She was glad when they reached Meadow Brook. Their whole talk had been of marsh pulp, and company organization, and preferred and common stock, and who was to get it, and how much they were to pay for it, and how they were going to cut the throats of the wood pulp manufacturers, and how much profit they were going to make from the consumers and with all that, not a word for her. Not a single word! Not even an apology! Oh, it was atrocious! As soon as they drew up to the porch she rose, and before Sam could jump down to open the door of the tonneau she had opened it for herself and sprung out.

"I'll hunt up father right away for you," she stated courteously. "Glad to have met you, Mr. Creamer. I presume I shall meet you again, Mr. Turner," she said to Jack. "Thank you so much for the ride," she said to Sam, and then she was gone.

Sam looked after her blankly. It couldn't be possible that she was "huffy" about this business talk. Why, couldn't the girl see that this had to do with the birth of a great big company, a million dollar corporation, and that it was of vital importance to him? It meant the apex of a lifetime of endeavor. It meant the upbuilding of a fortune. Couldn't she see that he and his brother were two lone youngsters against all these shrewd business men, whose only terms of aiding them and floating this big company was to take their mastery of it away from them? Couldn't she understand what control of a million dollar organization meant? He was not angry with Miss Stevens for her apparent attitude in this matter, but he was hurt. He was not impatient with her, but he was impatient of the fact that she could not appreciate. Now the fat was in the fire again. He felt that. Under other circumstances he would have said that it was much more trouble than it was worth to keep in the good graces of a girl, but under the present circumstances—well, his heart had sunk down about a foot out of place, and he had a sort of faint feeling in the region of his stomach. He was just about sick. He followed her in, just in time to see the flutter of her skirts at the top of the stairway, but he could not call without making himself and her ridiculous. Confound things in general!

Mr. Stevens joined him while he was still looking into that blank hole in the world.

"Glad I happened to be here, Sam," said Stevens. "Jo tells me that your brother and Mr. Creamer have arrived and that you want to form that company right away."

"Yes," admitted Sam. "Was she sarcastic about it?"

Mr. Stevens closed his eyes and laughed.

"Not exactly sarcastic," he stated; "but she did allude to your proposed corporation as 'that old company!'"

"I was afraid so," said Sam ruefully.

Stevens surveyed him in amusement for a moment, and then in pity.

"Never mind, my boy," he said kindly. "You'll get used to these things by and by. It took me the first five years of my married life to convince Mrs. Stevens that business was not a rival to her affections, when, if I'd only have known the recipe, I could have convinced her at the start."

"How did you finally do it?" asked Sam, vitally interested.

"Made her my confidante and adviser," stated Stevens, smiling reminiscently.

Sam shook his head.

"Was that safe?" he asked. "Didn't she sometimes let out your secrets?"

"Bosh!" exclaimed Stevens. "I'd rather trust a woman than a man, any day, with a secret, business or personal. That goes for any woman; mother, sister, sweetheart, wife, daughter, or stenographer. Just give them a chance to get interested in your game, and they're with you against the world."

"Thanks," said Sam, putting that bit of information aside for future pondering. "By the way, Mr. Stevens, before we join the others I'd like to ask you how much stock you're going to carry in the Marsh Pulp Company."

"Well," returned Mr. Stevens slowly, "I did think that if the thing looked good on final analysis, I might invest twenty-five thousand dollars."

"Can't you stretch that to fifty?"

"Can't see it. But why? Don't you think you're going to fill your list?"

"We'll fill our list all right," returned Sam. "As a matter of fact, that's what I'm afraid of. These fellows are going to pool their stock, and hold control in their own hands. Now if I could get you to invest fifty thousand and vote with me under proper emergency, I could control the thing; and I ought to. It is my own company. Seems to me these fellows are selfish about it. You think I'm a good business man, don't you?"

"I certainly do," agreed Mr. Stevens emphatically.

"Well, it stands to reason that if I have two hundred and sixty thousand dollars of common stock that isn't worth a picayune unless I make it worth par, I'll hustle; and if I make my common stock worth par, I'm making a fine, fat profit for these other fellows, to say nothing of the raising of their preferred stock from the value of fifty to a hundred dollars a share, and their common from nothing to a hundred."

"That's all right, Sam," returned Mr. Stevens; "but you'll work just as hard to make your common worth par if you only have two hundred thousand; and there's a growing tendency on the part of capital to be able to keep a string on its own money. Strange, but true."

"All right," said Sam wearily. "We won't argue that point any more just now; but will you invest fifty thousand?"

"I can't promise," said Stevens, and he walked out on the porch. Much worried, Sam followed him, and with many misgivings he introduced Mr. Stevens to his brother Jack and to Mr. Creamer. The prospective organizers of the Marsh Pulp Company were already in solemn conclave on the porch, with the single exception of Princeman, who was on the lawn talking most perfunctorily with Miss Josephine. That young lady, with wickedness of the deepest sort in her soul, was doing her best to entice Mr. Princeman into forgetting the important meeting, but as soon as Princeman saw the gathering hosts he gently but firmly tore himself away, very much to her surprise and indignation. Why, he had been as rude to her as Sam Turner himself, in placing the charms of business above her own! Immediately afterward she snubbed Billy Westlake unmercifully. Had he the qualities which would go to make a successful man in any walk of life? No!



CHAPTER XIV

A DUAL QUESTION OF MATRIMONIAL ELIGIBILITY AND STOCK SUBSCRIPTION

Mr. Westlake dropped back with his old friend Stevens as they trailed into the parlor which Blackstone had secured.

"Are you going to subscribe rather heavily in the company, Stevens?" inquired Westlake, with the curiosity of a man who likes to have his own opinion corroborated by another man of good judgment.

"Well," replied the father of Miss Josephine, "I think of taking a rather solid little block of stock. I believe I can spare twenty-five thousand dollars to invest in almost any company Sam Turner wants to start."

"He's a fine boy," agreed Westlake. "A square, straight young fellow, a good business man, and a hustler. I see him playing tennis with my girl every day, and she seems to think a lot of him."

"He's bound to make his mark," Mr. Stevens acquiesced, sharply suppressing a fool impulse to speak of his own daughter. "Do you fellows intend to let him secure control of this company?"

"I should say not!" replied Westlake, with such unnecessary emphasis that Stevens looked at him with sudden suspicion. He knew enough about old Westlake to "copper" his especially emphatic statements.

"Are you agreeable to Princeman's plan to pool all stock but Turner's?"

"Well—we can talk about that later."

"Huh!" grunted Mr. Stevens, and together the two heavy-weights, Stevens with his aggressive beard suddenly pointed a trifle more straight out, and Mr. Westlake with his placidity even more marked than usual, stalked on into the parlor, where Mr. Blackstone, taking the chair pro tem., read them the preliminary agreement he had drawn up; upon which Sam Turner immediately started to wrangle, a proceeding which proved altogether in vain.

The best he could get for patents and promotion was two thousand out of the five thousand shares of common stock, and finally he gave in, knowing that he could not secure the right kind of men on better terms. Mr. Blackstone thereupon offered a subscription list, to which every man present solemnly appended his name opposite the number of shares he would take. Sam, at the last moment, put down his own name for a block of stock which meant a cash investment of considerably more than he had originally figured upon. He cast up the list hurriedly. Five hundred shares of preferred, carrying half that much common, were still to be subscribed. With whom could he combine to obtain control? The only men who had subscribed enough for that purpose were Princeman, who was out of the question, and, in fact, would be the leader of the opposition, and Westlake. The highest of the others were Creamer, Cuthbert and Stevens. Sam would have to subscribe for the entire five hundred in order to make these men available to him.

McComas and Blackstone had only subscribed for the same amount as Sam. They could do him no good, and he knew it was hopeless to attempt to get two men to join with him. He looked over at Westlake. That gentleman was smiling like a placid cherub, all innocence without, and kindliness and good deeds; but there was nevertheless something fishy about Westlake's eyes, and Sam, in memory, cast over a list of maimed and wounded and crushed who had come in Westlake's business way. The logical candidate was Stevens. Stevens simply had to take enough stock to overbalance this thing, then he simply must vote his stock with Sam's! That was all there was to it! Sam did not pause to worry about how he was to gain over Stevens' consent, but he had an intuitive feeling that this was his only chance.

"Stevens," said he briskly, "there are five hundred shares left. I'll take half of it if you'll take the other half."

His brother Jack looked at him startled. Their total holdings, in that case, would mean an investment of more money than they could spare from their other operations. It would cramp them tremendously, but Jack ventured no objections. He had seen Sam at the helm in decisive places too often to interfere with him, either by word or look. As a matter of fact such a proceeding was not safe anyhow.

"I don't mind—" began Westlake, slowly fixing a beaming eye upon Sam, and crossing his hands ponderously upon his periphery; but before he could announce his benevolent intention, Mr. Stevens, with what might almost have been considered a malevolent glance toward Mr. Westlake, spoke up.

"I'll accept your proposition," he said with a jerk of his beard as his jaws snapped. So Miss Westlake thought a great deal of Sam, eh? And old Westlake knew it, eh? And he had already subscribed enough stock to throw Sam control, eh?

"Thanks," said Sam, and shot Mr. Stevens a look of gratitude as he altered the subscription figures.

"Stop just a moment, Sam," put in Mr. Westlake. "How many shares of common stock does that give you in combination with your bonus?"

"Two thousand two hundred and sixty," said Sam.

"Oh!" said Mr. Westlake musingly; "not enough for control by two hundred and forty one shares; so you won't mind, since you haven't enough for control anyhow, if I take up that additional two hundred and fifty shares of preferred, with its one hundred and twenty-five of common, myself."

Sam once more paused and glanced over the subscription list. As it stood now, aside from Princeman, there were two members, Westlake and Stevens, with whom, if he could get either one of them to do so, he could pool his common stock. If he allowed Westlake to take up this additional two hundred and fifty shares, Westlake was the only string to his bow.

"No, thanks," said Sam. "I prefer to keep them myself. It seems to me to be a very fair and equitable division just as it is."

In the end it stood just that way.



CHAPTER XV

THE HERO OF THE HOUR

On that very same afternoon, the youth and beauty, also the age and wisdom, of both Hollis Creek and Meadow Brook, gathered around the ball field of the former resort, to watch the Titanic struggle for victory between the two picked nines. As Sam took his place behind the bat for the first man up, who was Hollis, he felt his first touch of self-confidence anent the strictly amusement features of summer resorting. In all the other athletic pursuits he had been backward, but here, as he smacked his fist in his glove, he felt at home.

The only thing he did not like about it, as Princeman wound himself up to deliver the first ball, was that Princeman had the position of glory. On that gentleman the spotlight burned brightly all the time, and if they won, he would be the hero of the hour; the modest, reliable catcher would scarcely be thought of except by the men who knew the finer points of the game, and it was not the men whom he had in mind. Honestly and sincerely, he desired to shine before Miss Josephine Stevens. She was over there at the edge of the field under an oak tree.

Before her, cavorting for her amusement, were not only Princeman and himself, but Billy Westlake and Hollis, each of them alert for action at this moment; for now Princeman, with a mighty twirl upon his great toe, released the ball. It never reached Sam Turner's hands; instead it bounced off the bat with a "crack!" and sailed right down through Billy Westlake, who, at second, made a frantic grab for it, and then it spun out between center and right field, losing itself in the bushes, while Hollis, amid the frantic cheers of the audience, which consisted of Miss Josephine Stevens and several unconsidered other spectators, tore around the circuit. His colleagues strove wildly to hold Hollis at third, for the ball was found and was sailing over to that base. It arrived there just as he did, but far over the head of the third baseman, and fat, curly-haired Hollis, who looked like an ice wagon but ran like a motorcycle, secured the first run for Hollis Creek.

The next batter was up. Princeman, his confidence loftily unshaken, gave a correct imitation of a pretzel and delivered the ball. The batsman swung viciously at it.

Spat! It landed in Sam's glove.

"Strike one!" called the strident voice of Blackrock, who, jerking himself back several years into youth again, was umpiring the game with great joy. Nonchalantly Sam snapped the ball back over-hand. Princeman smiled with calm superiority. He wound himself up.

Spat! The ball had cut the plate and was in Sam's hands, while the batsman stood looking earnestly at the path over which it had come.

"Strike two!" called Blackstone.

Sam jerked the ball back with an underwrist toss of great perfection. Princeman drew himself up with smiling ease and posed a moment for the edification of the on-lookers. Sam Turner was the very first to detect the unbearable arrogance of that pose. Princeman eyed the batsman critically, mercilessly even, and delivered the third fatal plate-splitter.

Z-z-z-ing! The sphere slammed right out through Billy Westlake, who made a frantic grab for it. It bounded down between center and right field, and the players bumped shoulders in trying to stop it. It nestled among the bushes. The batsman tore around the bases. His colleagues tried to hold him at third, for the ball was streaking in that direction, but the batsman pawed straight on. The ball crossed the base before he did, but it bounded between the third sacker's feet, and score two was marked up for Hollis Creek, with nobody out!

With undiminished confidence, though somewhat annoyed, Princeman made a cute little knot of himself for the next batsman.

Spat! The ball landed in Sam's glove, two feet wide of the plate.

"Ball one!" called Blackstone.

Spat! In Sam's glove again, with the batsman jumping back to save his ribs.

"Ball two!" cried Blackstone.

Spat!

"Ball three."

"Put 'em over, Princeman!" yelled Billy Westlake from second.

"Don't be afraid of him! He couldn't hit it with a pillow!" jeered the third baseman.

In a calm, superior sort of way, Mr. Princeman smiled and shot over the ball.

"Four balls. Take your base!" said Mr. Blackstone, quite gently.

Reassuringly Mr. Princeman smiled upon his supporters, consisting of Miss Josephine Stevens and some other summer resorters, and proceeded to take out his revenge upon the next batter. The first two lofts were declared to be balls, and then Sam, catching his man playing too far off, snapped the pill down to the nearest suburb and nailed the first out. Encouraged by this, Princeman put over three successive strikes, and there were two gone. The next batter up, however, laced out, for two easy way-points, the first ball presented him. The next athlete brought him in with a single, and the next one put down a three-bagger which bored straight through Princeman and short stop and center field. That inglorious inning ended with a brilliant throw of Sam's to Billy Westlake at second, nipping a would-be thief who had hoped to purloin the seventh tally for Hollis Creek.

Billy Westlake, then taking the bat, increased the Meadow Brook depression by slapping the soft summer air three vicious spanks and retiring to think it over, and young Tilloughby bounced a feeble little bunt square at the feet of Hollis and was tossed out at first by something like six furlongs. The third batsman popped up a slow, lazy foul which gave the catcher almost plenty of time to roll a cigarette before it came down, and the Meadow Brook side was ignominiously retired. Score, six to nothing at the end of the first.

Princeman hit the first man up in the next inning and sent him down to the initial bag, which was a flat stone, happily limping. He issued free transportation to the next man and let the cripple hobble on to second, chortling with glee. The third man went to the first station on a measly little bunt with which Sam and Princeman and third base did some neat and shifty foot work, and the next man up soaked out a Wright Brothers beauty among the trees over beyond left field, and cleared the bases amid the perfectly frantic rejoicing of the fickle Miss Josephine Stevens and all the negligible balance of Hollis Creek. Oh, it was disgraceful! Sam Turner ground his teeth in impotent rage. He walked up to Princeman.

"Say, old man," he pleaded. "We've just got to settle down! We must pull this game out of the fire! We can't let Hollis Creek walk away with it!"

Princeman was pale, but clutched at his fast-slipping-away nonchalance with the grip of desperation.

"We'll hold them," he declared, and with careful deliberation he put over a ball which the next batter sent sailing right down inside the right foul line, pulling the first baseman away back almost to right field. Princeman stood gaping at that bingle in paralyzed dismay; but the batsman, who was a slow runner and slow thinker, stood a fatal second to see whether the ball was fair or foul. Almost at the crack of the bat Sam Turner started, raced down to first, caught the right fielder's throw and stepped on the stone, one handsome stride ahead of the runner! Then, as Blackrock, speechless with admiration, waved the runner out, the first mighty howl went up from Meadow Brook, and one partisan of the Hollis Creek nine, turning her back for the moment squarely upon her own colors, led the cheering. Sam heard her voice. It was a solo, while all the rest of the cheering was a faint accompaniment, and with such elation as comes only to the heroes in victorious battle, he trotted back to his place and caught three balls and three strikes on the next batter. Also, the next one went out on a pop fly which Sam was able to catch.

In their half Princeman redeemed himself in part by a three bagger which brought in two scores, and the second inning ended at ten to three in favor of Hollis Creek.

Confident and smiling, reinforced by the memory of his three bagger, Princeman took the mount for the beginning of the third, and with his compliments he suavely and politely presented a base to the first man up. A groan arose from all Meadow Brook. The second batsman shot a stinger to Princeman, who dropped it, and that batsman immediately thereafter roosted on first, crowing triumphantly; but the hot liner allowed Princeman a graceful opportunity. He complained of a badly hurt finger on his pitching hand. He called time while he held that injured member, and expressed in violent gestures the intolerable agony of it. Bravely, however, he insisted upon "sticking it out," and passed two wild ones up to the next willow wielder; then, having proved his gameness, he nobly sacrificed himself for the good of Meadow Brook, called time and asked for a substitute pitcher. He would go anywhere. He would take the field or he would retire. What he wanted was Meadow Brook to win. This was precisely what Sam Turner also wanted, and he lost no time in calling, with ill-concealed satisfaction, upon his brother Jack. Then Jack Turner, nothing loath, deserted his comfortable seat by the side of Miss Josephine Stevens, and strode forth to the mound, leaving the unfortunate Princeman to take his place by the side of Miss Stevens and give her an opportunity to sympathize with his poor maimed pitching hand, which, after a perfunctory moment of interest, she was too busy to do; for Jack Turner and Sam Turner, smiling across at each other in mutual confidence and esteem, proceeded to strike out the next three batters in succession, leaving men cemented to first and second bases, where they had been wildly imploring for opportunities to tear themselves loose.

What need to tell of the balance of that game; of the calm, easy, one-two-three work of the invincible Turner battery; of the brilliant base throwing and fielding of Turner and Turner, and their mighty swats when they came to bat? You know how the game turned out. Anybody would know. It ended in a triumph for Meadow Brook at the end of the seventh inning, which is all any summer resort game ever goes, and two innings more than most, by a total and glorious score of twenty-one to seventeen. And who were the heroes of the hour, as smilingly but modestly they strode from the diamond? Who, indeed, but Jack Turner and Sam Turner; and by token of their victory, after receiving the frenzied plaudits of all Meadow Brook and the generous plaudits of all Hollis Creek, they marched in triumph from the field, one on either side of Miss Josephine Stevens! Where now were Hollis and Princeman and Billy Westlake? Nowhere! They were forgotten of men, ignored of women, and the laurels of sweet victory rested upon the brow of busy Sam Turner!



CHAPTER XVI

AN INTERRUPTED BUT PROPERLY FINISHED PROPOSAL OF MARRIAGE

Jack's first opportunity for a quiet talk with his brother did not occur for an hour after the game.

"I don't like to worry you while you're resting, Sam," he began, "but I'll have to tell you that the Flatbush deal seems likely to drop through. It reaches a head to-morrow, you know."



Sam Turner grabbed for his watch.

"It can't drop through!" he vigorously declared. "I'll go right up there to-night and look after it."

"But you're on your vacation," protested Jack. "That's no way to rest."

"On my vacation!" snorted Sam. "Of course I am. I'm not losing a minute of my vacation. The proper way to have a vacation is to do the thing you enjoy most. Don't you suppose I'll enjoy closing that Flatbush deal?"

"Certainly," admitted his brother, "and I'll enjoy seeing you do it. I know you can."

"Of course I can. But you're to stay here."

"It's not my turn for an outing," protested Jack. "I haven't earned one yet."

"You're to work," explained Sam. "You see, Jack, in one week I can't become a bowling or golf expert enough to beat Princeman, nor a tennis or dancing expert enough to outshine Billy Westlake, nor a horseback or croquet expert enough to make a deuce out of Hollis. You can do all these things, and I want you to give this crowd of distinguished amateurs a showing up. Jack, if you ever worked for athletic honors in your life now is the time to do it; and in between time stick to Miss Stevens like glue. Monopolize her. Don't give these three or any other contenders any of her time. Keep her busy. Let me know every day what progress you're making; don't stop to write; wire! For remember, Jack, I'm going to marry her. I've got to."

"Well, then you'll marry her," Jack sagely concluded. "Does she know it yet?"

"I don't think she's quite sure of it," returned Sam with careful analysis. "Of course she's thought about it. Sometimes she thinks she won't, and sometimes she thinks she will, and sometimes she isn't quite sure whether she will or not. Don't you worry about that part, though, and don't bother to boost me. Just quietly you take the shine out of these summer champions and leave the rest to your brother Sam."

"Fine," agreed Jack. "Run right along and sell your papers, Sammy, and I'll wire you every time I put over a point."

Sam hunted and found Miss Josephine.

"I'm sorry I have to take a run back to New York for two or three days," he said.

She bent upon him a glance of amusement; the old glance of mingled amusement and mischief.

"I thought you were on your vacation," she observed.

"And I am," he insisted. "I've been having a bully time, and I'll come back here to finish up the couple of days I have left."

"Then the drive which didn't count this morning, and which was postponed again until to-morrow morning, will have to be put off once more," she reminded him with a gay laugh.

"By George, that's so!" he exclaimed. "In all the excitement it had quite slipped my mind."

"I presume you're going up on business," she slyly observed.

"Yes, I am," he admitted.

She laughed and gave him her hand.

"Well, I wish you good luck," she said. "I hope you make all the money in the world. But you won't forget us who are down here in the country dawdling away our time in useless amusements."

"Forget you!" he returned impetuously. "Never for a minute!" and he was in such deadly earnest about it that she hastily checked further speech, although she did not know why.

"Good!" she hurriedly exclaimed. "I'm glad you will bear us in mind while you're gone. Are you going to take your brother along?"

"No," he said with a smile. "I'm putting him in as my vacation substitute, and I'll give him special instructions to call you up every morning for orders. You'll find him in perfect discipline. He'll do whatever you tell him."

"I shall give him a thorough trial," she laughed. "I never yet had anybody to come and go abjectly at the word of command, and I think it will be a delightful novelty."

Jack approaching just then, she took his arm quite comfortably.

"Your brother tells me that during his absence you are to be my chief aide and attache," she advised that young man gaily; "that you'll fetch and carry and do what I tell you; and the first thing you must do is to call for me when you take Mr. Turner to the train."

It is glorious to part so pleasantly as that from people you have persistently in mind, and Sam, with such cheerful recollections, enjoyed his vacation to the full as he did new and brilliant and unexpected things in closing up the Flatbush deal, keeping, in the meantime, in constant touch with his office and with such telegrams as these:

"Established new tennis record this morning Westlake nowhere and has been snubbed do not know why."

"Bowled two eighty five last night against Princeman two twenty am teaching her."

"Danced six dances out of twelve with her says I'm better dancer than Billy Westlake."

"Jumped Hollis Creek after her hat on horseback this afternoon Hollis dared not follow am to give her riding lessons."

Then came this one:

"Her father just told me she refused Princeman last night she will not talk to Hollis and scarcely to me is dull and does not eat I beat all entries in ten mile Marathon today and she hardly applauded wire instructions."

Sam Turner took the next train. One look at Miss Stevens, after he had traveled two years to reach Restview, made him suddenly intoxicated, for in her eyes there was ravenous hunger for him and he read it, and feeling rather sure of his ground he determined that now was the time to strike. With that decisive end in view he dropped Jack at Meadow Brook and went right on over to Hollis Creek with Miss Josephine. Of course there was no chance to talk quite intimately, with Henry up there ahead listening with all his ears, but there was every chance in the world to look into her eyes and grow delirious; to touch elbows; to look again and gaze deep into her eyes and see her turn away startled and half frightened; to say perfunctory things which meant nothing and everything, and receive perfunctory answers which meant as little and as much; but before they had arrived at Hollis Creek Sam was frankly and boldly holding her hand and she was letting him do it, and they were both of them profoundly happy and profoundly silly, and would just as leave have ridden on that way for ever.

Words seemed superfluous, but yet they were more or less necessary, so Sam got out at Hollis Creek Inn with her, and led the way determinedly and directly into the stuffy little parlor just off the main assembly room. He saw Mr. Stevens in the door of the post-office, but only nodded to him, and then he drew Miss Josephine into the corner freest from observation.

"You know why I came back," he informed her, fixing her with a masterly eye; "I had to see you again. My whole life is changed since I met you. I need you. I can not do without you. I—"

"Beg your pardon, Sam," said Mr. Stevens, appearing suddenly in the doorway, and then he paused, much more confused even than the young people, for Sam was holding both Miss Josephine's hands and gazing down at her with an earnestness which, if harnessed, would have driven a four-ton dynamo; and she was gazing up at him just as earnestly, with an entirely breathless, but by no means displeased expression.

"Excuse me!" stammered Mr. Stevens.



It was Miss Josephine who first found her aplomb. She smiled her rare smile of mingled amusement and mischief at Sam, and then at her father.

"You're quite excusable, I guess, father," she said sweetly. "What is it?"

"Why, your brother Jack just called you up from Meadow Brook, Sam, and wants to tell you something immediately," stammered Mr. Stevens, plucking at a beard which in that moment seemed to have lost all its aggressiveness. "He called twice before you arrived, and is on the 'phone now."

Sam, as he walked to the telephone, had time to find that his heart was beating a tattoo against his ribs, that his breath was short and fluttery, and that stage fright had suddenly crept over him and claimed him for its own; so it was with no great patience or understanding that he heard Jack tell him in great glee about some tests which Princeman had had made in his own paper mills with the marsh pulp, and how Princeman was sorry he had not taken more stock, and could not the treasury stock be opened for further subscription? "Tell him no," said Sam shortly, and hung up the receiver; then he repented of his bluntness and spent five precious minutes in recalling his brother and apologizing for his bruskness, explaining that Princeman was probably trying to plan another attempt to pool the stock.

In the meantime Theophilus Stevens had stood surveying his daughter in contrition.

"I'm afraid I came in at a most inopportune moment," he said by way of apology.

"Yes, I'm afraid you did," she admitted with a smile. "However, I don't think Sam will forget what he wanted to say," and suddenly she reached up and put her arms around her father's neck and drew his face down and kissed him rapturously.

"I'm glad to see you feel the way you do about it," said Mr. Stevens delightedly, petting her gently upon the shoulder with one hand and with the other smoothing back the hair from her forehead. She was the dearest to him of all his children, although he never confessed it, even to himself, and just now they were very, very close together indeed. "I'm glad to hear you call him Sam, too. He's a fine young man and he is bound to be a howling success in everything he undertakes." He smiled reminiscently. "I rather thought there was something between you two," he went on, still patting her shoulder, "and when Dan Westlake told me that his girl thought a great deal of Sam and that he was going to buy enough stock in Sam's company to give Sam control, I turned right around and bought just as much stock as Westlake had, although just before the meeting I had refused to invest as much money as Sam wanted me to. Moreover, Westlake and myself, between us, stopped the move to pool the outside stock, just yet. He's a smart young man, that boy," he continued admiringly. "I didn't see, until I went into that meeting, why he was so crazy to have me buy enough stock to gain control— What's the matter?"

He stopped in perplexity, for his daughter, looking aghast at him, had pushed back from his embrace and was regarding him with perfectly round eyes, while over her face, at first pale, there gradually crept a crimson flush.

"Well, of all things!" she gasped. "Of all the cold-blooded, cruel, barter-and-sale proceedings! Why, father, how—how could you! How could he! I never in all my life—"

"Why, Jo, what do you mean? What's the trouble?"

"If you don't understand I can't make you," she said helplessly.

"Well, I'll be—busted!" observed Mr. Stevens under his breath.

To his infinite relief Sam came in just then, and Mr. Stevens, wondering what he had done now, slipped hastily out of the room. Mr. Turner, coming from the bright office into the dim room and innocent of any change in the atmosphere, approached confidently and eagerly to Miss Josephine with both hands extended, but she stepped back most indignantly.

"You need not finish what you were going to say!" she warned him. "My father has just given me some information which changes the entire aspect of affairs. I am not a part of a business bargain! I refuse to be regarded as a commercial proposition! I heard something from Mr. Princeman of what desperate efforts you were making to secure the command, whatever that may be, of the—of the stock—board—of shares in your new company, but I did not think you would go to such lengths as this!"

"Why, my dear girl," began Sam, shocked.

"I am not your dear girl and I never shall be," she told him, and angrily dabbed at some sudden tears. "I never was. I was only a business possibility."

"That's unjust," he charged her. "I don't see how you could accuse me of regarding you in any other way than as the dearest and the sweetest and the most beautiful girl in all the world, the wisest and the most sensible, the most faithful, the most charming, the most delightful, the most everything that is desirable."

"Wait just a moment," she told him, very coldly indeed; with almost extravagant coldness, in fact, as she beat out of her consciousness the enticing epithets he had bestowed upon her. "Do you mean to say that never in your calculations did you consider that if you married me my father would vote his stock with yours—I believe that's the way he puts it—and give you command or whatever it is of your company?"

"Well," considered Sam, brought to a standstill and put straight upon his honor, "I can't deny that it did seem to me a very satisfactory thing that my father-in-law should own enough stock in the company—"

"That will do," she interrupted him icily. "That is precisely what I have charged. We will consider this subject as ended, Mr. Turner; as one never to be referred to again."

"We'll do nothing of the sort," returned Sam flat-footedly. "I've been composing this speech for the last two weeks and I'm going to deliver it. I'm not going to have it wasted. I've unconsciously been rehearsing it every place I went. Even up in Flatbush, showing a man the superior advantages of that yellow-mud district, I found myself repeating sentence number twelve. It's been the first thing I thought of in the morning and the last thing I thought of at night. It's been with me all day, riding and walking and talking and eating and drinking and just breathing. Now I'm going to go through with it.

"I—I—confound it all! I've forgotten how I was going to say it now! After all, though, it only amounted to this: I love you! I want you to know it and understand it. I love you and love you and love you! I never loved any woman before in my life. I never had time. I didn't know what it was like. If I had I'd have fought it off until I met you, because I could not afford it for anybody short of you. It takes my whole attention. It distracts my mind entirely from other things. I can't think of anything else consecutively and connectedly. I—I'm sorry you take the attitude you do about this thing, but—I'm not going to accept your viewpoint. You've got to look at this thing differently to understand it.

"I know you've been glad I loved you. You were glad the first day we met, and you always will be glad! Whatever you have to say about it just now don't count. I'm going to let you alone a while to think it over, and then I'm coming back to tell you more about it," and with that Sam stalked from the room, leaving Miss Josephine Stevens gasping, dazed, quite sure that he was unforgivable, indignant with everything, still rankling, in spite of all Sam had said, with the thought that she had been made a mere part of a commercial transaction. Why, it was like those barbarous countries she had read about, where wives are bought and sold! Preposterous and unbearable!

While she was in this storm of mixed emotions her father came in upon her, this time seriously perplexed.

"What has happened to Sam Turner?" he demanded. "He slammed out of the house, passed me on the porch with only a grunt, and jumped into his automobile. You must have done something to anger him."

"I hope that I did!" she retorted with spirit. "I refused to marry him."

"You did!" he returned in surprise. "Why, I thought it was all cut and dried between you."

"It was until you blundered into us and spoiled everything," she charged. "But I'm glad you did. You let me know that Sam Turner wanted to marry me because you had bought shares enough in his company to give him the advantage. I'm ashamed of you and ashamed of Sam—of Mr. Turner—and ashamed of myself. Why, you make a bargain-counter remnant of me! I never, never was so humiliated!"

"Poor child!" her father blandly sympathized. "Also, poor Sam. By the way, though, he doesn't need you to secure control of his company. Dan Westlake, as I told you, has bought enough stock to do the work, and Miss Westlake would marry him in a minute. If Sam wants control of his company, he only has to go to her and say the word."

"Father!" exclaimed his daughter with stern indignation. "I don't see how you can even suggest that!"

"Suggest what? Now, what have I said?"

"That Sam—that Mr. Turner would even dream of marrying that Westlake girl, just in order to get the better of a business transaction," and very much to Theophilus Stevens' surprise and consternation and dismay, she suddenly crumpled up in a heap in her chair and burst out crying.

"Well, I'll be busted!" her father muttered into his beard.



CHAPTER XVII

SHE CALLS HIM SAM!

Miss Josephine, finding all ordinary occupations stale, unprofitable and wearisome on the following morning, and finding herself, moreover, possessed of a restless spirit which urged her to do something or other and yet recoiled at each suggestion she made it, started out quite aimlessly to walk by herself. She walked in the direction of Meadow Brook. The paths in that direction were so much prettier.

Sam Turner, finding all other occupations stale, unprofitable and wearisome, at the same moment started out to walk by himself, going in the direction of Hollis Creek because that was the exact direction in which he wanted to go. As he walked much more rapidly than Miss Stevens, he arrived midway of the distance before she did, but at the valley where the unnamed stream came rippling down he paused.

He had looked often at this little hollow as he had passed it, and every time he had looked upon it he seemed to have an idea of some sort in the back of his head regarding it; a dim, unformed, fugitive sort of idea which had never asserted itself very prominently because he had been too busy to listen to its rather timid voice.

Just now, however, the idea suddenly struggled to make itself loudly known, whereupon Sam bade it come forth. Given hearing it proved to be a very pleasant idea, and a forceful one as well; so much so that it even checked the speed with which Sam had set out for Hollis Creek. He looked calculatingly across the road to where the little stream went flashing from under its wooden bridge across the field and hid around a curve behind some bushes, then reappeared, dancing in the sunlight, until finally it plunged among some far trees and was lost to him. He gazed up the stream. He had not very far to look, for there it ran down between two quite steep hills, through a sort of pocket valley, closed or almost closed, at the upper end, by another hill equally steep, its waters being augmented by a leaping little stream from a strong spring hidden away somewhere in the hill to the left.

As his eyes calculatingly swept stream and hills, they suddenly caught a flutter of white through the trees, and it was coming down the winding path which led across the hills to Hollis Creek. As it emerged more from the concealment of the leaves his blood gave a leap, for the flutter of white was a gown inclosing the unmistakable figure of Miss Josephine Stevens. The whole valley suddenly seemed radiant.

"Hello!" he called to her as she approached. "I didn't expect to find you here."

"I did not expect to be here," she laughed. "I just started out for a stroll and happened to land in this beautiful spot."

"Beautiful is no name for it," he replied with sudden vast enthusiasm, and ran up the path to help her down over a steep place.

For a moment, in the wonderful mystery of the touch of her hand and the joy of her presence, he forgot everything else. What was this strange phenomenon, by which the mere presence of one particular person filled all the air with a tingling glow? Marvelous, that's what it was! If Miss Josephine had any of the same wonder she was extremely careful not to express it, nor let it show, especially after yesterday's conversation, so she immediately talked of other things; and the first thing which came handy was another reference to the beautiful valley.

"You know, it is a wonder to me," she said, "that no one has built a summer resort here. I think it ever so much more charming than either Hollis Creek or Meadow Brook."

"Do you believe in telepathy?" asked Sam, almost startled. "I do. It hasn't been but a few minutes since that identical idea popped into my head, and I had just now decided that if I could secure options on this property I would have a real summer resort here—one that would make Hollis Creek and Meadow Brook mere farm boarding-houses. Do you see how close together these hills draw at their feet? The hollow is at least a thousand feet across at the widest part, but down there at the road, where the stream emerges to the fields, they close in with natural buttresses, as it were, to not over a hundred feet in width. Well, right across there we'll build a dam, and there is enough water here to make a beautiful lake up as high as that yellow rock."

Miss Josephine looked up at the yellow rock and clasped her hands with an exclamation of delight.

"Glorious!" she said. "I never would have thought of that; and how beautiful it will be! Why, if the lake comes up that high it will go clear back around that turn in the valley, won't it?"

"Easily," he replied; "although that might make us trouble, for I don't know where that turn in the valley leads. I have never explored that region. Suppose we go up and look it over."

"Won't that be fun?" she agreed, and they started to follow the stream.

As they reached the rear of the "pocket," where they could see around the curve, they turned and looked back over the route they had just traversed.

"My idea," Sam explained, having waited until they reached this viewpoint to do so, "is to build the dam down there at the roadside, and build the hotel right over it so that arriving guests will, after an elevator has brought them up to the height of the main floor, find the blue of the lake suddenly bursting upon them from the main piazza, which will face the valley. All of the inside rooms will, of course, have hanging balconies looking out over the water."

"Perfectly ideal!" she agreed, her enthusiasm growing.

"I think I'd better investigate the curve of the valley," he decided, studying the path carefully. "It seems rather rough for you, and I'll go alone. All I want to see is how far the water height will carry around there, and if it will become necessary to build a dam at the other end."

"Oh, it isn't too rough for me," she declared immediately. "I am an excellent climber," and together they started to explore the now narrowing valley, following the stream over steep rocks and fallen trees, and pushing through tangled undergrowth and among briers and bushes and around slippery banks until they came to another tortuous turn, where a second spring, welling up from under a flat, overhanging rock, tumbled down to augment the supply for the future lake; and here they stopped and had a drink of the cool, delicious water, Sam making the girl a cup from a huge leaf which she said made the water taste fuzzy, and then showing her how to get down on her hands and knees—spreading his coat on the ground to protect her gown—and drink au naturel, a trick at which she was most charming, and probably knew it.

The valley here had grown most narrow, but they followed the now very small stream around one sharp curve after another until they found its source, which was still another spring, and here there was no more valley; but a cleft in the hill to the right, which they suddenly came upon, gave them an exquisite view out over the beautiful low-lying country, miles in extent, which lay between this and the next range of hills; a delightful vista dotted with green farms and white farm-houses and smiling streams and waving trees and grazing cattle. They stopped in awe at the beauty of it and looked out over the valley in silence; and unconsciously the girl slipped her hand within the arm of the man!

"Just imagine a sunset out over there," he said. "You see those fleecy clouds that are out there now. If clouds like those are still there when the sun goes down, they will be a fleet of pearl-gray vessels, with carmine keels, upon a sea of gold."

She glanced at him quickly, but she did not express her marvel that this man had so many sides. Before she could comment, and while she was still framing some way to express her appreciation of his gentler gifts, he returned briskly to practical things.

"Our lake will scarcely come up to this point," he judged. "I don't think that at any point it will be high enough to cover the springs. We don't want it to if we can help it, for that would destroy some of the beauty of it. Have you noticed that our lake will be much like a kite in shape, with this winding ravine the tail of it. We'll have to take in a lot of acreage to cover this property, but it will be worth it. I'm going to look after options right away. I'm glad now I had already decided to stay another two weeks."

Of course she was still angry with Sam, she reminded herself, but she was inexpressibly glad, somehow or other, to find that he was intending to stay two weeks longer, and was startled as she recognized that fact.

"It will take a lot of money, won't it, to build a hotel here?" she asked, getting away from certain troublesome thoughts as quickly as she could.

"Yes, it will take a great deal," he admitted, as they turned to scramble down the ravine again. "I should judge, however, that about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars would finance it."

"But I thought, from something father once said, that you did not have so much money as that?"

"Bless you, no!" replied Sam, smiling. "No indeed! I've enough to cover an option on this property and that's about all, now, since I'm tangled up so deeply with my Pulp Company, but I figure that I can make a quick turn on this property to help me out on the other thing. What I'll do," he explained, "is to get this option first of all, and then have some plans drawn, including a nice perspective view of the hotel—a water-color sketch, you know, showing the building fronting the lake—and upon that build a prospectus to get up the stock company. I'll take stock for my control of the land and for my services in promotion. Then I'll sell my stock and get out. I ought to make the turn in two or three months and come out fifteen, or possibly twenty or twenty-five thousand dollars to the good. It is a nice, big scheme."

"Oh," she said blankly, "then you wouldn't actually build a hotel yourself?"

"Hardly," he returned. "I'll be content to make the profit out of promoting it that I'd make in the first four or five years of running the place."

"I see," she said musingly; "and you'd get this up just like you formed your Marsh Pulp Company, I think father called it, and of course you'd try to get—what is it?—oh, yes; control."

He smiled at her.

"I'd scarcely look for that in this deal," he explained. "If I can just get a nice slice of promotion stock and sell it I shall be quite well satisfied."

She bent puzzled brows over this new problem.

"I don't quite understand how you can do it," she confessed, "but of course you know how. You're used to these things. Father says you're very good at promoting."

"That's the way I've made all my money, or rather what little I have," he told her, modestly enough. "I expect this Pulp Company, however, to lift me out of that, for a few years at least; then when I come back into the promoting field I can go after things on a big scale. The Pulp Company ought to make me a lot of money if I can just keep it in my own hands," and involuntarily he sighed.

She looked at him musingly for a moment, and was about to say something, but thought better of it and said something else.

"The tail of your kite will be almost a perfect letter 'S'," she observed. "How beautiful it will be; the big, broad lake out there in the main valley, and then the nice, little, secluded, twisty waterway back in through here; a regular lover's lane of a waterway, as it were. I don't suppose these springs have any names. They must be named, and—why, we haven't even named the lake!"

"Yes, we have," he quickly returned. "I'm going to call it Lake Josephine."

"You haven't asked my permission for that," she objected with mock severity.

"There are plenty of Josephines in the world," he calmly observed. "Nobody has a copyright on the name, you know."

She smiled, as one sure of her ground.

"Yes, but you wouldn't call it that, if I were to object seriously."

"No, I guess I wouldn't," he gave up; "but you're not going to object seriously, are you?"

"I'll think it over," she said.

They were now making their way along a bank that was too difficult of travel to allow much conversation, though it did allow some delicious helping, but when they came out into the main valley where they could again look down on the road, they paused to survey the course over which they had just come, and to appreciate to the full the beauty of Sam's plan.

"I don't believe I quite like your idea of the hotel built down there at the roadside," she objected as they sat on a huge boulder to rest. "It cuts off the view of the lake from passers-by, and I should think it would be the best advertisement you could have for everybody who drove past there to say: 'Oh, what a pretty place!' Now I should think that right about here where we are sitting would be the proper location for your hotel. Just think how the lake and the building would look from the road. Right here would be a broad porch jutting out over the water, giving a view down that first bend of the kite tail, and back of the hotel would be this big hill and all the trees, and hills and trees would spread out each side of it, sort of open armed, as it were, welcoming people in."

"It couldn't be seen, though," objected Sam. "The dam down there would necessarily be about thirty feet high at the center, and people driving along the roadway would not be able to see the water at all. They would only see the blank wall of the dam. Of course we could soften that by building the dam back a few feet from the roadway, making an embankment and covering that with turf, or possibly shrubbery or flowers, but still the water would not be visible, nor the hotel!"

"I see," she said slowly.

They both studied that objection in silence for quite a little while. Then she suddenly and excitedly ejaculated:

"Sam!"

He jumped, and he thrilled all through. She had called him Sam entirely unconsciously, which showed that she had been thinking of him by that familiar name. With the exclamation had come sparkling eyes and heightened color, not due to having used the word, but due to a bright thought, and he almost lost his sense of logic in considering the delightful combination. It occurred to him, however, that it would be very unwise for him to call attention to her slip of the tongue, or even to give her time to think and recognize it herself.

"Another idea?" he asked.

"Indeed yes," she asserted, "and this time I know it's feasible. I don't know much about measurements in feet and inches, but there are three feet in a yard."

"Yes."

"Well, doesn't the road down there, from hill to hill, dip about ten yards?"

"Yes."

"Well then, that's thirty feet, just as high as you say the dam will have to be. Why not raise the road itself thirty feet, letting it be level and just as high as your dam?"

Sam rose and solemnly shook hands with her.

"You must come into the firm," he declared. "That solves the entire problem. We'll run a culvert underneath there to the fields. The road will reinforce the dam and the edge of the dam will be entirely concealed. It will be merely a retaining wall with a nice stone coping, which will be repeated on the field side. There will be no objection from the county commissioners, because we shall improve the road by taking two steep hills out of it. Your plan is much better than mine. I can see myself, for instance, driving along that road on my way to Hollis Creek from Restview, looking over that beautiful little lake to the hotel beyond, and saying to myself: 'Well, next summer I won't stop at Hollis Creek. I'll stop at Lake Jo.'"

"I thought it was to be Lake Josephine," she interposed.

"I thought so too," he agreed, "but Lake Jo just slipped out. It seems so much better. Lake Jo! That would look fine on a prospectus."

"You'd print the cover of it in blue and gold, I suppose, wouldn't you?"

"There would need to be a splash of brown-red in it," he reminded her, considering color schemes for a moment. "The roof of the hotel would, of course, be red tile. We'd build it fireproof. There is plenty of gray stone around here, and we'd build it of native rock."

"And then," she went on, in the full swing of their idea, "think of the beautiful walks and climbs you could have among these hills; and the driveway! Your approach to the hotel would come around the dam and up that hill, would wind up through those trees and rocks, and right here at the bend of the ravine it would cross the thick part of the kite tail to the hotel on a quaint rustic bridge; and as people arrived and departed you'd hear the clatter of the horses' hoofs."

"Great!" he exclaimed, catching her enthusiasm and with it augmenting his own, "and guests leaving would first wave good-by at the porte-cochere just about where we are sitting. They'd clatter across the bridge, with their friends on the porch still fluttering handkerchiefs after them; they'd disappear into the trees over yonder and around through that cleft in the rocks. And see; on the other side of the cleft there is a little tableland which juts out, and the road would wind over that, where carriages would once more be seen from the hotel porch. Then they'd twist in through the trees again down the winding driveway, and once more, for the very last glimpse, come into view as they went across our new road in front of the lake; and there the last flutter of handkerchiefs would be seen. You know it's silly to stand and wave your friends out of sight for a long distance when they're always in view, but if the view is interrupted two or three times it relieves the monotony."



CHAPTER XVIII

SAM TURNER ACQUIRES A BUSINESS PARTNER

They followed the stream down to the road, at every step gaging with the eye the height of the lake and judging the altered scenic view from the level of the water. There would be room for dozens and dozens of boats upon that surface without interference. Sam calculated that from the upper spring there would be headway enough to run a small fountain in the center, surrounded by a pond-lily bed which would be kept in place by a stone curbing. In the hill to the right there was a deep indenture. Back in there would go the bathing pavilions. They even went up to look at it, and were delighted to find a natural, shallow bowl. By cementing the floor of that bowl they could have a splendid swimming-pool for timid bathers, where they could not go beyond their depth; and it was entirely surrounded by a thick screen of shrubbery. Oh, it was delightful; it was perfect! At the road they looked back up over the valley again. It was no longer a valley. It was a lake. They could see the water there. Sam drew from his pocket a pencil and an envelope.

"The hotel will have to be long and tall," he observed, "for there will not be much room on that ledge, from front to back. The building will stretch out quite a ways. Three or four hundred feet long it will be, and about five stories in height," and taking a letter from the envelope, he sat down upon a fallen log and began rapidly to sketch.

He drew the hotel with wide-spreading Spanish roofs and balconies, and a wide porch with rippling water in front of it, and rowboats and people in them; and behind the hotel rose the broken sky-line of the hills and the trees, with an indication of fleecy clouds above. It was just a light sketch, a sort of shorthand picture, as it were, and yet it seemed full of sunlight and of atmosphere.

"I hadn't any idea you could draw like that," she exclaimed in admiration.

"I do a little of everything, I think, but nothing perfectly," he admitted with some regret.

"It seems to me you do everything excellently," she objected quite seriously; and she was, in fact, deeply impressed.

He walked over to the stream, a trifle confused, but not displeased, by any means, by the earnestness of her compliment.

"I must have the water analyzed to see if it has any medicinal virtue," he said. "The spring out of which we drank has a sweetish-like taste, but the water here—" and he caught up some of it in his hand and tasted it, "seems to be slightly salt."

He had left her sitting on the log with the sketch in her lap. Now the sketch fluttered to the ground and the letter turned over, right side up. It was a letter which Sam had written to his brother Jack and had not mailed because he had suddenly decided to come down to the scene of action. As she stooped over to pick it up her eyes caught the sentence: "I love her, Jack, more than I can tell you, more than I can tell anybody, more than I can tell myself. It's the most important, the most stupendous thing—" She hastily turned that letter over and was very careful to have it lying upon her lap, back upward, exactly as he had left it there, and when he came back she was very, very careful indeed to hand it nonchalantly over to him, with the sketch uppermost.

"Of course," he said, looking around him comprehensively, "this is only a day-dream, so far. It may be impossible to realize it."

"Why?" she asked, instantly concerned. "This project must be carried through! It is already as good as completed. It just must be done. I never before had a hand, even in a remote way, in planning a big thing, and I couldn't bear not to see this done. What is to prevent it?"

"I may not be able to get the land," returned Sam soberly. "It is probably owned by half a dozen people, and one or more of them is certain to want exorbitant prices for it."

"It certainly can't be very valuable," she protested. "It isn't fit for anything, is it?"

"For nothing but the building of Lake Jo," he agreed. "Right now it is worthless, but the minute anybody found out I wanted it it would become extremely valuable. The only way to do would be to see everybody at once and close the options before they could get to talking it over among themselves."

"What time is it?" she demanded.

He looked at his watch.

"Ten-thirty," he said.

"Then let's go and see all these people right away," she urged, jumping to her feet.

He smiled at her enthusiasm, but he was none loath to accept her suggestion.

"All right," he agreed. "I wish they had telephones here in the woods. We'll simply have to walk over to Meadow Brook and get an auto."

"Come on," she said energetically, and they started out on the road. They had not gone far, however, when young Tilloughby, with Miss Westlake, overtook them in a trap. He reined up, and Miss Westlake greeted the pedestrians with frigid courtesy. Jack Turner had accidentally dropped her a hint. Now that she had begun to appreciate Mr. Tilloughby—Bob—at his true value, she wondered what she had ever seen in Sam Turner—and she never had liked Josephine Stevens!

"Gug-gug-gug-glorious day, isn't it?" observed Tilloughby, his face glowing with joy.

"Fine," agreed Sam with enthusiasm. "There never was a more glorious day in all the world. You've just come along in time to save our lives, Tilloughby. Which way are you bound?"

"Wuw-wuw-wuw-we had intended to go around Bald Hill."

"Well, postpone that for a few minutes, won't you, Tilloughby, like a good fellow? Trot back to Meadow Brook and send an auto out here for us. Get Henry, by all means, to drive it."

"Wuw-wuw-wuw-with pleasure," replied Tilloughby, wondering at this strange whim, but restraining his curiosity like a thoroughbred. "Huh-huh-huh-Henry shall be back here for you in a jiffy," and he drove off in a cloud of dust.

Miss Stevens surveyed the retiring trap in satisfaction.

"Good," she exclaimed. "I already feel as though we were doing something to save Lake Jo."

They walked back quite contentedly to the valley and surveyed it anew, there resting now on both of them a sense of almost prideful possession. They discovered a high point on which a rustic observatory could be built; they planned paths and trails; they found where the water-line came just under an overhanging rock which would make a cave large enough for three or four boats to scurry under out of the rain. They found delightful surprises all along the bank of the future lake, and Miss Stevens declared that when the dam was built and the lake began to fill, she never intended to leave it except for meals, until it was up to the level at which they would permit the overflow to be opened.

Henry, returning with the automobile, found them far up in the valley discussing a floating band pavilion, but they came down quickly enough when they saw him, and scrambled into the tonneau with the haste of small children. Henry watched them take their places with smiling affection. He had not only had good tips but pleasant words from Sam, and Miss Stevens was her own incentive to good wishes and good will.

"Henry," said Sam, "we want to drive around to see the people who own this land."

"Oh, shucks," said Henry, disappointed. "I can't drive you there. The man that owns all this land lives in New York."

"In New York!" repeated Sam in dismay. "What would anybody in New York want with this?"

"The fellow that bought it got it about ten years ago," Henry informed them. "He was going to build a big country house, back up there in the hills, I understand, and raise deer to shoot at, and things like that; got an architect to make him plans for house and stables and all costing hundreds of thousands of dollars; but before he could break ground on it him and his wife had a spat and got a divorce. He tried to sell the land back again to the people he bought it from, but they wouldn't take it at any price. They were glad to be shut of it and none of his rich friends wanted to buy it after that, because, they said, there were so many of those cheap summer resorts around here."

"I see," said Sam musingly. "You don't happen to know the man's name, do you?"

"Dickson, I think it was. Henry Dickson. I remember his first name because it was the same as mine."

"Great!" exclaimed Sam, overjoyed. "Why, I know Henry Dickson like a book. I've engineered several deals for him. He's a mighty good friend of mine too. That simplifies matters. Drive us right over to Hollis Creek."

"To Hollis Creek!" she objected. "I should think you'd drive to Meadow Brook instead and dress for the trip. Aren't you going to catch that afternoon train and go right up there?"

"By no means. This is Saturday, and by the time I'd get to New York he couldn't be found anywhere; and anyhow, I wouldn't have time to deliver you at Hollis Creek and make this next train."

"Don't mind about me," she urged. "I could go to the train with you and Henry could take me back to Hollis Creek."

"That's fine of you," returned Sam gratefully; "but it isn't the program at all. I happen to know that Dickson stays in his office until one o'clock on Saturdays. I'll get him by long distance."

They were quite silent in calculation on the way to Hollis Creek, and Miss Josephine found herself pushing forward to help make the machine go faster. Breathlessly she followed Sam into the house, and he obligingly left the door of the telephone booth ajar, so that she could hear his conversation with Dickson.

"Hello, Dickson," said Sam, when he got his connection. "This is Sam Turner. . . . Oh yes, fine. Never better in my life. . . . Up here in Hamster County, taking a little vacation. Say, Dickson, I understand you own a thousand acres down here. Do you want to sell it? . . . How much?" As he received the answer to that question he turned to Miss Josephine and winked, while an expression of profound joy, albeit materialized into a grin, overspread his features. "I won't dicker with you on that price," he said into the telephone. "But will you take my note for it at six per cent.?"

He laughed aloud at the next reply.

"No, I don't want it to run that long. The interest in a hundred years would amount to too much; but I'll make it five years. . . . All right, Dickson, instruct your lawyer chap to make out the papers and I'll be up Monday to close with you."

He hung up the receiver and turned to meet her glistening eyes fixed upon him in ecstasy. "It's better than all right," he assured her. He was more enthusiastic about this than he had ever been about any business deal in his life, that is, more openly enthusiastic, for Miss Josephine's enthusiasm was contagion itself. He took her arm with a swing, and they hurried into the writing-room, which was deserted for the time being on account of the mail having just come in. Sam placed a chair for her and they sat down at the table.

"I want to figure a minute," said he. "Now that I have actual possession of the property, in place of a mere option, I can go at the thing differently. First of all, when I go up Monday I'll see my engineer, and on Tuesday morning I'll bring him down here with me. Then I shall secure permission from the county to alter that road and we'll build the dam. That will cost very little in comparison to the whole improvement. Then, and not till then, I'll get out my stock prospectus, and I'll drive prospective investors down here to look at Lake Jo. I'll be almost in position to dictate terms."

"Isn't that fine!" she exclaimed. "And then I suppose you can secure—control," she ventured anxiously.

"Yes, I think I can if I want it," he assured her.

"I'm so glad," she said gravely. "I'm so very glad."

"Really, though, I have a big notion to see if I can't finance the entire project myself. I'm quite sure I can get Dickson to give me a clear deed to that land merely on my unsupported note. If I can do that I can erect all the buildings on progressive mortgages. Roadways and engineering work of course I'll have to pay for, and then I can finance a subsidiary operating company to rent the plant from the original company, and can retain stock in both of them. I'll figure that out both ways."

It was all Greek to her, this talk, but she knitted her brows in an earnest effort to understand, and crowded close to him to look over the figures he was putting down. The touch of her arm against his own threw out his calculations entirely. He could not add a row of figures to save his life.

"I'll go over the financial end of this later on," he said, but he did not put away the paper. He kept it there for them both to look at, touching arms.

"All right," she agreed, "but you must let me see you do it. Of course I can't understand, but I do want to feel as if I were helping when it is done."

"I won't take a step in it without consulting you or having you along," he promised.

At that moment the bugle sounded the first call for luncheon.

"You'll stay for luncheon," she invited.

"Certainly," he assured her. "You couldn't drive me away."

"Very well, right after luncheon let's go out and look at the place again. It will look different now that it is—" She caught herself. She had almost said "now that it is ours." "Now that it is secured," she finished.

After luncheon they drove back to the site of Lake Jo, and spent a delirious while planning the things which were to be done to make that spot an earthly Paradise. Never was a couple so prolific of ideas as they were that afternoon. With 'Ennery waiting down in the road they tramped all over the hills again, standing first on one spot and then another to survey the alluring prospect, and to plan wonderful new and attractive features of which no previous summer resort builder had ever even dared to dream.

During the afternoon not one word passed between them which might be construed to be of an intimately personal nature, but as they drove to Hollis Creek, tired but happy, Sam somehow or other felt that he had made quite a bit of progress, and was correspondingly elated. Leaving Miss Stevens on the porch he hurried home to dress for dinner, for it was growing late, but immediately after dinner he drove over again. When he arrived Miss Josephine was in the seldom used parlor with her father.

"I haven't seen you since breakfast," Mr. Stevens had said, pinching her cheek, "Hollis and Billy Westlake have been looking for you everywhere."

"Oh, they," she returned with kindly contempt. "I'm glad I didn't see them. They're nice boys enough, but father, I don't believe that either one of them will ever become clever business men!"

"No?" he replied, highly amused. "Well, I don't think they will either. Business is a shade too big a game for them. But where have you been?"

"Out on business with S-s-s—with Mr. Turner," she replied demurely. "I came in late for lunch, and you had already finished and gone. Then we went right back out again. Father, we have found the dearest, the most delightful, the most charming business opportunity you ever saw. You must go out with us to-morrow and look at it. Sam's going to build a lake and call it Lake Jo. You know where that little stream is between here and Meadow Brook? Well, that's the place. We found out this morning what a delightful spot it would make for a lake and a big summer resort hotel, and at noon Sam bought the property, and we have been planning it all afternoon. He's bought it outright and he's going to capitalize it for a quarter of a million dollars. How much stock are you going to take in it?"

"How much what?"

"How many shares of stock are you going to take in it? You must speak up quickly, because it's going to be a favor to you for us to let you in."

"Well, I don't know," said Mr. Stevens, resisting a sudden desire to guffaw. "I'd have to look it over first before I decide to invest. Sounds like a sort of wild-eyed scheme to me. Besides that, I already have a good big block of stock in one of Sam Turner's enterprises."

"Oh, yes," she said, puckering her brows. "Are you going to vote your pulp stock with his?"

Mr. Stevens' eyes twinkled, but his tone was conservative gravity itself.

"Well, since it's a purely business deal it would not be a very wise thing to do; and though Sam Turner is a mighty fine boy, I don't think I shall."

"But you will!" she vigorously protested. "Why, father, you wouldn't for a minute vote against your own son-in-law!"

"No, I wouldn't!" declared Mr. Stevens emphatically, and suddenly drew her to him and kissed her; and she clung about his neck half laughing and half crying.

Do you suppose there is anything in telepathy? It would seem so, for it was at this moment that Sam stepped up on the porch. They in the parlor heard his voice, and Mr. Stevens immediately slipped out the back way in order not to be de trop a second time. Now Sam could not possibly have known what had been said in the parlor, and yet when he found his way in there, he and Miss Josephine, without any palaver about it, without exchanging a solitary word, or scarcely even a look, just naturally fell into each other's arms. Neither one of them made the first move. It just somehow happened, and they stood there and held and held and held that embrace; and whatever foolishness they said and did in the next hour is none of your business nor of mine; but later in the evening, when they were sitting quietly in the darkest corner of the porch, and Sam had his hand on the arm of her chair with her elbows resting upon his fingers—it didn't matter, you know, where he touched her, just so he did—she turned to him with thoughtful earnestness in her voice.

"Sam," she said, and this time she used his first name quite consciously and was glad it was dark so that he could not see her trace of shyness, "I wish you would explain to me just what you mean by control in a stock company."

Sam Turner moved his fingers from under her elbow and caught her hand, which he firmly clasped before he began.

"Well, Jo, it's just this way," he said, and then, quite comfortably, he explained to her all about it.



THE END