so much—” she answered, “when I wrote that letter; but up there, Kurt, up in the clouds yesterday—something within me unlatched, and I knew that I loved you, and that my love would make you forgive me for deceiving you. You will?”

“I will. But you see there is a greater obstacle than that—or in the thought that you were a thief.”

“You mean my being a movie actress. Are you so prejudiced against the profession?”

“The obstacle is that the clerk of the hotel told me he had read somewhere that Bobbie Burr received a stupendous salary.”

“Well, don’t you think she earns it?”

“You see, a poor foreman of a ranch would never have the hardihood to ask a rich girl to marry him; he’d a thousand times rather marry a poor thief.”

“Is that the only obstacle?” she asked.

“It is, and it is unsurmountable.”

He was silent, and in his deep-set eyes she read the resolve he had made.

“That is an obstacle that soon can be vanquished. I am a good spender, and I will soon make way with all I have. I am looking for a good investment. Mr. Kingdon or Jo or some one told me Westcott’s was for sale. You see, we might run it fifty-fifty. I could buy it and you run it.”

“I can’t, Pen,” he said desperately.

She made no reply.

The car whipped round the curves. She was watching the long efficient hands gripping the wheel. Then she stole a glance at his grim, thrust-forward profile. She felt that something must be done and she was a believer in the power of action over words.

She scanned the side of the road keenly for a way, and when she recognized the memorable little clump of trees, she spoke in plaintive tone.

“Aren’t we going to stop at all, Mr. Sheriff Man?”

Instinctively he stopped the car.

She climbed out and went toward the trees. As in a dream he mechanically followed her.

“Do you remember our camping place that night?” she asked.

“Do I remember? If you knew how I battled with my best and strongest feeling that night!”

“Kurt, you know in the library at Top Hill last night—no, night before last, you asked me something. I didn’t answer. I will answer now. Kurt, I love you! Now will you ask me—the rest of it?”

“Penelope!”

“Oh! You do—care—Kurt. Your mother’s name!”

THE END.