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THE SECRET OF LAKOON
309

money sent me from the bank and I was thinking of taking a trip when Sam came. He asked me to ride with him; and I did it. He had a horse for me. It was a wonderful day, David; I mean the weather. But there'd been a lot of rain just before."

"Never mind the weather."

"You don't understand, David; the rain did it. The river was up."

"What river?"

"The one by Lakoon. It wasn't much of a river, usually; you could ride through it; but this day it certainly was up with the water coming down from the mountains. Sam said we could ford it anyway; but we couldn't. We didn't find it out till we were in the middle of it and our horses lost their feet. We were carried down, David."

She caught breath and told on. "There was a sort of canyon there, David. We got carried into it and lost our horses. They drowned. We almost drowned. I told you about that; I know, I told you something about this once."

"You did," said David. This, of course, was the time when she had to fight water to live and which she had mentioned to him on that morning they saw the sunrise together.

"David, I had no idea of marrying Sam when we rode into that river. I'd just been riding with him; then, there we were in the water, and our horses drowned and we—we had to fight for our lives—I'll tell you! He'd help me and then I'd have a chance to help him when the water was whirling us about. It took you under, David; and there wasn't any use