{"product_id":"2940013653092","title":"THE MYSTERIOUS RIDER","description":"THE MYSTERIOUS RIDER\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCHAPTER I\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA September sun, losing some of its heat if not its brilliance, was\u003cbr\u003edropping low in the west over the black Colorado range. Purple haze\u003cbr\u003ebegan to thicken in the timbered notches. Gray foothills, round and\u003cbr\u003ebillowy, rolled down from the higher country. They were smooth,\u003cbr\u003esweeping, with long velvety slopes and isolated patches of aspens that\u003cbr\u003eblazed in autumn gold. Splotches of red vine colored the soft gray of\u003cbr\u003esage. Old White Slides, a mountain scarred by avalanche, towered with\u003cbr\u003ebleak rocky peak above the valley, sheltering it from the north.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA girl rode along the slope, with gaze on the sweep and range and color\u003cbr\u003eof the mountain fastness that was her home. She followed an old trail\u003cbr\u003ewhich led to a bluff overlooking an arm of the valley. Once it had been\u003cbr\u003ea familiar lookout for her, but she had not visited the place of late.\u003cbr\u003eIt was associated with serious hours of her life. Here seven years\u003cbr\u003ebefore, when she was twelve, she had made a hard choice to please her\u003cbr\u003eguardian--the old rancher whom she loved and called father, who had\u003cbr\u003eindeed been a father to her. That choice had been to go to school in\u003cbr\u003eDenver. Four years she had lived away from her beloved gray hills and\u003cbr\u003eblack mountains. Only once since her return had she climbed to this\u003cbr\u003eheight, and that occasion, too, was memorable as an unhappy hour. It\u003cbr\u003ehad been three years ago. To-day girlish ordeals and griefs seemed back\u003cbr\u003ein the past: she was a woman at nineteen and face to face with the first\u003cbr\u003egreat problem in her life.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe trail came up back of the bluff, through a clump of aspens with\u003cbr\u003ewhite trunks and yellow fluttering leaves, and led across a level bench\u003cbr\u003eof luxuriant grass and wild flowers to the rocky edge.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShe dismounted and threw the bridle. Her mustang, used to being petted,\u003cbr\u003erubbed his sleek, dark head against her and evidently expected like\u003cbr\u003edemonstration in return, but as none was forthcoming he bent his nose to\u003cbr\u003ethe grass and began grazing. The girl's eyes were intent upon some\u003cbr\u003ewaving, slender, white-and-blue flowers. They smiled up wanly, like pale\u003cbr\u003estars, out of the long grass that had a tinge of gold.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47152586195184,"sku":"2940013653092","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940013653092_p0.jpg?v=1763583532","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940013653092","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}