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White, Stewart Edward, 1873-1946

"The Claim Jumpers"

Even boundless space was amplified at the
bidding of their solemn uplifted fingers. The girl reined in her horse.
"Oh!" she murmured in a hushed voice, "I feel impertinent--as though I
were intruding."
A squirrel many hundreds of feet below could be heard faintly barking.
"There _is_ something solemn about them," the boy agreed in the same
tone, "but, after all, we are nothing to them. They are thinking their
own thoughts, far above everything in the world."
She slipped from her horse.
"Let's sit here and watch them," she said. "I want to look at them, and
_feel_ them."
They sat on the moss, and stared solemnly across at the great spires of
stone.
"They are waiting for something there," she observed; "for something
that has not come to pass, and they are looking for it always toward
the East. Don't you see how they are waiting?"
"Yes, like Indian warriors wrapped each in his blanket. They might be
the Manitous. They say there are lots of them in the Hills."
"Yes, of course!" she cried, on fire with the idea. "They are the Gods
of the people, and they are waiting for something that is
coming--something from the East.


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