He rejoiced with her--with a pure and holy joy--that she was so soon to be set free to live amid the surroundings that would afford her those opportunities for the higher development of her intellectual and spiritual powers which her soul craved.

All this he told her from day to day; and then, one afternoon, he told her more.
It was the same afternoon that Patches had so unexpectedly found Helen and Stanford in their Granite Basin camp.

Kitty and the professor had driven in the buckboard to Simmons for the mail, and were coming back by the road to the Cross-Triangle, when the man asked, "Must we return to the ranch so soon?
It is so delightful out here where there is no one to intrude with vulgar commonplaces, to mar our companionship." "Why, no," returned Kitty.

"There is no need for us to hurry home." She glanced around.

"We might sit over there, under those cedars on the hill, where you found me with Mr.Patches that day--the day we saw Yavapai Joe, you remember." "If you think it quite safe to leave the vehicle," he said, "I should be delighted." Kitty tied the horses to a convenient bush at the foot of the low hill, and soon they were in the welcome shade of the cedars.
"Miss Reid," the professor began, with portentous gravity, "I must confess that I have been rather puzzled to account for your presence here that day with such a man as that fellow Patches.