"I'm going through to the railroad, but the ride has shaken me, and I'll lie down and sleep a while," he said.

"Well," said Horton, "you know best, but you look a long way more fit to be sitting beside the stove up there at the ranch. That was a tolerably bad accident you had?"

Alton glanced at him sharply, but his voice was indifferent as he answered. "Oh, yes, I came to grief bringing in a deer, and lay out in the frost a good while before they found me. Have you had many strangers round here?"

Horton nodded. "The bush is just full of them—looking for timber rights and prospecting round the Crown lands—Hallam's friends, I think. There was one of them seemed kind of anxious about you lately."

Alton's eyes grew a trifle keener, but he was shaken and weary, and made a little gesture which seemed to indicate that he would ask questions later.

"You'll give the horse a light feed, and let me know when supper's on," he said.

It was dark when he mounted with Horton's assistance, and the horse plunged once or twice. Then it started at a gallop, and Alton had some difficulty in pulling it up, for the snow was beaten down and the trail was good. He had not been gone half-an-hour when Seaforth, whose horse was smoking, swung himself down before the hotel.

"Where's Harry?" he said.

"On the trail," said Horton. "I wanted to keep him, but he lit out a little while ago, and borrowed a rifle. What he wanted it for I don't know, but he wouldn't be lonely, anyway. One of the boys who was staying here pulled out for the railroad just before him."

"Did you know the man?" asked Seaforth with unusual sharpness.

"No," said Horton. "He was timber-righting, but I'd a kind of fancy I'd once seen somebody very like him working round Somasco."

Seaforth said nothing further, but swung himself into the saddle and rode off at a gallop. He had been unsettled all day, and now it was with vague apprehensions he sent his heels home and shook the bridle.

In the meantime Alton was riding almost as fast, though the saddle galled him and he was stiff and aching. His senses also grew a trifle lethargic under the frost, but he knew there would be little rest for him until he reached Vancouver, and strove to shake off his weakness. The horse was, however, unusually restive, and would at times break into a gallop in spite of him where the trail was level, but Alton, who fancied there was something troubling the beast, was more than a little dubious of his ability to mount again if he got out of the saddle. Until that day he had not ventured outside the ranch.

The shadowy pines flitted by him, here and there the moon shone down, and the drumming of hoofs rang muffled by the snow through a great silence which was curiously emphasized when twice a wolf howled. Still, plunging and snorting now and then, the beast held pluckily on while the miles melted behind them, and midnight was past when Alton, turning, half-asleep, in his saddle, fancied he heard somebody riding behind him. For a moment his fingers tightened on the bridle, but his hearing was dulled by weakness and the numbing cold, and pressing his heels home he rode on into the darkness.

It would probably have occurred to him at any other time that the beast responded with suspicious readiness, but his perceptions were not of the clearest just then, which was unfortunate, because the trail led downwards steeply through black darkness along the edge of a ravine. The rain had also washed parts of it away, and no ray of moonlight pierced the vaulted roof of cedar-sprays. The drumming of hoofs rolled along it, there was a hoarse growling far down in the darkness below, and Alton strove to rouse himself, knowing that a stumble might result in a plunge down the declivity. He could dimly see the great trunks stream past him on the one hand, but there was only a gulf of shadow on the other.

Suddenly a flash of light sprang up almost under the horse's feet. The beast flung its head up, and next moment they were flying at a gallop down the winding and almost precipitous trail. Alton's strength had not returned to him, and he set his lips, realizing the uselessness of it as he shifted his numbed hands on the bridle. Twice the horse stumbled, but picked up its stride again, and the man had almost commenced to hope they might reach the foot of the declivity when it stumbled once more, struck a young fir, and reeled downwards from the trail.

It all happened in a moment, but there was just time enough for Alton to clear his feet from his stirrups, and though he was never quite sure what next he did he found himself sitting in the snow, shaken and dazed by his fall, while the horse rolled downwards through the shadows beneath him. He heard the brushwood crackle, and then a curiously sickening thud as though something soft had fallen from a height upon a rock. After that there was an oppressive silence save for a faint drumming that grew louder down the trail.

Alton unslung the rifle which still hung behind him, and crawled behind a big hemlock that grew out of the slope. He could hear nothing but the increasing thud of hoofs for a while, and then there was a sound that suggested stealthy footsteps in the darkness up the trail. Alton crouched very still and waited, but the footsteps came no nearer, and then pitching up the rifle fired in their direction at a venture. The sound ceased suddenly, and while the great trunks flung back the concussion it was evident that the rider was coming on at a furious gallop, and Alton rising sent out a hoarse cry, "Pull him before you come to the edge of the dip!"

The beat of hoofs sank into silence, and a shout came down. "Hallo. Is that you, Harry?"

"Yes," said Alton. "Lead your beast down."

It was five minutes later when Seaforth found him leaning against a tree with the rifle in his hand.

"What was the shooting for, and where's your horse?" said he.

Alton appeared to laugh softly and venomously, and his voice jarred upon the listener. "Down there, and stone dead. The last drop's most of a hundred feet," he said.

"But how did he get there?" and Seaforth felt a little chill strike through him.

Alton grasped his arm, and his voice was harsher still. "This is the second time."

"Good Lord!" said Seaforth, who understood him, huskily.

"Well," said Alton, "I think the thing's quite plain. If we could get down to the poor beast I figure we'd find something that had no business there under the girth or saddle. The rest is simpler—a little coal oil or giant powder, and—just at the turning yonder—a lariat across the trail. That man knows his business, Charley."

"Good Lord!" said Seaforth once more. "It's devilish, Harry. You're not going to tell anybody, and repeat the mistake you made?"

"Yes," said Alton grimly. "That's just what I figure on doing."

"But," and Seaforth's horror was evident, "he may try again. There are more than the Somasco ranchers who would be sorry if—he was successful—Harry."

Alton laughed, but the grating cachination sent a shiver through his companion. "Yes," he said, "I think he will, and that's why I'm waiting. He may give himself away the third time, and then it will be either him or me."

Seaforth stood silent for almost a minute. "If you would only listen to me—but of course you will not. Can't you see that you are in the way of somebody who stands behind that man?"

"Yes," and Alton's smile was now quietly grim. "It don't take much genius to figure out that. Before I'm through I'll know just who he is, and all about him."

Once more Seaforth was silent a space. Then he spoke very slowly. "Are you sure you're wise?"

Alton gripped his comrade's arm so that he winced with pain. "It's the second time you've asked me that," he said. "There will not be room for you and me in this province if you ask it me again."

Seaforth shook his grasp off. "You are my partner, Harry, and the only friend I have. God send you safe through with it. Now, is there any use in looking for the fellow with the lariat?"

"No," said Alton in his usual voice. "There isn't. He would have been waiting up there ready to whip the thing away, and by this time he has doubled back down the trail. If you met a man riding along quietly what could you do to him?"

"It's devilish," said Seaforth, as a fit of impotent anger shook him.

"Oh, yes," said Alton languidly. "Still, there isn't much use in slinging names, and I'm kind of tired. Help me up into your saddle, and lead the beast by the bridle. We'll head for Gordon's."

CHAPTER XXV

ALTON IS SILENT

There is a ridge of rising ground on the outskirts of Vancouver City where a few years ago a pretty wooden house stood beneath the pines. They rose sombrely behind it, but the axe had let in the sunlight between the rise and the water, and one could look out from the trim garden across the blue inlet towards the ranges' snow. To-day one would in all probability look for that dwelling in vain, and find only stores or great stone buildings, for as the silent men with the axes push the lonely clearings farther back into the forest the Western cities grow, and those who dwell in them increase in riches, which is not usually the case with the axeman who goes on farther into the bush again.

Still, one moonlight evening, when Alton waited upon its verandah, cigar in hand, the house stood upon the hillside, picturesque with its painted scroll-work, green shutters, colonnades of cedar pillars, and broad verandahs. Its owner was an Englishman who had prospered in the Dominion, and combined the kindliness he still retained for his countrymen with the lavish hospitality of the West. He knew Alton by reputation, and having business with him had made him free of his house when he inquired for Deringham, who was his guest, during the former's absence in the State of Washington. That was how Alton came to be waiting for dinner in company with a young naval officer. Deringham and his daughter had returned during the day, but they had driven somewhere with their hostess and not come back as yet.

Alton had seen Commander Thorne for the first time that day, but some friendships are made rapidly and without an effort, and he was already sensible of a regard for his companion. He was a quiet and unobtrusive Englishman, with the steadiness of gaze and decisiveness of speech which characterized those who command at sea, and had discovered that he had, notwithstanding the difference in their vocations, much in common with rancher Alton.

"Yes," he said. "It is very good of you, and if we stay at Esquimault I will come up and spend a day or two among the deer. Atkinson told us what a good time he had with you, but we were a trifle astonished to see the fine wapiti head he brought back with him."

There was a faint twinkle in the speaker's eyes which Alton understood, for Atkinson, who was not an adept at trailing deer, had shot more than a wapiti. Still, he was not the man to allude to the misadventures of his guest.

"He killed it neatly—a good hundred yards, and in the fern," he said.

"Well," said Thorne with a little laugh, "you were with him, and know best. You had, however, a tolerably mixed bag on that occasion?"

Alton checked a smile. "A wapiti, a wood deer—and sundries."

Thorne laughed again. "I wonder if you have forgotten the hog? You see, Atkinson told us one night at mess, and I was inclined to fancy he came near including you in the bag."

Alton's face was suspiciously grave, but his answer strengthened the incipient friendship between the men.

"It is a little difficult for a stranger to distinguish things in the bush."

Thorne nodded. "You had Deringham and Miss Deringham staying with you?"

"Yes," said Alton. "They are connections of mine, and Miss Deringham did a good deal for me when I was sick a little while ago. You knew them in the old country?"

There was, though he strove to suppress it, something in his voice which caused the naval officer to glance at him sharply. "Oh, yes," he said. "I knew them—rather well."

The men's eyes met, and both were conscious that the words might have been amplified, while it was with a slight abruptness they returned to the previous topic and discussed it until there was a rattle of wheels in the drive. Then Forel, their host, came out upon the verandah, and there was a hum of voices as several people descended from the vehicle beneath.

Mrs. Forel came up the stairway first with Alice Deringham, and when a blaze of light shone into the verandah from the open door Alton saw the girl draw back for a second as her eyes rested upon his companion. She, however, smiled next moment, and Alton did not miss the slight flush of pleasure in the face of Commander Thorne. He was also to meet with another astonishment, for Deringham and Seaforth came up the stairway next together, and Thorne dropped his cigar when he and the latter stood face to face.

"Charley! Is it you?" he said.

Seaforth stood quite still a moment looking at him, and then, being possibly sensible that other eyes were upon him, shook hands.

"Yes," he said. "I heard the gunboat was at Esquimault, but did not expect to see you."

Then there was a somewhat awkward silence, and Alton fancied that both men were relieved when Mrs. Forel's voice broke in, "Jack, you will look after the men, but don't keep them talking too long. We picked up Mr. Seaforth, and there are one or two more of our friends coming."

Alton followed his host, wondering at what he had seen. It was evident that Miss Deringham had not noticed him, and he fancied she had been for a moment almost embarrassed by the encounter with Thorne. That and what the man had told him had its meaning. He had also noticed that when the latter greeted his comrade there had been a constraint upon both of them, but decided that what it betokened did not concern him.

Returning he found Mrs. Forel waiting for him, and having been born in a Western city her conversation was not marked by English reticence or the restraint which is at least as common in the Canadian bush.

"Dinner is ready, and you will have to talk to me and the railroad man during it," she said. "I had thought of making you over to Miss Deringham until Commander Thorne turned up. Jack and he are great friends, but he didn't seem able to get over here, until he heard Miss Deringham was staying with us."

Alton laughed a little. "Now what am I to answer to that? Miss Deringham was very good to me."

The lady fancied that his merriment was a trifle forced. "You will just sit down, and eat your dinner like a sensible man," she said. "You are a Canadian and not expected to say nice things like those others from the old country. They don't always do it very well, and, though Jack is fond of them, they make me tired now and then."

Alton took his place beside her, and speedily found himself at home. Save for the naval officer and two English financiers the men present had a stake in the future of that country, and as usual neither they nor their womenkind considered it out of place to talk of their affairs. They were also men of mark, though several of them who now held large issues in very capable hands had commenced life as wielders of the axe. Most of them had heard of Alton of the Somasco Consolidated, and those who had not listened with attention when he spoke, for it was evident that they and the rancher had the same cause at heart. Alice Deringham noticed this, and, though he was not conscious of it, little Alton did that night escaped her attention.

She saw that while he rarely asserted himself, these men, whom she knew were regarded with respect as leaders of great industries, accepted him as an equal when they had heard him speak, but that caused her less surprise than the fashion in which he adapted himself to his surroundings. She had already discovered that he was a man with abilities and ambitions, but she had only seen him amidst the grim simplicity of the Somasco ranch, and now there was no trifling lapse or momentary embarrassments to show that he found the changed conditions incongruous. His dress was also different, but he wore his city garments as though he had worn nothing else, and there was, she fancied, an indefinite stamp of something which almost amounted to distinction upon him that set him apart from the rest. Even Seaforth wondered a little at his comrade, but both he and Alice Deringham overlooked the fact that Alton had not spent his whole life at Somasco ranch.

He, on his part, as the girl was quite aware, glanced often at her. She did not, however, meet his gaze, for once Alton was on the way to recovery, she had left the ranch somewhat hastily, and there had been as yet no defining of the relations between them, while neither she nor her father were cognizant of the actual cause of his wound. In the meanwhile she made the most of Thorne, and by degrees Alton lost his grip of the conversation. He had never seen Alice Deringham attired as she was then, and, for his hostess had made the bravest display possible, the profusion of flowers, glass, and glittering silver which it seemed appropriate that she should be placed amidst, in a curious fashion troubled the man. This, he knew, was a part of the environment she had been used to, and he sighed as he thought of the sordid simplicity at Somasco. There was also Commander Thorne beside her, and the naval officer was one upon whom the stamp of birth and polish was very visible. This man, he surmised, would understand the thoughts and fancies which were incomprehensible to him, and was acquainted with all the petty trifles which are of vast importance to a woman in the aggregate.

Alton's heart grew heavy as he watched them, noticing the passing smile of comprehension that came so easily and expressed so much, and heard through the hum of voices the soft English accentuation which by contrast with his own speech seemed musical. He knew his value in the busy world, but he also knew his failings, and the knowledge was bitter to him then. There were so many little things he did not know, and he saw himself, as he thought the girl must see him—uncouth, which it was impossible for him to be, crude of thought, over-vehement or taciturn in speech, a barbarian. The misgivings had troubled him before, but they were very forceful now, and at last he was glad when Mrs. Forel smiled at him.

"You have been watching Miss Deringham, and neglecting me," she said.

For a moment Alton looked almost confused, and the lady laughed as she continued. "Very pretty and stylish, isn't she? Now we have pretty girls right here in Vancouver, but I fancy they can still give us points in one respect in the old country. You think that is foolish of me? Well, I wouldn't worry to tell me so; I think Commander Thorne could do it more neatly."

"He is apparently too busy," said Alton. "Still, I fancy if you asked him he would support me."

Mrs. Forel smiled mischievously, "Well, though one could scarcely blame you, jealousy wouldn't do you any good. Those two were great friends in the old country."

"That," said Alton, "is a little indefinite."

"Of course, but I don't know anything more," said his companion. "Lieutenant Atkinson, who knew them both, told me. Thorne wasn't rich, you see, but he comes of good people, and not long ago somebody left him all their money. Quite romantic, isn't it? Still, don't you think Miss Deringham would be thrown away upon anybody less than a baronet."

Alton did not answer, but his face grew somewhat grim as once more he glanced across at Thorne. This, he thought, was a good man, and he had all that Alton felt himself so horribly deficient in. In the meanwhile Mrs. Forel was looking at Seaforth, who was talking to the wife of an English financier.

"I like your partner, and he is from the old country, too," she said. "Of course you know what he was over there?"

It was put artlessly, but Alton's eyes twinkled. "I'm afraid I don't, though I've no doubt Charley would have told me if I'd asked him," he said. "He is a tolerably useful man in this country, anyway, and that kind of contented me."

The lady shook her head at him reproachfully. "And I thought you were slow in the bush," said she. "Still, Thorne will know."

Alton fancied his hostess intended to be kind to him, but he was glad when the dinner was over and he gravitated with the other men towards Forel's smoking-room. There, as it happened, the talk turned upon shooting and fishing, and when one or two of the guests had narrated their adventures in the ranges, one who was bent and grizzled told in turn several grim stories of the early days when the treasure-seekers went up into the snows of Caribou. There was a brief silence when he had finished, until one of the Englishmen said:

"I presume things of that kind seldom happen now?"

"I don't know," said Seaforth, who spoke in the Western idiom. "We have still a few of the good old-fashioned villains right here in this country, and that reminds me of a thing which happened to a man I know. He was a quiet man, and quite harmless so long as nobody worried him, but generally held on with a tight grip to his own, and he once got his hands into something another man wanted. That was how the fuss began."

There was a little pause, during which Alton glanced bewilderedly at his comrade, and Deringham glanced round as he poured himself out a whisky and seltzer.

"It's not an uncommon beginning," said Forel. "What was the end?"

"There isn't any," said Seaforth, "but I can tell you the middle. One day the quiet man, who was living by himself way up in the bush, went out hunting, and as he had eaten very little for a week he was tolerably hungry. Well, when he had been out all day be got a deer, and was packing it home at night when he struck a belt of thick timber. The man was played out from want of food, the deer was heavy, but he dragged himself along thinking of his supper, until something twinkled beneath a fir. He jumped when he saw it, but he wasn't quick enough, and went down with a bullet in him. His rifle fell away from him where he couldn't get it without the other man seeing him, and he was bleeding fast, but still sensible enough to know that nobody would start out on a contract of that kind without his magazine full. It was a tolerably tight place for him—the man was worn out, and almost famishing, and he lay there in the snow, getting fainter every minute, with one leg no use to him."

Seaforth looked round as though to see what impression he had made, and though all the faces were turned towards him it was one among them his eyes rested on. Deringham was leaning forward in his chair with fingers closed more tightly about the glass he held than there seemed any necessity for. His eyes were slightly dilated, and Seaforth fancied he read in them a growing horror.

"He crawled away into the bush?" said somebody.

"No, sir," said Seaforth, "he just wriggled into the undergrowth and waited for the other man."

"Waited for him?" said Forel.

"Yes," said Seaforth. "That is what he did, and when the other man came along peering into the bushes, just reached out and grabbed him by the leg. Then they both rolled over, and I think that must have been a tolerably grim struggle. There they were, alone, far up in the bush, and probably not a living soul within forty miles of them."

Seaforth stopped again and reached out for his glass, while he noticed that Deringham emptied his at a gulp and refilled it with fingers that seemed to shake a trifle.

"And your friend got away?" said somebody.

"No, sir," said Seaforth. "It was the other man. The one I knew had his hand on the other's throat and his knife feeling for a soft place when his adversary broke away from him. He did it just a moment too soon, for while he was getting out through the bush the other one dropped his knife and rolled over in the snow. He lay there a day or two until somebody found him."

Seaforth rose and moved towards the cigar-box on the table. "And that's all," he said.

"Dramatic, but it's a little incomplete, isn't it?" said the Englishman.

Seaforth smiled somewhat dryly, and once more glanced casually towards Deringham. "It may be finished by and by, and I fancy the wind-up will be more dramatic still," he said. "You see the man who would wait for his enemy with only a knife in his hand while his life drained away from him, is scarcely likely to forget an injury."

There was silence for several moments which was broken by a rattle, and a stream of whisky and seltzer dripped from the table.

"Hallo!" said Forel. "Has anything upset you, Deringham?"

Deringham stood up with a little harsh laugh, dabbing It the breast of his shirt with his handkerchief.

"I think the question should apply to my glass, but the room is a trifle hot, and my heart has been troubling me lately," he said.

Forel flung one of the windows open. "I fancy my wife is waiting for us, gentlemen, and I will be with you in a few minutes," he said.

Alton and Seaforth were almost the last to file out of the smoking-room, and when they reached the corridor the former turned upon his comrade with a glint in his half-closed eyes.

"You show a curious taste for a man raised as you have been in the old country," he said. "Now what in the name of thunder made you tell that story?"

Seaforth smiled somewhat inanely. "I don't know; I just felt I had to. All of us are subject to little weaknesses occasionally."

Alton stopped and looked at him steadily. "Then there will be trouble if you give way to them again. And you put in a good deal more than I ever told anybody. Now you haven't brains enough to figure out all that."

Seaforth laughed good-humouredly. "It is possibly fortunate that Tom has," he said.

"Tom—be condemned," said Alton viciously, and Seaforth, seeing that he was about to revert to the previous question, apparently answered a summons from his host and slipped back into the smoking-room.

Alton waited a moment, and then moved somewhat stiffly towards a low stairway which led to a broad landing that was draped and furnished as an annex to an upper room. One or two of the company were seated there, and he hoped they would not notice him, for while he could walk tolerably well upon the level a stairway presented a difficulty. He had all his life been a vigorous man, and because of it was painfully sensitive about his affliction. Just then Mrs. Forel came out upon the landing, and when the girl she spoke to turned. Alton saw that Alice Deringham was looking down on him. For a moment there was a brightness in his eyes, but it faded suddenly, and while his knee bent under him he set his lips as with pain. Then he stumbled, and clung to the balustrade. For a moment he dare not look up, and when he did so there was a flush on his forehead which slowly died away as he saw the face of the girl.

She had also laid her hand as if for support upon the balustrade, for it was unfortunate she had not been told that one effect of Alton's injury would be permanent. At the commencement of their friendship she had been painfully aware of what she considered his shortcomings, but these had gradually become less evident, and something in the man's forceful personality had carried her away. Possibly, though she may not have realized it, his splendid animal vigour had its part in this—and now dismay and a great pity struggled within her. It was especially unfortunate that when Alton looked up the consternation had risen uppermost, for the man's perceptions were not of the clearest then, and he saw nothing of the compassion, but only the shrinking in her eyes.

His face grew a trifle grey as he straightened himself with a visible effort and limped forward, for he was one who could make a quick decision, while to complete his bitterness Thorne came up behind him and slipped an arm beneath his shoulder.

"You seem a little shaky, I'll help you up," he said. "An axe-cut? The effect will probably soon wear off."

Alton understood that Thorne was talking to cover any embarrassment he may have felt, but was not especially grateful just then. "No," he said; "a rifle-shot."

He fancied that Thorne was a trifle astonished, and remembered Seaforth's story, but they had gained the head of the stairway now, and he looked at Alice Deringham as he added, "And the effect will not wear off."

Thorne passed through with the others into the lighted room, and Alton stood silent before the girl. She was a trifle pale, and though the pity for him was there, it is possible that she had understood him, and she was very proud. Thus the silence that was perilous lasted too long, and her voice was a trifle strained in place of gentle as she said, "I am so sorry."

Alton, who dared not look at her, now bent his head. "You are very kind—still, it can't be helped," he said. "I think Mrs. Forel is coming back for you. Somebody is going to sing."

Their hostess approached the doorway, and Alice Deringham found words fail her as she watched the man, though she knew that the silence was horribly eloquent. It was Alton who broke it.

"You had better go in. I"—and he smiled bitterly—"will wait until the music commences and they cannot notice me."

The girl could stay no longer, though at last words which would have made a difference to both of them rose to her lips, but Alton waited until he could slip into the room unnoticed, and heard very little of the music. During it Mrs. Forel managed to secure a few words with Thorne.

"You seem to have made friends with rancher Alton," she said.

Thorne smiled a little. "Yes," he said. "Of course I know little about him, but I think that is a man one could trust."

The lady nodded, for he had given her an opportunity. "You know more about his partner?"

Thorne's manner appeared to change a trifle, which Mrs. Forel of course noticed. "Yes," he said.

The lady thoughtfully smoothed out a fold of her dress. "Well," she said with Western frankness, "I want to know a little about him, too."

Thorne smiled as he saw there was no evading the issue. "So I surmised from what your husband asked me. Seaforth was considered a young man of promise when I knew him in England, and his family is unexceptional. His father, however, lost a good deal of money, which presumably accounts for Charley having turned Canadian rancher."

Mrs. Forel turned so that she could see her companion. "That is not what I mean, and I think I had better talk quite straight to you. Now I like Mr. Seaforth and Mr. Alton, too, and as Jack is mixed up in some business of theirs and they are going to stay down in Vancouver we shall probably see a good deal of them. Jack, however, is sometimes a little hasty in making friends, and I want to know the other reason that brought Mr. Seaforth out from the old country."

"You fancy there is one?" Thorne said quietly.

"Yes. Lieutenant Atkinson made a little blunder one night when he spoke of him."

"Atkinson never had very much sense," Thorne said dryly. "I, however, fancied a man took his standing among you according to what he did in this country."

"Yes," said Mrs. Forel. "The trouble is that the man who has crossed the line once may do so again. Well, you see who these people are, and if he meets them here it means that I vouch for him."

Thorne sighed. "If Atkinson has blundered, I am afraid that I must speak. Now I don't think you need be afraid of Seaforth crossing that line again. He was not worse than foolish and somebody victimized him, but he has had his punishment and borne it very well—while if you knew the whole story you would scarcely blame him."

"And that is all you can tell me?"

"Yes," said Thorne, very quietly. "Still, I can add that if Charley ever comes back to the old country I—and my mother and sisters—would be glad to welcome him."

"That I think should be sufficient," said Mrs. Forel, who was acquainted with Commander Thorne's status in the old country.

It was a little later when Alton glanced towards Thorne, who was talking to Alice Deringham. "I could get on with that man," he said. "You knew him, Charley?"

"Oh, yes," said Seaforth with a curious expression. "He is a very good fellow, and has distinguished himself several times. Somebody left him a good deal of money lately."

Alton seemed to sigh. "Well," he said slowly, "he is to be envied. They wouldn't have much use for him in your navy if he was a cripple."

The party was breaking up before Alton had speech with Alice Deringham again, and as it happened the girl had just left Commander Thorne. Alton spoke with an effort as one going through a task. "I never thanked you yet for what you did for me," he said.

The girl smiled, though her pulses were throbbing painfully. "It was very little."

"No," said Alton gravely. "I think I should not have been here now if you had not taken care of me, and I'm very grateful. Still"—and he glanced down with a wry smile at his knee, which was bent a trifle—"it was unfortunate you and the doctor did not get me earlier. There are disadvantages in being—all one's life—a cripple."

As fate would have it they were interrupted before Miss Deringham could answer, and Alton limped down the stairway very grim in face, while Thorne appeared sympathetic when he overtook him. "That wound of yours is troubling you?" he said.

"Yes," said Alton dryly; "I'm afraid it will. Now I was a trifle confused when you helped me. Did I tell you how I got it?"

Thorne remembering Seaforth's story answered indifferently, "I concluded it was an axe-cut."

He passed on, but Alton had quick perceptions, and made a little gesture of contentment. "He is almost good enough, anyway," he said wearily.

When all the guests had gone Deringham came upon his daughter alone. "I noticed Mr. Alton was not effusive," he said.

"No," said the girl languidly, though there was a curious expression in her eyes. "I do not remember that he told much beyond the fact that he would be a cripple—all his life. He mentioned it twice."



CHAPTER XXVI

WITHOUT COUNTING THE COST

There had been a revival of speculation in industrial enterprise, and it was unusually late at night when Miss Townshead rose wearily from the table she had been busy at. Her eyes ached, her fingers and arms were cramped, but that did not distress her greatly, for Townshead needed many comforts, and she was earning what would have been considered in England a liberal salary. It was very quiet in the room at the top of the towering building, where, however, another young woman, who as it happened was jealous of her companion's progress, still sat writing, and a light blinked in the adjoining one across the passage in which one of the heads of the firm would probably remain most of the night. Trade is spasmodic in the West, and those who live by it work with feverish activity when the tide is with them.

"You're through?" said Miss Holder. "Well, if you can wait ten minutes I'll come along with you."

Nellie Townshead was not especially fond of her companion, but at that hour the streets were lonely, and she sat down again when she had put on her hat and jacket. While she waited a little bell began to ring, and Miss Holder rose with an impatient exclamation.

"Get your pencil, Nellie," she said, as she took the telephonic receiver down from the hook.

Miss Townshead took a sheet of paper from a case, and waited until her companion spoke again. "Oh, yes, I'm here. A little late to worry tired folks, isn't it? No. Mr. Hallam's away just now. Wire from Somasco just come in—and we're to let him have it as soon as we can. Oh, yes, I understand you. 'Platinum, galena, cyanide, Alton, oxide. In a vise.' You've got that, Nellie? Do I know when Hallam will get it? No, I don't. Good-night."

Now a man would probably have at once enclosed the message in an envelope, but a Western business lady not infrequently takes a kindly interest in the private concerns of her employer, especially if they are not quite clear to her. Accordingly Miss Holder sat down and read over the message, after which she shook her head.

"I wonder what it's all about, and I don't like that Hallam," she said. "He's an insect. A crawling one with slimy feet, and to pin a big diamond in front of one as he does is horrible taste. Give me the book, Nellie. It reads like our cypher. Oh, yes. 'Instructions to hand. No legal improvements done and claim unrecorded. Will relocate.' Now we've nothing that silver stands for, and it reads quite straight. 'Will relocate the silver claim as soon as prospecting is possible. Alton cannot take action.' He means he's got him in a vise."

Miss Holder crossed the landing and tapped at the door of the adjoining room, while Nellie Townshead walked to the window and looked down on the city. It stretched away before her, silent for once under its blinking lights, sidewalk and pavement lying empty far down beneath the mazy wires and towering buildings, but she saw little of it as she glanced towards the block where the Somasco Consolidated had their offices. The message had troubled her, for she recalled many kindnesses shown to her and her father by the owners of Somasco ranch. She also owed one of them a reparation, for she had seen the man who miscarried the message in Vancouver, and knew that the delay, when the ranch was sold, was not Alton's fault. Nor had she forgiven Hallam for the greed and cunning which had effected her father's ruin, and now it seemed that he held Alton of Somasco and his partner in his grip. That there was treachery at work she felt sure, and grew hot with indignation as she determined that if she could prevent it neither Alton—nor his partner—should suffer.

It might have occurred to a man that what she contemplated implied a breach of confidence, but Nellie Townshead was a high-spirited girl, and only realized that Hallam was about to wrong her friends just then.

There would also be no difficulty in warning him, for Alton had taken over the office of the Somasco Consolidated on his arrival at Vancouver, and while she considered the question a voice came out of the adjoining room.

"Hallam's at Westminster, and it will have to wait until he comes round in the morning. Don't stay any longer, and take Miss Townshead with you. It's later than I fancied."

Five minutes afterwards the two girls went out into the silent streets, and Miss Townshead, who left her companion at the corner of one of them, turned round again and walked back somewhat slowly part of the way she had come. She did not notice that Miss Holder had also turned and was watching her, for she realized for the first time that what she was about to do admitted of misconception. Still, remembering how Hallam had tricked her father, she went on, and only stopped for a moment when she entered the great building in the upper part of which was the office of the Somasco Consolidated. It was very silent. The rooms which had hummed with voices all day long were shut, and one blinking light emphasized the darkness of the big empty corridor. Scarcely a sound reached her from the city, but she had seen that two windows high up were lighted, and went up the stairway resolutely. The warning could be delivered in less than a minute, and she fancied that Alton would not be alone, while she knew that the conventionalities as understood in England are almost unknown in the West.

As it happened Alton, who, though Miss Townshead did not know this, lived in the room adjoining his office, was busy about the stove just then. In those days, when Vancouver had more inhabitants than it could well find room for and its hotels overflowed, single men taking their meals in the public restaurants lived as best they could, over their stores and offices, or in rude cabins and shanties flung up anywhere on the outskirts of the city, while it is not improbable that a good many of them live in much the same fashion now. Alton had, however, missed the six o'clock supper, for reasons which the sheaf of papers on his desk made plain, and was then engaged in cooking something in a frying-pan. A portable cedar partition partly shrouded the little table set out with a few plates, and the stove, while his old worked-deerhide slippers and loose jacket indicated that the man was just then not so much in his place of business as at home. He had been busy in the city and at his desk for ten hours that day, for the Somasco products were becoming known, and men had been toiling in the valley, driving roads, and building a new sawmill in the frost and snow. Part of Alton's business in the city was to raise the money that was needed to maintain them, and already he could foresee that if the time of prosperity was delayed it might go hardly with the Somasco Company.

He had laid down the frying-pan and was shaking a pot of strong green tea when there was a tapping at the door, which opened while he wondered whether there would be time for him to alter his attire. Then he stood up with the teapot in his hand, and made a little whimsical gesture of dismay as Miss Townshead stood before him. She coloured a trifle, but took courage at Alton's soft laugh, for it was clear that he was as yet only concerned about the plight in which she had found him. Alton, she remembered, had not been brought up conventionally in England, and she knew his wholesome simplicity.

"I'm very glad to see you, but if I'd known who was there I'd have fixed the place up before you got in," he said. "Sit right down beside the stove."

Nellie Townshead stood still a moment, but she was tired and the night was cold, so she took the chair he drew forward, and then shook her head as he laid a cup before her.

"It's Horton's tea, and bad at that, but it will help us to fancy ourselves back in the bush," he said. "Your father is keeping all right?"

The girl made a little gesture of impatience. "Yes," she said. "I am almost afraid I am doing wrong, but I felt I must warn you. Now don't ask me any questions, but take it as a fact that Hallam has sent up somebody to locate your silver as soon as it can be done. He seems to consider he has you at a disadvantage because you have not put in your legal improvements."

Alton thrust his chair back and clenched one hand, while the girl noticed with relief that he had almost forgotten her.

"Hallam," he said, and stopped a moment, while his voice was harsh as he continued, "going to restake my claim. Well, there is time still in hand and he can't do it yet. Now——"

The girl stopped him with a gesture. "You must ask me nothing," she said. "You can understand what I told you?"

A slow glow crept into Alton's eyes. "Oh, yes, it's all quite plain," he said. "When you find a mineral claim you have got to record it in fifteen days, or it goes back to the Crown, and I couldn't do that, you see, because I was lying for weeks at Somasco. Well, while the claim is unrecorded anybody can jump it, but I couldn't get back up there through the snow, and didn't figure Hallam's man knew just where to find it. Now you've told me we'll get in ahead of him yet, and the man he sends up there will have his journey for nothing. Do you know that what you have done means just everything to Somasco?"

Alton stopped suddenly, and there was consternation in the girl's face as she glanced at him.

"I think there's somebody coming," he said slowly.

Now there was still just time for Alton to have shut the outer door, but he remembered for the first time that the girl's visit at that hour might be considered unusual, and it appeared probable that she would not approve of the action, while having as yet only dealt with men, his usual quick decision deserted him. He glanced once from his companion to the partition and the door of the inner room, and shook his head. Then he sprang forward towards the outer door, forgetting that he was lame. That, however, did not alter the fact, and as he stumbled a little the tray on the table he struck went down with a crash, scattering its contents about the room, while before he reached the door it swung open and a man stood smiling in the opening.

"Hello! I seem to have scared you," he said. "Got anything you don't want folks to know about in here?"

The stranger moved forward another step, and then stopped abruptly with a little gasp as his glance took in the overturned tray, scattered crockery, and the rigid figure of the girl standing with a flushed face beside the stove. Then he glanced at Alton, and noticing the old jacket and deerhide slippers, appeared to have some difficulty in checking a smile, for this was a young man who knew nothing of the simple strenuous life of the bush, but a good deal about the under-side of that of the cities.

"I'll come back in business hours to-morrow," he said. "Sorry to disturb you, but I hadn't a minute all day, and there was a question I figured we could best talk over quietly."

"Then you had better start in with it," said Alton quietly. "This lady, who came here on business, is just going."

"Of course," said the stranger. "I think I have had the pleasure of meeting her."

He turned with a little smile which broadened into a grin Alton found intolerable, for there was a patter of feet on the stairway, and when he looked round except for himself and Alton the room was empty.

"The fact is I'm awfully sorry," he said. "But how was I to know?"

The veins were swollen on Alton's forehead, and his eyes half-closed. "Now," he said sternly, "I don't want to hear any more of that. I think I told you the lady you saw here came in a few minutes ago on an affair of business."

It was unfortunate that Alton had a difficult temper and his visitor no discretion, for there are men in whom Western directness degenerates into effrontery.

"Of course!" said the latter. "My dear fellow, you needn't protest. Considering the connection between her employers and Hallam, who is scarcely a friend of yours, that is especially likely."

Alton stood very straight, looking at the speaker in a fashion which would have warned any one who knew him. "I figure you can't help being a fool, but I want to hear you admit that you're sorry for it," he said.

He spoke very quietly, but it was unfortunate for both of them that the other man, who was growing slightly nettled, did not know when to stop.

"I told you I was sorry—I looked in at an inopportune time—already, and I'll forget it right off," he said. "Now that should content anybody, because there are folks who would think the story too good to be lost."

He got no further, because Alton stepped forward and seized him by the collar, which tore away in his grasp. Then there was a brief scuffle, a scattering of papers up and down the room, and Alton stood gasping in the doorway, while his visitor reeled down the first flight of stairs and into the wall at the foot of it. Alton glanced down at him a moment, and seeing he was not seriously hurt, flung the door to with a bang that rolled from corridor to corridor through the great silent building, before he turned back into the disordered room with a little laugh.

"I've fixed that fellow, anyway, and now I'd better go through those plans until I simmer down," he said.

He picked up the overturned table and his scattered supper, while it was characteristic of him that when an hour later he rolled up a sheet of mill-drawings in a survey plotting of the Somasco valley, he had forgotten all about the incident, which was, however, not the case with the other man. In another twenty minutes he was also fast asleep, and because men commence their work betimes in that country, had disposed of several car-loads of Somasco produce before he breakfasted next morning. During the day he noticed that some of the younger men he met smiled at him curiously, but attached no especial meaning to it. Alton had taught himself to concentrate all his faculties upon his task, and he worked in the city as he had done in the bush, with the singleness of purpose and activity that left no opportunity of considering side issues. He had also, as usual, a good deal to do: buyers of dressed lumber, cattle, and ranching produce to interview; shippers of horses to bargain with: railroad men and politicians to obtain promises of concessions from, and men who had money to lend to interest. The latter was the most difficult task, and now and then his face grew momentarily grave as he remembered the burdens he had already laid upon his ranch and the Somasco Consolidated.

"Still, what we're working for is bound to come, and we'll hold on somehow until it does," he said to Forel, who occasionally remonstrated with him. "When you've helped me to put the new loan through I'll bring Charley or the other man down, and go up and relocate the claim. After the late snowfall nobody could get through the ranges now, but Tom and I could make our way when it wouldn't be possible to any of Hallam's men."

Possibly because he had been successful hitherto, Alton was slightly over-sanguine, and apt to make too small allowance in his calculations for contingencies in which human foresight and tenacity of purpose may not avail. It happened in the meanwhile, though he was, of course, not aware of this, that Deringham had an interview with Hallam in the smoking-room of the big C.P.R. hotel. They did not enter it together, for Deringham was sitting there when Hallam came in, about the time the Atlantic express was starting, which accounted for the fact that there was nobody else present. Deringham appeared a trifle too much at his ease, though his face was pale, for he had not departed from veracity when he informed Forel that his heart had troubled him after listening to Seaforth's story. He nodded to Hallam, and picked out a fresh cigar from the box upon the table before he spoke.

"It is fine weather," he said.

"Oh, yes," said Hallam dryly. "Still, I guess you didn't ask me to come here and talk about the climate."

"No," and Deringham glanced at his cigar. "I meant to tell you that the little speculation you recently mentioned does not commend itself to me. In fact, I have decided that we can have no more dealings of any description together."

"No?" said Hallam, with a little brutal laugh. "Dollars running out?"

Deringham glanced at him languidly. "As you know, that is not the reason. Now I do not ask for a return of the money you obtained from me—but I want the thing stopped immediately."

Hallam poured out a glass of wine. "You will have to put it straight."

"Well," said Deringham, "if you insist. I am sincerely sorry I ever saw or heard of you. You, of course, remember the conditions on which I made that deal with you. I desired Mr. Alton kept away from Somasco—for a time, and now I want a definite promise from you that he will be free from any further molestation."

"Then," said Hallam, with a grin, "what's your programme if I don't agree? You would put the police on to me?"

"No," said Deringham, making the best play he could, though he realized the weakness of his hand. "That would not appear advisable—or necessary. It would be simpler to warn my kinsman."

Hallam laid his hand upon the table, and Deringham noticed that it was coarse and ill-shaped, but suggested a brutal tenacity of grasp.

"Bluff, with nothing behind it. You don't take me that way," he said. "Now I'll put my cards right down in front of you. Alton is not a fool, and you couldn't tell him anything he doesn't know already. The trouble is, he can prove nothing. He has a tolerably short temper, and one day he 'most hammered the life out of another man in the Somasco mill. That man didn't like him before, and it's quite possible he fell foul of Alton after it, but where does that take in me? Got hold of that, haven't you? Well, then, there's just this difference between you and me. I could tell Alton one or two things about you he didn't know!"

"I would be willing to take my chance of his believing you," said Deringham.

Hallam laughed. "For a man of business you have a plaguy bad memory. Now it seems to me quite likely that the man I talked about has had quite enough of fooling with Alton, and we'll let what you asked for go at that, because there's something else we're coming to. There was a cheque you gave me, and I had who it was drawn by and payable to put down on the slip when I passed it through my bank. Now I've got that slip, and after I'd had a talk with him, Alton wouldn't wonder what you gave me all those dollars for."

Deringham was silent almost a minute, for he knew his opponent had seen the weak point. Then he said, "If I admitted that you were right?"

Hallam raised his big hand, and pressed his thumb down slowly and viciously on the table. "It don't need admitting. I've got you there," he said. "Still, I don't know that I want to squeeze you. Well, I once kept Alton out of Somasco to please you, and now I want you to keep him right here in Vancouver for a while."

"I could not do it."

"Well," said Hallam, grinning, "if you couldn't, I figure your daughter could."

Deringham had all along been struggling with a sense of disgust, and now his anger mastered him. It was, however, the rage of a weak man which is not far removed from fear.

"You infernal scoundrel," he said.

Hallam laughed brutally. "That may do you good, and it makes no difference to me," he said. "I want Alton to stop here just three weeks from to-day. He'll stay without pressing for two of them, I think—and you've got to keep him during the third one. There's nothing going to hurt him, but it wouldn't be wise to fool things, you understand?"

He took up his hat as he spoke, and moved towards the door, while Deringham's eyes blazed when it closed behind him.

"Damn him!" he said, almost choked with impotent fury, and then sat down limply with a face that grew suddenly blanched. His hand shook as he seized his glass, and some of the wine he needed was spilled upon the table, for his eyes grew dim as the faintness came upon him. Deringham had been recommended a rest from all excitement and business anxieties before he sailed from England, and passion was distinctly injudicious considering the condition of one of his organs.



CHAPTER XXVII

THE FORCE OF CALUMNY

As Hallam had surmised, one or two affairs of importance detained Alton in Vancouver. The winter had been exceptionally rigorous, and he knew that the claim was guarded securely by frost and snow. Having also, he fancied, effectually silenced his indiscreet visitor by flinging him down-stairs, he thought no more about that affair, and spent one or two evenings pleasantly at Forel's house, where Alice Deringham greeted him with slightly reserved cordiality.

She fancied she understood his reticence on the memorable evening when he had stumbled on the stairway, and was not altogether displeased by it. He had, it seemed, been over-sensitive, for he was but slightly lame, while she had reasons for surmising that he would realize there was no great necessity for the self-sacrifice in time. Alice Deringham was not unduly vain, but she knew her power, and Alton had in his silence betrayed himself again and again. Still, it seemed only fitting that he should make the first advances, now the moment when she might have done so had passed. She also fancied she understood the motive which prompted his answer when her father spoke to him respecting Carnaby.

"I can't go over now," he said. "Your lawyers and agents can look after the place a little longer, and I needn't worry if you're content with them. Anyway, all of it does not belong to me and we will see what we can fix up between us when I go over by and by."

This was pleasant hearing to Deringham, who commenced to hope that he would be able to give a satisfactory account of his stewardship when the time came, and winced at the recollection of the folly which had placed him in Hallam's grasp. Of late his health had given way again, and that served as an excuse for remaining at Vancouver, which he had scarcely the courage to leave.

Affairs were in this condition when Miss Deringham sat listening to the conversation of other visitors in the house of a friend of Mrs. Forel's one afternoon. Now and then a veiled allusion reached her, and at last she glanced inquiringly at her hostess.

The lady smiled deprecatingly and shook her head. "It is really indiscreet of Helen, but she seems to believe it is true," she said. "These things do happen, even in the old country."

Alice Deringham laughed. "I am afraid I cannot controvert you if that is uncomplimentary, because I don't know what you are alluding to."

Her hostess looked thoughtful. "Then you haven't heard it yet?" she said. "Well, I am not the one to tell you, and it is quite possible they haven't got the story correctly."

Miss Deringham was interested, but she asked no more questions, and had changed her place when she once more heard a subdued voice she recognized behind a great lacquered screen.

"One would be sorry for Hettie Forel, but her husband was always a little unguarded. Opened his house to everybody, you know."

"It was the big bushman I saw there?" said another person, and Alice Deringham felt a curious little quiver in her fingers as she waited the answer.

"Yes. Hettie will feel it. She made such a fuss of him, but it mayn't have been his fault altogether. He is quite a good-looking man, if he is a trifle lame, and the girl may have thrown herself at him. They sometimes do."

Alice Deringham set her lips and turned her head away from her companion as one of the voices continued. "Hettie has not heard it yet, and Tom did not seem sure about it when he told me. In fact, Forel brought the man over to see us the night before, but it is quite evident now the girl had been living there. Yes, Tom heard he had rooms behind his office."

Miss Deringham had recovered her outward serenity, and the flush had faded from her face, leaving it very colourless as she turned to her companion.

"You heard that woman?" she said.

The lady beside her nodded, though there was a little pink tinge in her cheeks. "I am sorry that you did, my dear."

Alice Deringham stood up, and looked down at her with a sparkle in her eyes. "I know," she said, "that it cannot be true."

"We must hope so," said her companion, who appeared distinctly uncomfortable. "Still, the story is being told all over the city, and several of the houses Forel took the man to are closed against him already."

Alice Deringham seemed to shiver a little. "But—it is impossible."

Her companion shook her bead. "My husband is a member of the company which employed Miss Townshead, and as the man's business affairs were antagonistic to theirs she was dismissed immediately."

Alice Deringham found it very difficult to conceal the effect of this last blow, and was turning away when two women rose from a divan behind the screen. "The tea is cold. Shall I ask for some more for you?" said one of them. "Pleased to see you again, Miss Deringham."

She got no further, for the girl, who looked her full in the face, passed on, and the other woman flushed a trifle.

"I'm afraid she must have heard you," said somebody. "Miss Deringham is, I believe, a connection of Alton's, and Hettie Forel hinted there was something more than that between them. It would be an especially suitable match because of some property in the old country."

The lady she spoke to smiled somewhat sourly. "Then one would be a trifle sorry for the rancher," she said.

It cost Miss Deringham a good deal to talk to her hostess until she could depart without attracting attention, and she walked back to Forel's house with a blaze in her eyes. As yet she could not think connectedly, for the astonishment had left no room for more than vague sensations of disgust and anger and a horrible rankling of wounded pride. Mrs. Forel as it happened was busy, and the girl slipped away to a room that was seldom occupied and sat there in the gathering darkness staring at the fire. The story was, she strove to persuade herself, utterly impossible, for she had probed the man's character thoroughly, and seen that it was wholesome through all its crudities—and yet it was evident the horrible tale must have some foundation, because otherwise refutation would be so simple.

Almost incredible as it was, the belief that it was borne out by fact was forced upon her, and too dazed to reason clearly she shrank with an overwhelming sense of disgust. She had, it seemed, wilfully deceived herself, and the man was, as she had fancied at the beginning, without sensibility or refinement, brutal in his forcefulness, and swayed by elementary passions. Then she writhed under the memory of the occasions on which she had unbent somewhat far to him, and the recollection of two incidents in the sickroom stung her pride to the quick; while when the booming of a gong rolled through the house, she rose faint and cold with an intensity of anger that for the time being drove out any other feeling. It would have gone very hardly with Alton had chance afforded her the means of punishing him just then.

As fate would have it the opportunity was also given her, for that evening Deringham, who had heard nothing of the story, was able to secure a few minutes alone with his daughter. He was, she noticed, looking unusually pale and ill, and that reminded her that he owed all his anxieties to Alton.

"Our kinsman is going back to Somasco very shortly, and then on into the ranges. I wish he could be prevented," he said.

The girl laughed a little. "I think it would be difficult to prevent Mr. Alton doing anything he had decided on."

"Yes," said Deringham. "He can be exasperatingly obstinate, but—and I put it frankly—he might listen to you. The journey he contemplates would be apt to prove perilous at this season."

Alice Deringham looked at her father with a smile the meaning of which he could not fathom. He did not know that she had of late been disturbed by unpleasant suspicions concerning his connection with Hallam.

"I fancy you are mistaken. You are of course influenced by a desire for his safety?"

Deringham winced, for he recognized the tone of sardonic scepticism, but he was horribly afraid of Hallam, and could not afford to fail.

"Well," he said, with a gesture of weariness, "I am afraid I must make an admission, I am hemmed in by almost overwhelming anxieties, and I have come to no understanding yet with Alton respecting Carnaby. Now if disaster overtook him in the ranges it would entail an investigation of the Carnaby affairs, and the withdrawal of a good deal of money from my companies, which would seriously hamper me. I have once or twice had to slightly exceed my duties as trustee, and Alton would approve of steps I have taken which a lawyer or accountant would consider irregular. Of course, if you had any knowledge of business I could make it more clear to you, but I can only tell you that I am anxious about Alton's safety for my own sake as well as his."

Alice Deringham turned towards him with a trace of impatience. "We may as well be honest, and I fancy Mr. Alton is used to risks," she said quietly. "Whether he encounters more than usual just now or otherwise is absolutely no concern of mine."

Deringham saw the change in her and wondered, but resolved to profit by it.

"I want him kept here a little longer. It is important to me," he said,

The girl saw the hand of Hallam in this, and surmised that it would not be to Alton's advantage if he postponed his journey, but she was vindictively bitter against him then, and glanced at her father inquiringly. It was evident that he was anxious and ill, and she was sensible of a pity that had yet a trace of contempt in it for him.

"Still, I do not see how I could induce him to remain," she said.

"Well," said Deringham slowly, "there is a way. Forel will be here in a minute—but if you would listen to me."

Deringham seemed to find a difficulty in commencing, and there was a curious expression in his restless eyes, while once or twice he stopped and proceeded somewhat inconsequently. He had made tools of a good many men and befooled the public without any especial scruples, but there was a shred of pride left him, and this was the first time he had stooped to drag his daughter into his schemes. His story lacked plausibility, and the girl was not deceived, but he was her father, and it was his cause she was asked to further against the man who had humiliated her and dispossessed him. She glanced away from him when he had finished, but her voice was quietly even.

"I think I shall be sorry for it ever afterwards, but I will do what you ask," she said.

Deringham, who was slightly bewildered by something in her attitude, sighed with relief, and then turned with the grotesque resemblance of a smile in his face to greet Forel, who came in.

"Gillard has been called away south on business and has sent me word he can let me have the places at the opera-house for both nights," he said. "No doubt you have seen the great man in England with his regular company, but a treat of the kind is appreciated here, and Gillard bought up a row of places, the best in the house. My wife is wondering who she should ask, and would like to know if Miss Deringham has any preference."

Deringham glanced at his daughter, and then smiled at his host. "One feels a little diffident about returning a favour at somebody else's expense, but my kinsman Alton was very kind to us in the bush," he said.

Forel appeared a trifle embarrassed, and Alice Deringham felt her neck grow warm as she watched him. "We can talk about it later, but I scarcely think Mr. Alton would come just now if he was asked," he said.

The girl turned away, for she could comprehend Forel's discomfiture, while as they followed him her father touched her.

"Get Mr. Alton there on the second night, and that is all I ask," he said.

It was two days later, when Alton returned to his office in a somewhat uncertain temper. He had called at Forel's house the previous evening, and been informed that Mrs. Forel was not at home, though the blaze of lights and music made it evident that she was entertaining a good many guests. He had also waited a considerable time for a banker who had been apparently willing to make him certain advances a few days earlier, and when he came to complete the transaction, raised wholly unexpected difficulties. Afterwards he called upon a dealer in tools and sawmill machinery, who, after professing his willingness to deal with him on usual easy terms, demanded a cheque with the order. Alton fancied he recognized the hand of Hallam in this, but there was also something else which troubled him. Some of the men he had business with had been a trifle abrupt in their greetings, and others smiled sardonically when they saw him.

As he strode down the corridor the keeper of the building signed to him. "There was a young man here asking for you," he said. "Told me he was Mr. Townshead, and he'd be back again."

Alton had scarcely reopened his office when a produce broker he had dealings with came in. "I've worked off the first two car-loads, and you can send some more along," he said. "Now, it's not quite my business, but if you'll not stand out about the usual commission I can put you on to a man who wants a hundred fat cattle."

"It's a deal," said Alton, glancing thoughtfully at his visitor, whom he considered an honest man. "Now I think you know a good deal about all that goes on in this city?"

"Oh, yes," said the other man, "I have to. Glad to be of any use to you I can."

"Well," said Alton, "I've noticed men smiling at me kind of curiously, and I want to know right off what's the meaning of it. There's nothing especially humorous about me."

"You don't know?" and his visitor appeared to reflect when Alton shook his head.

"Then to put it straight, there are folks who would not believe you. No, stop a little, I mentioned nothing about myself. Have you done anything lately, that might have hurt the susceptibilities of Mr. Cartier?"

Alton laughed grimly. "Yes," he said, "I hope so. I hove him out of this place one night and he fell downstairs."

"Well," said the other man, smiling, "that accounts for a good deal. Do you happen to be on good terms with Mr. Hallam? Cartier is."

"No," said Alton dryly, "I don't. When Mr. Hallam and I feel at peace one of us will be dead."

"Now, this thing is getting a little more clear to me. I wasn't willing to believe all I heard, anyway."

"That," said Alton, "does not concern me. The question is what did you hear?"

The other man appeared embarrassed and sat silent a space. "I think it's only right that you should know," he said. "Well—according to Cartier—there was a lady here when he came in close on midnight, and he gave folks the impression that she stayed here altogether. That wouldn't possibly have counted for so much, but it also got about that she made use of her place to give you information that was worth a good deal about the business of Hallam and the folks she worked for."

Alton's face grew almost purple, but the dark hue faded and left it unusually pale again. "That," he said very slowly, "is a damnable lie. The lady alluded to was here once only, and for at the most three minutes."

The other man grew a trifle uneasy under his gaze. "Of course," he said, "your word will do for me. Still, she was here, you see—and it's difficult to rub out a lie with that much behind it. I'm afraid you'll find it stick to you both like glue, especially as her employers turned the girl out immediately. Anyway, I'll do what I can for you, and now about that other car-load and the cattle?"

Alton brought his hand down crashing on the table. "The cattle? Oh, get out and come back to-morrow or next month, when I feel less like killing somebody!"

The other man appeared quite willing to accept his dismissal, and Alton vacantly noticed that a black stream of ink was trickling across the table. Mechanically he dabbled his handkerchief in it and then flung it and the ink-vessel into the grate, after which he sat still with a black stain upon the cheek that rested on his fist.

"The plucky little soul—and they've turned her out," he said. "Lord, but somebody has got to pay for this!"

He did not move for at least ten minutes, while the clamour of the city vibrated through the silent room, and when his first anger passed away became sensible of a great pity for the girl who had risked so much for him. It appeared only too probable that because of the modicum of truth it was founded on the lie would stick to both of them, and now when it was too late Alton regretted his folly. He had been fully justified in kicking Cartier out of his rooms, but he knew that everything that is legitimate is not advisable, and groaned as he saw what the story must cost the defenceless girl who had a living to earn and her father to maintain. There was so far as he could see no way out of the difficulty yet—and the one that concerned himself was almost as formidable, for he knew Alice Deringham's pride, and the damning fact remained that he could not deny the whole story.

He had flung himself back wearily in his chair when there was a step in the passage and a young man came in. He walked straight forward, and stood with one hand on Alton's table looking down on him with wonder and anger in his face. His eyes were unusually bright, and there was a great contusion on his forehead.

"Jack," said Alton simply. "Well, sit down there, and I'll try to talk to you. This is a devlish mess I've got into. Only heard about it ten minutes ago."

Jack Townshead did not move at all. "I'll stand in the meantime." he said harshly. "Unfortunately there are more concerned than you."

"Yes," said Alton wearily. "Don't rub it in. I know. Who was it told you?"

"That's beyond the question," said the lad. "Still, last night one of our men who'd been down here came in and was telling the story in the boys' sleeping-shed. I knocked him down—that is, I meant to, and started out by the first train. I'm at the mine on the south road now."

"You haven't been home?"

"No," said Townshead grimly. "I came straight to you, and in the first place you're coming with me everywhere to deny this story."

Alton sat very still for a space, and the lad seemed to quiver as he watched him. "I can't—that is, not all of it."

Every trace of colour faded from Jack Townshead's face. "Good Lord! Damn you, Alton—it can't be true."

Alton rose up slowly and stretched his hand out, while the veins swelled out on his forehead. Then he dropped it again.

"You'll be sorry for this by and by, Jack," he said. "Don't you know your sister better—you fool? Now sit down there, and I'll tell you everything."

The lad was evidently spirited, but he was a trifle awed by what he saw in Alton's eyes, and did as he was bidden. The hoarse voice he listened to carried conviction with it, but his face was almost haggard when the story was concluded. "Now," said Alton very slowly, "that's all, and for your sister's sake you dare not disbelieve me."

Jack Townshead groaned. "Thank God," he said, with a tremor in his voice. "But, Harry, what is to be done? I simply can't tell the old man—and there's Nellie. You can't deny sufficient to be any good—and the cursed thing will kill her. Now I'm trying not to blame you—but there must be a way of getting out somehow—and it's for you to find it."

Alton leaned upon the table a trifle more heavily, his eyes half-closed, and one hand clenched.

"Yes," he said slowly. "There is a way—and I'm beginning to see it now. Get your hat, Jack, and in the first place we'll go right along and see Mr. Cartier."

The lad rose, and then, possibly because he was over-strung and needed relief in some direction, laughed harshly. "I think you had better wash your face before you go," he said.

Twenty minutes later they entered an office together and Alton signed to a clerk. "Tell Mr. Cartier I'm wanting to see him right now," he said. "You know who I am."

The man smiled, for he probably also grasped the purport of Alton's visit. "Then you had better come back in a week," he said. "He went across to Victoria yesterday."

"That," said Alton grimly, "was wise of him."

They went out, and the lad glanced at his companion. "It is of the least importance. There is more to be done!"

"Yes," said Alton simply. "You have my sympathy, Jack, but just now I can't do with too much of you. Go right away—to anywhere, and don't come back until you're wanted. I've got to think how I can best do the thing that's right to everybody."



CHAPTER XXVIII

ALTON FINDS A WAY

Daylight was fading, and it was growing dim in the little upper room where Miss Townshead sat alone. The front of the stove was, however, open, and now and then a flicker of radiance fell upon the girl, and showed that her eyes were hazy, and there were traces of moisture on her cheek. Her patience had been taxed to the uttermost that day, but Townshead, who had spent most of it in querulous reproaches, had gone out, and his daughter was thankful to be alone at last, for the effort to retain a show of composure had become almost unendurable.

It was with a sinking heart she glanced down across the roofs of the city into the busy streets where already the big lights were blinking, and remembered all she had borne with there during the last few days. Somebody, it seemed, had industriously spread the story of her dismissal, and a refusal had followed every application she made for employment; but while that alone was sufficient to cause her consternation, the half-contemptuous pity of her former companions, and the fashion in which one or two of them had avoided her, were almost worse to bear, and sitting alone in the gathering darkness the girl flushed crimson at the memory. There was also the grim question by what means she could stave off actual want to grapple with, and to that she could as yet find no answer, while her eyes grew dim as she glanced about the little room. Townshead had changed his quarters, and many of the trifles that caught his daughter's glance had cost her a meal or hours of labour with the needle after a long day in the city, but they made the place a home, and she knew what it would cost her to part with them.

Twice she had raised her head and straightened herself with an effort, while a flicker of pride and resolution crept into her eyes, only to sink back again limply in her chair, when there was a tapping at the door, and she rose as some one came into the room. Then she set her lips and stood up very straight as she saw that it was Alton.

"I could find nobody about, and there was no answer when I knocked," he said. "So I just came in."

The girl moved a little so that she could see his face in the light from the stove, and it was quietly stern, but the movement had served two purposes, for her own was now invisible.

"And you fancied you could dispense with common courtesy in my case?" she said.

Alton made a little grave gesture of deprecation. "I wanted to see you—very much—but please sit down."

Nellie Townshead took the chair he drew out, and was glad that it was in the shadow, for Alton stood leaning against the window-casing looking down on her with grave respect and pity in his face.

"I am a little lame—as you may have heard," he said, as though to explain his attitude.

"Yes," said the girl, whose composure returned as she saw that he was temporizing. "I am sorry."

"Well," said Alton quietly, "so am I—especially just now—but I did not come to talk to you about my injury."

Nellie Townshead appeared very collected as she glanced in his direction, for she had a good courage, and had been taught already that when an issue is unavoidable it is better to face it boldly.

"One would scarcely have fancied that was your object."

"No," said Alton very quietly. "Now I am just a plain bush rancher, and don't know how to put things nicely, but I don't know that there's any disrespect in a straight question, and I came to ask if you would marry me."

The girl was mistress of herself, and the man's naive directness was in a fashion reassuring. She was also, for a moment, very angry.

"It is a little sudden, is it not?" she said. "Did I ever give you any cause for believing that I would?"

"No," said Alton, "I don't think you did."

Nellie Townshead afterwards wondered a little at her composure and temerity, but she fancied she knew what had prompted the man, and, because it hurt her horribly, all the pride she had came to her assistance, and in place of embarrassment she was sensible of a desire to test him to the uttermost.

"Then," she said, "one should have a reason for asking such a question, and, at least, something to urge in support of it."

Alton moved forward, and leaned over the back of her chair, where because he did most things thoroughly he attempted to lay one hand caressingly on her hair. Miss Townshead, however, moved her head suddenly, and the man drew back a pace with a flush in his face.

"It is very lonely up at the ranch, and I have begun to see that I have been missing the best of life. Mine is too grim and bare, and I want somebody to brighten and sweeten it for me."

The girl was very collected. What she had borne during the last few days had turned her gentleness into bitterness and anger. Thus it was, with a curious dispassionate interest she would have been incapable of under different circumstances, she continued to try the man, realizing that though it was no doubt unpleasant to him, there was one great reason which precluded the possibility of his suffering as he would otherwise have done.

"But you are going to live in the city now," she said.

"Yes," said Alton gravely. "That is why I want you more. You see I know so little, and there is so much you could teach me. I want somebody to lead me where I could not otherwise go, though I know it is asking a great deal while I can give so little."

This, the girl realized, was, though somewhat impersonal, wholly genuine. The tone of chivalrous respect rang true, and she could comprehend the half-instinctive straining after an ideal by one whose belief in her sex was, if slightly crude, almost reverential. It touched her, though she knew that to benefit him it could only be offered to one woman, and she was not that one.

"And that is all?" she said.

"Of course!" said Alton too decisively, because he remembered, as Miss Townshead quite realized, that the other reason must always remain hidden. This was also as balm to her pride, and there was a trace of a smile in her eyes.

"It is, as you appear to understand, very little."

"Well," said Alton, who seemed to take courage, "now when I see your meaning there is a trifle more."

Again he moved a pace, and the girl fancied he would have laid his hand upon her shoulder. "No," she said decisively.

Alton sighed, and his face became impassive, but it seemed to the girl that there was relief in it.

"I think I could be kind to you and make things smooth for you," he said very simply. "I should always look up to you, and I wouldn't ask for very much—only to see you happy."

He stopped apparently for inspiration, and Nellie Townshead smiled a little. "Do you think that last was wise?"

Alton turned towards her with a little glint in his eyes, and the girl, who knew his temperament, felt that she had gone far enough. He had borne it very well, and it seemed to her that other men might have handled the situation, which was difficult, less delicately.

"I asked you a question, and it seems to me that it still waits an answer."

The girl rose and stood looking at him with a little colour in her cheeks and a flash in her eyes, but there was that in her attitude which held Alton at a distance. "If you were not the man you are, and I was a little weaker, I should have said yes," she said. "As it is—there is nothing that would induce me to marry you."

It was almost dark now, and Nellie Townshead could not see her companion's face, but she was no longer careful to keep her own in the shadow, even when the radiance from the stove flickered about the room.

"Will you not think it over?" he said very quietly. "I know how unfit I am for you—and I am a cripple—but——"

The light was now more visible in Nellie Townshead's eyes, but her voice was gentle. "No," she said, "There are two very good reasons why it is impossible—and you know one of them. Now do you believe I do not know what brought you here to-day?"

"I think I have been trying to tell you," said Alton sturdily. "If you fancy it was anything else you are wrong."

The girl shook her head. "You are a good man, Harry Alton, but not a clever one. Only that it would have been a wrong to you, you would almost have persuaded me—by your silence chiefly. Still, you must go away, and never speak of this again."

Alton stood still a moment glancing at her with pity and a great admiration. The girl was good to look upon, he knew her courage, and now as she flung all that he could offer her away and stood alone and friendless with the world against her, but undismayed, all his heart went out to her, and what he had commenced from duty he could almost have continued from inclination.

"Please listen just a little, and I'll be quite frank," he said. "You told me there were two reasons."

Possibly the girl read what was passing in his mind, for she smiled curiously.

"I think you had better go—now—and leave me only a kindly memory of you. Do you think I should be content to take—the second place?" she said. "Nothing that you could tell me would remove one of the obstacles, and you will be grateful presently. When that time comes be wise, and don't ask for less than everything."

Alton said nothing further, and when his steps rang hollowly down the stairway the girl sat down and sighed. Then she laughed a curious little laugh and stopped to brush the tears from her eyes.

As it happened, while Nellie Townshead sat alone in the darkness Miss Deringham was writing a note to Alton. Spoiled sheets of paper were scattered about the table, and though there was nobody to see it the girl's face was flushed as she glanced down at the last one. The message it bore was somewhat laconic and ran, "We are going to the opera-house on Thursday, and as there is a place not filled I would like to see you there before you start for the ranges, if you know of no reason why you should not come."

She gave it to a maid, and sat still until she heard a door swing to, then rose swiftly and ran down the stairway. She met the maid at the foot of it, and said breathlessly, "I want to add something to the letter."

"It's too late, miss," said the maid, who was a recent importation from Britain. "I gave it John the Chinaman, and he went off trotting as usual. I couldn't overtake him."

Alice Deringham smiled a little, though her voice belied her as she said, "It is of no importance. I can write another."

She knew, however, that no second message she could send would repair what she had done, for Alton had timed his departure for the ranges next day, and several must elapse before Thursday came. He would, she also felt assured, not fail to come.

Miss Deringham was justified, for a few days later Seaforth stood waiting in the snow with a pack-horse's bridle in his hand, and several brawny men with heavy packs slung about them close by, when Tom of Okanagan drove into the clearing as fast as his smoking team could haul the jolting wagon.

"You can sling all those things down again," he said. "Thomson rode in with a wire from the railroad, and Harry's not coming."

"Not coming?" said Seaforth bewilderedly as he opened the message. "We've no time to lose—now."

Then he crumpled the strip of paper angrily. "We'll push on slowly, boys, until he comes up with us, but you had better wait for him, Tom," he said, and added half aloud, "The devil take all women!"

Miss Deringham went to the opera-house on Thursday with a somewhat distinguished party, and though a storm of applause greeted the eminent English dramatist, and the play was a popular one, saw very little of him or the first act of it. Then when the glitter of lights filled the building as the curtain went down she looked about her with veiled expectancy. She knew Alton of Somasco, and that if he intended to keep the assignation he would then come when everybody could see him.

She had also surmised correctly, for just then Alton, who had shouldered his way through a group in the corridor, moved down it under a blaze of light, his head erect, and his face somewhat grim as he saw the smiles and glances of disapproval of those who made way for him. As the rancher who was fighting Hallam and the capitalists behind him he was already known in that city, and the story that the woman who was spoken of with him had assisted him from the beginning by betraying the secrets of those who employed her at his instigation had spread, and told against him.

Alton saw it all, and did not for a moment turn aside so long as the smiles and whispers were directed at him, but he stopped and waited, leaning on a chair some distance behind the spot where Forel's party were until the curtain rose again. The next act commenced, as he knew, with a night scene, and while most of the audience had no eyes for any one but the great tragedian, he moved forward quickly, and Alice Deringham turned her head a trifle as a shadowy form slipped into the vacant place beside her. She could scarcely see the man, and was not certain that she desired to, but she would have known who he was had he been wholly invisible.

"It is you," she said softly. "I knew that you would come."

"Yes," said Alton. "You asked me to, but now I know that I should not have done so."

"And that I should not have asked you?" said Alice Deringham. "You should have been on your journey already."

Alton laughed a little. "That was not what I meant—as of course you know," he said. "Still, I wanted to see you—and I had to come."

"Why?"

Alton was silent a little. "It may be the last time."

Alice Deringham shivered. "But there is no reason?"

"No—and yes," said Alton grimly. "I—and it is due to you and another to tell you this—have done no wrong, but there are reasons why I should not intrude myself into your company, and I am going back up there into the snow to-morrow."

"But," said the girl, feeling horribly guilty, "there are times when one's friends can do a good deal for one."

Alton seemed to laugh a trifle bitterly. "Yes," he said. "Still, I do not care to trouble mine in that direction. One must stand alone now and then, and things have not been going well with me lately. I had another blow to-day. I asked Miss Townshead to marry me—and she would not."

Alice Deringham said nothing for a space, and then her voice was different. There was no shade of expression in it. "And you are going back to look for the silver tomorrow? I hope you will be successful."

"Thank you," said Alton. "It would mean a good deal to everybody—and now I think I have already stayed too long."

Alice Deringham heard the creaking of a chair, and when she looked round he had gone, but she said very little to any one when the curtain came down again, while Alton, turning in a doorway for a moment, set his lips as he caught the gleam of her hair.

"I think I have done the right thing all round, but it was condemnably hard," he said as he went down the corridor.

By chance he came face to face with Forel a few moments later, and both men stopped. "I am glad I found you," said Alton. "It is only fitting to tell you that for a minute or two I joined your party."

Forel looked uncomfortable. "To be frank, there are unpleasant tales about you, and while they needn't interfere with business one has to——" he said, and stopped.

Alton nodded. "You needn't be too explicit. The tales, so far as you have heard them, are not true. I tell you so on my word of honour—and I want you to show that you believe me by finding Miss Townshead something to do. You can draw on me for the salary if it's necessary."

Forel, who was a good-tempered man, flushed a little. "If there was anything in the stories I should take this very ill."

"Of course," said Alton. "I shouldn't have objected if you had knocked me down, but, as I see you are not quite sure yet, for just five minutes you have got to listen to me."

Forel did so, and nodded when Alton concluded, "I think you should do what I want you to, because in the first place it will give you very little trouble, and if you can't take my word so far, I'm not fit to be trusted with your interests in the big deal we have in hand."

"And in the second?" said Forel, who stood to benefit considerably by the success of the Somasco Consolidated, dryly.

Alton laughed. "I think it would be more tasteful to leave that unexpressed, because it's connected with the other one," he said.

"Well," said Forel, "frankly, I should have doubted what you have told me had it come from most other men, but in this case I will see what I can do. We are, as it happens, in want of somebody at Westminster, and I'll send them down a line to-morrow."

"Thanks," said Alton, with a little sigh of relief. "Now I think I've straightened up everything, and I can go back to the ranges contented."



CHAPTER XXIX

THE PRICE OF DELAY

It was raining with pitiless persistency when Alton and Tom of Okanagan came floundering down into the river valley. The roar of the canon rose in great reverberations from out of the haze beneath them, and all the pines were dripping, while the men struggled wearily knee-deep in slush of snow. The spring which lingers in the North had come suddenly, and a warm wind from the Pacific was melting the snow, so that the hillsides ran water, and the torrents that had burst their chains swirled frothing down every hollow.

The men were chilled to the backbone, for it had rained all day and they had passed several nights sheltered only by the pines. Garments and boots were sodden, and Alton's face was set and drawn, for though he could now walk without much visible effort upon the level, a journey through the ranges of that country would at any season test the endurance of the strongest whole-limbed man, and his forced march had only been accomplished by stubborn determination and disregard of pain. Still, it was not physical distress alone which accounted for his gravity. He had put off his journey to the latest moment, and now when time was scanty the weather promised to further delay him. They had stopped a moment breathless, when Okanagan broke the silence.

"Plenty water. I'm figuring we'll find Charley Seaforth somewhere here," he said. "The jumpers would have it drier, if they headed out from lower down the railroad over the bench country."

Alton nodded as he listened to the roar of the river, which warned him that their road up the valley would be almost impassable.

"It can't be helped," he said, and Tom of Okanagan, who saw how grim his face had grown, understood the reason. If Hallam's emissaries had gone up before them any further delay might cost Alton the mine.

Nothing was said for another minute, and then Okanagan pointed to a dim smear of vapour below them that was a little bluer than the mist.

"Smoke. Charley's held up by the river," he said.

They went on in moody silence, knowing that where the hardy ranchers Seaforth had with him had failed there was little probability of any man forcing a passage, and presently the smell of burning firwood came up to them through the rain. Then a red flicker appeared and vanished amidst the dusky trunks, and in another few minutes Alton was shaking his comrade's hand. The faces of both of them were unusually grave, and there was dejection in the growl of greeting from the men, who sat half seen amidst the smoke watching them.

"That's the whole of us," said Seaforth, who noticed his comrade's glance. "We can't get on."

"How long have you been here?" said Alton, with significant quietness.

"Two days. It's unfortunate you didn't come earlier, Harry, because we could have got right through a week ago. Was it the leg that kept you?"

"No," said Alton, with a little mirthless laugh, "it wasn't the leg. I should have come, but one can't always do two things at once, and I had to choose. I've a good deal to tell you."

Seaforth glanced sharply at his comrade. "I fancied you had. You are not the man I left at Vancouver, Harry. Well, you will be hungry, and supper's almost ready."

It was several hours later, and the men in the bigger tent were fast asleep, when Seaforth and Alton sat swathed in clammy blankets under a little canvas shelter. The drip from the great branches above beat upon it, and the red light of the snapping fire shone in upon the men. Neither of them had spoken for some time, but at last Alton laid down his pipe.

"This is a thing I wouldn't tell to any man if it could be helped, but as you will hear it told the wrong way when you get back to the city, you have got to know," he said. "I'd have been where I was wanted if it hadn't happened, and now I can't help feeling I have given you and the rest away. It hurts me, Charley, but what could I do? It would have been worse to let two women suffer for my condemned folly."

Seaforth was in no mood for laughter, but his eyes twinkled faintly. "Two of them? You have been getting on tolerably fast down there, Harry."

Alton stopped him with a gesture. "My temper's not what it was a few weeks ago," he said. "Now, you sit still and listen to me."

He had scarcely commenced his story when the smile died out of Seaforth's eyes. He seemed to listen with breathless intentness, and his voice shook a little as he said, "And you asked her to marry you. Did you think for a moment that she would?"

Alton appeared to consider. "I didn't think at all," he said. "It seemed the one thing I could do, and I did it."

"The city hasn't made much difference in you," said Seaforth, watching his comrade intently. "It must have been a load off your mind when she refused you?"

Alton straightened himself a little. "I don't like the way you put it, Charley. Whoever gets Miss Townshead will have a treasure. The girl's good all through. Now I think I've told you everything, and I don't ask if you believe me."

There was a flicker of warmer colour under Seaforth's bronze, and a curious glint in his eyes.

"Yes," he said slowly; "I think she is too good even for you, and you have done all that any one could have expected of you, without keeping up the farce any longer. I am glad you did not ask if I believed you—because I could scarcely have forgiven you that question. Do you think I don't know—both of you—better?"

The last words were a trifle strained, and Alton stared at his comrade in bewildered astonishment, for Seaforth had betrayed himself in his passion. Then there was silence for a full minute until he said very quietly—

"And I never guessed."

"No?" said Seaforth, still a trifle hoarsely. "And now I think you know."

Alton nodded, and there was a very kindly smile in his eyes. "Yes; I'm beginning to understand—a good deal," he said. "I'm very glad, for there are not many girls like Miss Townshead in the Dominion. Charley, you're a lucky man, but why have you been so long over it? It never struck me that you were bashful."

Seaforth smiled mirthlessly. "If you will listen a few minutes you will see how fortunate I am. You never asked me what brought me out from the old country, Harry."

Alton gravely pressed his arm. "There are times when one must talk. Go on, if it will do you good," he said.

It was not an uncommon story Seaforth told that night, and Alton, who had heard it, slightly varied, several times already, could fill up the gaps when his comrade ceased, and the drip from the branches splashing upon the canvas replaced his disjointed utterance. Seaforth was very young when it happened and the woman older than him.