THE CLAIM JUMPERS

_A ROMANCE_

BY

STEWART EDWARD WHITE

1901

CONTENTS

 CHAPTER

 I. --JIM LESLIE WRITES A LETTER II. --THE STORY-BOOK WEST III. --BENNINGTON HUNTS FOR GOLD AND FINDS A KISS IV. --THE SUN FAIRY V. --THE SPIRIT MOUNTAIN VI. --BENNINGTON AS A MAN OF BUSINESS VII. --THE MEETING AT THE ROCK VIII. --AN ADVENTURE IN THE NIGHT IX. --THE HEAVENS OPENED X. --THE WORLD MADE YOUNG XI. --AND HE DID EAT XII. --OLD MIZZOU RESIGNS XIII. --THE SPIRES OF STONE XIV. --THE PIONEER'S PICNIC XV. --THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN XVI. --A NOON DINNER XVII. --NOBLESSE OBLIGEXVIII. --THE CLAIM JUMPERS XIX. --BENNINGTON PROVES GAME XX. --MASKS OFF XXI. --THE LAND OF VISIONS XXII. --FLOWER O' THE WORLD

CHAPTER I

JIM LESLIE WRITES A LETTER

In a fifth-story sitting room of a New York boarding house four youthswere holding a discussion. The sitting room was large and square, andin the wildest disorder, which was, however, sublimated into a certainsystem by an illuminated device to the effect that one should "Have aPlace for Everything, and then there'll be one Place you won't have tolook. " Easels and artists' materials thrust back to the wallsufficiently advertised the art student, and perhaps explained theuntidiness. 

Two of the occupants of the room, curled up on elevated window ledges, were emitting clouds of tobacco smoke and nursing their knees; theother two, naked to the waist, sat on a couple of ordinary bedroommattresses deposited carefully in the vacant centre of the apartment. They were eager, alert-looking young men, well-muscled, curly of hair, and possessing in common an unabashed carriage of the head which, moreplainly than any mere facial resemblance, proved them brothers. They, too, were nursing their knees. 

"He must be an unadorned ass, " remarked one of the occupants of thewindow seats, in answer to some previous statement. 

"He is not, " categorically denied a youth of the mattresses. "My dearHench, you make no distinctions. I've been talking about the boy'speople and his bringing up and the way he acts, whereupon you fly offon a tangent and coolly conclude things about the boy himself. It isnot only unkind, but stupid. "

Hench laughed. "You amuse me, Jeems, " said he; "elucidate. "

Jeems let go his knees. The upper part of his body, thus deprived ofsupport, fell backward on the mattress. He then clasped his handsbehind his head, and stared at the ceiling. 

"Listen, ye multitude, " he began; "I'm an artist. So are you. I'm alsoa philosopher. You are not. Therefore, I'll deign to instruct you. Bende Laney has a father and a mother. The father is pompous, conceited, and a bore. The mother is pompous, conceited, and a bore. The fatheruses language of whose absolutely vapid correctness Addison would havebeen proud. So does the mother, unless she forgets, in which case theold man calls her down hard. They, are rich and of a good socialposition. The latter worries them, because they have to keep up itsdignity. "

"They succeed, " interrupted the other brother fervently, "they succeed. I dined there once. After that I went around to the waxworks to getcheered up a bit. "

"Quite so, Bertie, " replied the philosopher; "but you interrupted mejust before I got to my point. The poor old creatures had been marriedmany years before Bennie came to cheer _them_ up. Naturally, Bennie hasbeen the whole thing ever since. He is allowed a few privileges, butalways under the best auspices. The rest of the time he stays at home, is told what or what not a gentleman should do, and is instructed inthe genealogy of the de Laneys. "

"The mother is always impressing him with the fact that he is a deLaney on both sides, " interpolated Bert. 

"Important, if true, as the newspapers say, " remarked the other youngman on the window ledge. "What constitutes a de Laney?"

"Hereditary lack of humour, Beck, my boy. Well, the result is that poorBennie is a sort of----" the speaker hesitated for his word. 

"'Willy boy, '" suggested Beck, mildly. 

"Something of the sort, but not exactly. A 'willy boy' never has ideas. Bennie has. "

"Such as?"

"Well, for one thing, he wants to get away. He doesn't seem quitecontent with his job of idle aristocrat. I believe he's been pesteringthe old man to send him West. Old man doesn't approve. "

"'That the fine bloom of culture will become rubbed off in the contactwith rude, rough men, seems to me inevitable, '" mimicked Bert inpedantic tones, "'unless a firm sense of personal dignity and anequally firm sense of our obligations to more refined though absentfriends hedges us about with adequate safeguards. '"

The four laughed. "That's his style, sure enough, " Jim agreed. 

"What does he want to do West?" asked Hench. 

"_He_ doesn't know. Write a book, I believe, or something of that sort. But he _isn't_ an ass. He has a lot of good stuff in him, only it willnever get a chance, fixed the way he is now. "

A silence fell, which was broken at last by Bert. 

"Come, Jeems, " he suggested; "here we've taken up Hench's valuableidea, but are no farther with it. "

"True, " said Jeems. 

He rolled over on his hands and knees. Bert took up a similar positionby his side. 

"Go!" shouted Hench from the window ledge. 

At the word, the two on the mattress turned and grappled each otherfiercely, half rising to their feet in the strenuousness of endeavour. Jeems tried frantically for a half-Nelson. While preventing it the wilyBert awaited his chance for a hammer-lock. In the moment of indecisionas to which would succeed in his charitable design, a knock on the doorput an end to hostilities. The gladiators sat upright and panted. 

A young man stepped bashfully into the room and closed the door behindhim. 

The newcomer was a clean-cut young fellow, of perhaps twenty-two yearsof age, with regular features, brown eyes, straight hair, and sensitivelips. He was exceedingly well-dressed. A moment's pause followed hisappearance. Then:

"Why, it's our old friend, the kid!" cried Jeems. 

"Don't let me interrupt, " begged the youth diffidently. 

"No interruption. End of round one, " panted Jeems. "Glad you came. Bertie, here, was twisting my delicate clavicle most cruelly. KnowHench and Beck there?"

De Laney bowed to the young men in the window, who removed their pipesfrom their mouths and grinned amiably. 

"This, gentlemen, " explained Jeems, without changing his position, "isMr. Bennie de Laney on both sides. It is extremely fortunate for Mr. DeLaney that he is a de Laney on both sides, for otherwise he would belop-sided. "

"You will find a seat, Mr. De Laney, in the adjoining bedroom, " saidthe first, with great politeness; "and if you don't care to go inthere, you will stand yourself in the corner by that easel until theconclusion of this little discussion between Jeems and myself. --Jeems, will you kindly state the merits of the discussion to the gentleman?I'm out of breath. "

Jeems kindly would. 

"Bert and I have, for the last few weeks, been obeying the partingcommands of our dear mother. 'Boys, ' said she, with tears in her eyes, 'Boys, always take care of one another. ' So each evening I have triedto tuck Bertie in his little bed, and Bertie, with equal enthusiasm, has attempted to tuck _me_ in. It has been hard on pyjamas, bedsprings, and the temper of the Lady with the Piano who resides in theapartments immediately beneath; so, at the wise suggestion of ourfriends in the windows"--he waved a graceful hand toward them, and theygravely bowed acknowledgment--"we are now engaged in deciding thematter Grćco-Roman. The winner 'tucks. ' Come on, Bertie. "

The two again took position side by side, on their hands and knees, while Mr. Hench explained to de Laney that this method of beginning thebout was necessary, because the limited area of the mat precludedflying falls. At a signal from Mr. Beck, they turned and grappled, Jeems, by the grace of Providence, on top. In the course of the combatit often happened that the two mattresses would slide apart. Thecontestants, suspending their struggles, would then try to kick themtogether again without releasing the advantage of their holds. Thenoise was beautiful. To de Laney, strong in maternal admonitions as toproper deportment, it was all new and stirring, and quite withoutprecedent. He applauded excitedly, and made as much racket as therest. 

A sudden and vigorous knock for the second time put an end tohostilities. The wrestlers again sat bolt upright on the mattresses, and listened. 

"Gentlemen, " cried an irritated German voice, "there is a ladyschleeping on the next floor!"

"Karl, Karl!" called one of the irrepressibles, "can I never teach youto be accurate! No lady could possibly be sleeping anywhere in thebuilding. "

He arose from the mattress and shook himself. 

"Jeems, " he continued sadly, "the world is against true virtue. Ourdear mother's wishes can not be respected. "

De Laney came out of his corner. 

"Fellows, " he cried with enthusiasm, "I want you to come up and stayall night with me some time, so mother can see that gentlemen can makea noise!"

Bertie sat down suddenly and shrieked. Jeems rolled over and over, clutching small feathers from the mattress in the agony of his delight, while the clothed youths contented themselves with amused but gurglingchuckles. 

"Bennie, my boy, " gasped Jeems, at last, "you'll be the death of me! OLord! O Lord! You unfortunate infant! You shall come here and have adrum to pound; yes, you shall. " He tottered weakly to his feet. "Come, Bertie, let us go get dressed. "

The two disappeared into the bedroom, leaving de Laney uncomfortablyalone with the occupants of the window ledge. 

The young fellow walked awkwardly across the room and sat down on apartly empty chair, not because he preferred sitting to standing, butin order to give himself time to recover from his embarrassment. 

The sort of chaffing to which he had just been subjected was direct andbrutal; it touched all his tender spots--the very spots wherein herealized the intensest soreness of his deficiencies, and about which, therefore, he was the most sensitive--yet, somehow, he liked it. Thiswas because the Leslie boys meant to him everything free and young thathe had missed in the precise atmosphere of his own home, and so headmired them and stood in delightful inferiority to them in spite ofhis wealth and position. He would have given anything he owned to havefelt himself one of their sort; but, failing that, the next best thingwas to possess their intimacy. Of this intimacy chaffing was a gauge. Bennington Clarence de Laney always glowed at heart when they rubbedhis fur the wrong way, for it showed that they felt they knew him wellenough to do so. And in this there was something just a littlepathetic. 

Bennington held to the society standpoint with men, so he thought hemust keep up a conversation. He did so. It was laboured. Benningtonthought of things to say about Art, the Theatre, and Books. Hench andBeck looked at each other from time to time. 

Finally the door opened, and, to the relief of all, two sweatered andwhite-ducked individuals appeared. 

"And now, Jeems, we'll smoke the pipe of peace, " suggested Bert, divingfor the mantel and the pipe rack. 

"Correct, my boy, " responded Jeems, doing likewise. They lit up, andturned with simultaneous interest to their latest caller. 

"And how is the proud plutocrat?" inquired Bert; "and how did hecontrive to get leave to visit us rude and vulgar persons?"

The Leslies had called at the de Laneys', and, as Bert said, had dinedthere once. They recognised their status, and rejoiced therein. 

"He is calling on the minister, " explained Jeems for him. "Bennington, my son, you'll get caught at that some day, as sure as shooting. Ifyour mamma ever found out that, instead of talking society-religion toold Garnett, you were revelling in this awful dissipation, you'd haveto go abroad again. "

"What did you call him?" inquired Bert. 

"Call who?"

"Him--Bennie--what was that full name?"

"Bennington. "

"Great Scott! and here I've been thinking all the time he was plainBenjamin! Tell us about it, my boy. What is it? It sounds like a battleof the Revolution. _Is_ it a battle of the Revolution? Just to thinkthat all this time we have been entertaining unawares a real livebattle!"

De Laney grinned, half-embarrassed as usual. 

"It's a family name, " said he. "It's the name of an ancestor. "

He never knew whether or not these vivacious youths really desired thevaried information they demanded. 

The Leslies looked upon him with awe. 

"You don't mean to tell me, " said Bertie, "that you are a Bennington!Well, well! This is a small world! We will celebrate the discovery. " Hewalked to the door and touched a bell five times. "Beautiful system, "he explained. "In a moment Karl will appear with five beers. Thisarrangement is possible because never, in any circumstances, do we ringfor anything but beer. "

The beer came. Two steins, two glasses, and a carefully scrubbedshaving mug were pressed into service. After the excitement of findingall these things had died, and the five men were grouped about theplace in ungraceful but comfortable attitudes, Bennington bid for thesympathy he had sought in this visit. 

"Fellows, " said he, "I've something to tell you. "

"Let her flicker, " said Jim. 

"I'm going away next week. It's all settled. "

"Bar Harbour, Trouville, Paris, or Berlin?"

"None of them. I'm going West. "

"Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, San Diego, or Monterey?"

"None of them. I'm going to the real West. I'm going to a mining camp. "

The Leslies straightened their backbones. 

"Don't spring things on us that way, " reproved Bertie severely; "you'llgive us heart disease. Now repeat softly. "

"I am going to a mining camp, " obeyed Bennington, a littleshamefacedly. 

"With whom?"

"Alone. "

This time the Leslies sprang quite to their feet. 

"By the Great Horn Spoon, man!" cried Jim. "Alone! No chaperon! GoodLord!"

"Yes, " said Bennington, "I've always wanted to go West. I want towrite, and I'm sure, in that great, free country, I'll get a chance fordevelopment. I had to work hard to induce father and mother to consent, but it's done now, and I leave next week. Father procured me a positionout there in one of the camps. I'm to be local treasurer, or somethinglike that; I'm not quite sure, you see, for I haven't talked withBishop yet. I go to his office for directions to-morrow. "

At the mention of Bishop the Leslies glanced at each other behind theyoung man's back. 

"Bishop?" repeated Jim. "Where's your job located?"

"In the Black Hills of South Dakota, somewhere near a little placecalled Spanish Gulch. "

This time the Leslies winked at each other. 

"It's a nice country, " commented Bert vaguely; "I've been there. "

"Oh, have you?" cried the young man. "What's it like?"

"Hills, pines, log houses, good hunting--oh, it's Western enough. "

A clock struck in a church tower outside. In spite of himself, Bennington started. 

"Better run along home, " laughed Jim; "your mamma will be angry. "

To prove that this consideration carried no weight, Bennington stayedten minutes longer. Then he descended the five flights of stairsdeliberately enough, but once out of earshot of his friends, he ranseveral blocks. Before going into the house he took off his shoes. Inspite of the precaution, his mother called to him as he passed herroom. It was half past ten. 

Beck and Hench kicked de Laney's chair aside, and drew up morecomfortably before the fire; but James would have none of it. He seemedto be excited. 

"No, " he vetoed decidedly. "You fellows have got to get out! I've gotsomething to do, and I can't be bothered. "

The visitors grumbled. "There's true hospitality for you, " objectedthey; "turn your best friends out into the cold world! I like that!"

"Sorry, boys, " insisted James, unmoved. "Got an inspiration. Get out!Vamoose!"

They went, grumbling loudly down the length of the stairs, to thedisgust of the Lady with the Piano on the floor below. 

"What're you up to, anyway, Jimmie?" inquired the brother with somecuriosity. 

James had swept a space clear on the table, and was arranging somestationery. 

"Don't you care, " he replied; "you just sit down and read your littleOmar for a while. "

He plunged into the labours of composition, and Bert sat smokingmeditatively. After some moments the writer passed a letter over to thesmoker. 

"Think it'll do?" he inquired. 

Bert read the letter through carefully. 

"Jeems, " said he, after due deliberation, "Jeems, you're a bloominggenius. "

James stamped the envelope. 

"I'll mail it for you when I go out in the morning, " Bert suggested. 

"Not on your daily bread, sonny. It is posted now by my own hand. Wewon't take any chances on _this_ layout, and that I can tell you. "

He tramped down four flights and to the corner, although it wasmidnight and bitter cold. Then, with a seraphic grin on hiscountenance, he went to bed and slept the sleep of the just. 

The envelope was addressed to a Mr. James Fay, Spanish Gulch, SouthDakota. 

CHAPTER II

THE STORY-BOOK WEST

When a man is twenty-one, and has had no experience, and graduates froma small college where he roomed alone in splendour, and possesses agift of words and a certain delight in reading, and is thrown into newand, to him, romantic surroundings--when all these stars of chancecross their orbits, he begins to write a novel. The novel never hasanything to do with the aforesaid new and romantic surroundings;neither has it the faintest connection with anything the author hasever seen. That would limit his imagination. 

Once he was well settled in his new home, and the first excitement ofnovel impressions had worn off, Bennington de Laney began to writeregularly three hours a day. He did his scribbling with a fountain pen, on typewriter paper, and left a broad right-hand margin, just as he hadseen Brooks do. In it he experienced, above all, a delightful feelingof power. He enjoyed to the full his ability to swing gorgeous involvedsentences, phrase after phrase, down the long arc of rhetoric, withouta pause, without a quiver, until they rushed unhasting up the otherslope to end in beautiful words, polysyllabic, but with just the rightnumber of syllables. Interspersed were short sentences. He counted thewords in one or the other of these two sorts, carefully noting therelations they bore to each other. On occasions he despaired becausethey did not bear the right relations. And he also dragged out, squirming, the Anglo-Saxon and Latin derivations, and set them up in arow that he might observe their respective numbers. He was uneasilyconscious that he ought, in the dread of college anathema, to use theformer, but he loved the many-syllabled crash or modulated music of thelatter. Also, there was the question of getting variety into hisparagraph lengths. It was all excellent practice. 

And yet this technique, absorbing as it was, counted as nothing incomparison with the subject-matter. 

The method was talent; the subject-matter was Genius; and Genius hadevolved an Idea which no one had ever thought of before--somethingbrand new under the sun. It goes without saying that the Ideasymbolized a great Truth. One department, the more impersonal, ofBennington's critical faculty, assured him that the Idea would takerank with the Ideas of Plato and Emerson. Emerson, Benningtonworshipped. Plato he also worshipped--because Emerson told him to. Hehad never read Plato himself. The other, the more personal and modest, however, had perforce to doubt this, not because it doubted the Idea, but because Bennington was not naturally conceited. 

To settle the discrepancy he began to write. He laid the scene inArabia and decided to call it _Aliris: A Romance of all Time_, becausehe liked the smooth, easy flow of the syllables. 

The consciousness that he could do all this sugar-coated his WildWestern experiences, which otherwise might have been a littledisagreeable. He could comfort himself with the reflection that he wassuperior, if ridiculous. 

In spots, he was certainly the latter. The locality into which hisdestinies had led him lay in the tumultuous centre of the Hills, aboutthirty miles from Custer and ten from Hill City. Spanish Gulch wasthree miles down the draw. The Holy Smoke mine, to which Bennington wasaccredited, he found to consist of a hole in the ground, of unsoundeddepth, two log structures, and a chicken coop. The log structuresresembled those he had read about. In one of them lived Arthur and hiswife. The wife did the cooking. Arthur did nothing at all but sit inthe shade and smoke a pipe, and this in spite of the fact that he didnot look like a loafer. He had no official connection with the place, except that of husband to Mrs. Arthur. The other member of thecommunity was Davidson, alias Old Mizzou. 

The latter was cordial and voluble. As he was blessed with a long whitebeard of the patriarchal type, he inspired confidence. He usedexclusively the present tense and chewed tobacco. He also playedinterminable cribbage. Likewise he talked. The latter was his strongpoint. Bennington found that within two days of his arrival he knew allabout the company's business without having proved the necessity ofstirring foot on his own behalf. The claims were not worth much, according to Old Mizzou. The company had been cheated. They would findit out some day. None of the ore assayed very high. For his part he didnot see why they even did assessment work. Bennington was to look afterthe latter? All in good time. You know you had until the end of theyear to do it. What else was there to do? Nothing much; The presentholders had come into the property on a foreclosed mortgage, andweren't doing anything to develop it yet. Did Bennington know of theirplans? No? Well, it looked as though the two of them were to have apretty easy time of it, didn't it?

Old Mizzou tried, by adroit questioning, to find out just why de Laneyhad been sent West. There was, in reality, not enough to keep one manbusy, and surely Old Mizzou considered himself quite competent toattend to that. Finally, he concluded that it must be to watchhim--Old Mizzou. Acting on that supposition, he tried a new tack. 

For two delicious hours he showed up, to his own satisfaction, Bennington's ignorance of mining. That was an easy enough task. Bennington did not even know what country-rock was. All he succeeded ineliciting confirmed him in the impression that de Laney was sent to spyon him. But why de Laney? Old Mizzou wagged his gray beard. And why spyon him? What could the company want to know? He gave it up. One thingalone was clear: this young man's understanding of his duties was verysimple. Bennington imagined he was expected to see certain assessmentwork done (whatever that was), and was to find out what he could aboutthe value of the property. 

As a matter of sedulously concealed truth, he was really expected to donothing at all. The place had been made for him through Mr. De Laney'sinfluence, because he wanted to go West. 

"Now, my boy, " Bishop, the mining capitalist, had said, whenBennington had visited him in his New York office, "do you knowanything about mining?"

"No, sir, " Bennington replied. 

"Well, that doesn't matter much. We don't expect to do anything in theway of development. The case, briefly, is this: We've bought thisbusted proposition of the people who were handling it, and have assumedtheir debt. They didn't run it right. They had a sort of a wildcatindividual in charge of the thing, and he got contracts for sinkingshafts with all the turtlebacks out there, and then didn't pay forthem. Now, what we want you to do is this: First of all, you're to takecharge financially at that end of the line. That means paying the localdebts as we send you the money, and looking after whatever expendituresmay become necessary. Then you'll have to attend to the assessmentwork. Do you know what assessment work is?"

"No, sir. "

"Well, in order to hold the various claims legally, the owners have todo one hundred dollars' worth of work a year on each claim. If thework isn't done, the claims can be 'jumped. ' You'll have to hire themen, buy the supplies, and see that the full amount is done. We have aman out there named Davidson. You can rely on him, and he'll help youout in all practical matters. He's a good enough practical miner, buthe's useless in bossing a job or handling money. Between you, you oughtto get along. "

"I'll try, anyway. "

"That's right. Then, another thing. You can put in your spare timeinvestigating what the thing is worth. I don't expect much from you inthat respect, for you haven't had enough experience; but do the bestyou can. It'll be good practice, anyway. Hunt up Davidson; go over allthe claims; find out how the lead runs, and how it holds out; getsamples and ship them to me; investigate everything you can, and don'tbe afraid to write when you're stuck. "

In other words, Bennington was to hold the ends of the reins while someone else drove. But he did not know that. He felt his responsibility. 

As to the assessment work, Old Mizzou had already assured him there wasno immediate hurry; men were cheaper in the fall. As to investigating, he started in on that at once. He and Davidson climbed down shafts, andbroke off ore, and worked the gold pan. It was fun. 

In the morning Bennington decided to work from seven until ten on_Aliris_. Then for three hours he and Old Mizzou prospected. In theafternoon the young man took a vacation and hunted Wild Westernadventures. 

It may as well be remarked here that Bennington knew all about the Westbefore he left home. Until this excursion he had never even crossed theAlleghanies, but he thought he appreciated the conditions thoroughly. This was because he was young. He could close his eyes and see thecowboys scouring the plain. As a parenthesis it should be noted thatcowboys always scour the plain, just as sailors always scan thehorizon. He knew how the cowboys looked, because he had seen BuffaloBill's show; and he knew how they talked, because he had read accurateauthors of the school of Bret Harte. He could even imagine theromantic mountain maidens. 

With his preconceived notions the country, in most particulars, talliedinterestingly. At first Bennington frequented the little town down thedraw. It answered fairly well to the story-book descriptions, butproved a bit lively for him. The first day they lent him a horse. Thehorse looked sleepy. It took him twenty minutes to get on the animaland twenty seconds to fall off. There was an audience. They made himpurchase strange drinks at outlandish prices. After that they shotholes all around his feet to induce him to dance. He had inherited anobstinate streak from some of his forebears, and declined when it wentthat far. They then did other things to him which were not pleasant. Most of these pranks seemed to have been instigated by a laughing, curly-haired young man named Fay. Fay had clear blue eyes, which seemedalways to mock you. He could think up more diabolical schemes in tenminutes than the rest of the men in as many hours. Bennington cameshortly to hate this man Fay. His attentions had so much of thegratuitous! For a number of days, even after the enjoyment of noveltyhad worn off, the Easterner returned bravely to Spanish Gulch everyafternoon for the mail. It was a matter of pride with him. He did notlike to be bluffed out. But Fay was always there. 

"Tender _foot!_" the latter would shriek joyously, and bear down on theshrinking de Laney. 

That would bring out the loafers. It all had to happen over again. 

Bennington hoped that this performance would cease in time. It neverdid. 

By a mental process, unnecessary to trace here, he modified his firstviews, and permitted Old Mizzou to get the mail. Spanish Gulch saw himno more. 

After all, it was quite as good Western experience to wander in thehills. He did not regret the other. In fact, as he cast in review hisresearch in Wild West literature, he perceived that the incidents ofhis town visits were the proper thing. He would not have had themdifferent--to look back on. They were inspiring--to write home about. He recognised all the types--the miner, the gambler, thesaloon-keeper, the bad man, the cowboy, the prospector--just as thoughthey had stepped living from the pages of his classics. They had thetrue slouch; they used the picturesque language. The log cabins squaredwith his ideas. The broncos even exceeded them. 

But now he had seen it all. There is no sense in draining an agreeablecup to satiety. He was quite content to enjoy his rambles in the hills, like the healthy youngster he was. But had he seen it all? Onreflection, he acknowledged he could not make this statement to himselfwith a full consciousness of sincerity. One thing was lacking from thepreconceived picture his imagination had drawn. There had been noMountain Flowers. By that he meant girls. 

Every one knows what a Western girl is. She is a beautiful creature, always, with clear, tanned skin, bright eyes, and curly hair. She wearsa Tam o' Shanter. She rides a horse. Also, she talks deliciously, in asilver voice, about "old pards. " Altogether a charming vision--inbooks. 

This vision Bennington had not yet realized. The rest of the West cameup to specifications, but this one essential failed. In Spanish Gulchhe had, to be sure, encountered a number of girls. But they werered-handed, big-boned, freckled-faced, rough-skinned, and there wasn'ta Tam o' Shanter in the lot. Plainly servants, Bennington thought. TheMountain Flower must have gone on a visit. Come to think of it, therenever was more than one Mountain Flower to a town. 

CHAPTER III

BENNINGTON HUNTS FOR GOLD AND FINDS A KISS

One day Old Mizzou brought him a blue-print map. 

"This y'ar map, " said he, spreading it out under his stubby fingers, "shows the deestrict. I gets it of Fay, so you gains an idee of th' layof the land a whole lot. Them claims marked with a crost belongs to th'Company. You kin take her and explore. "

This struck Bennington as an excellent idea. He sat down at the tableand counted the crosses. There were fourteen of them. The differentlodes were laid off in mathematically exact rectangles, running in manydirections. A few joined one another, but most lay isolated. Theirrelative positions were a trifle confusing at first, but, after alittle earnest study, Bennington thought he understood them. He couldstart with the Holy Smoke, just outside the door. The John Logan laybeyond, at an obtuse angle. Then a jump of a hundred yards or so to thesouthwest would bring him to the Crazy Horse. This he resolved tolocate, for it was said to be on the same "lode" as a big strike someone had recently made. He picked up his rifle and set out. 

Now, a blue-print map maker has undoubtedly accurate ideas as to pointsof the compass, and faultless proficiency in depicting bird's-eyeviews, but he neglects entirely the putting in of various ups and down, slants and windings of the country, which apparently twist the northpole around to the east-south-east. You start due west on a bee line, according to directions; after about ten feet you scramble over afallen tree, skirt a boulder, dip into a ravine, and climb a ledge. Your starting point is out of sight behind you; your destination is, Heaven knows where, in front. By the time you have walked six thousandactual feet, which is as near as you can guess to fifteen hundredtheoretical level ones, your little blazed stake in a pile of stones islikely to be almost anywhere within a liberal quarter of a mile. Thenit is guess-work. If the hill is pretty thickly staked out, the chasebecomes exciting. In the middle distance you see a post. You clambereagerly to it, only to find that it marks your neighbour's claim. Youhave lost your standpoint of a moment ago, and must start afresh. In anhour's time you have discovered every stake on the hill but the one youwant. In two hours' time you are staggering homeward a gibbering idiot. Then you are brought back to profane sanity by falling at full lengthover the very object of your search. 

Bennington was treated to full measure of this experience. He found theJohn Logan lode without much difficulty, and followed its length withless, for the simple reason that its course lay over the round brow ofa hill bare of trees. He also discovered the "Northeast Corner of theCrazy Horse Lode" plainly marked on the white surface of a pine stakebraced upright in a pile of rocks. Thence he confidently paced south, and found nothing. Next trip he came across pencilled directionsconcerning the "Miner's Dream Lode. " The time after he ran against the"Golden Ball" and the "Golden Chain Lodes. " Bennington reflected; hismind was becoming a little heated. 

"It's because I went around those ledges and boulders, " he said tohimself; "I got off the straight line. This time I'll take the straightline and keep it. "

So he addressed himself to the surmounting of obstructions. Work ofthat sort is not easy. At one point he lost his hold on a broad, steeprock, and slid ungracefully to the foot of it, his elbows diggingfrantically into the moss, and his legs straddled apart. As he struckbottom, he imagined he heard a most delicious little laugh. So real wasthe illusion that he gripped two handfuls of moss and looked aboutsharply, but of course saw nothing. The laugh was repeated. 

He looked again, and so became aware of a Vision in pink, standing justin front of a big pine above him on the hill and surveying him withmischievous eyes. 

Surprise froze him, his legs straddled, his hat on one side, his mouthopen. The Vision began to pick its way down the hill, eyeing him thewhile. 

That dancing scrutiny seemed to mesmerize him. He was enchanted toperfect stillness, but he was graciously permitted to take in theparticulars of the girl's appearance. She was dainty. Every posture ofher slight figure was of an airy grace, as light and delicate as thatof a rose tendril swaying in the wind. Even when she tripped over aloose rock, she caught her balance again with a pretty little uplift ofthe hand. As she approached, slowly, and evidently not unwilling toallow her charms full time in which to work, Bennington could see thather face was delicately made; but as to the details he could not judgeclearly because of her mischievous eyes. They were large and wide andclear, and of a most peculiar colour--a purple-violet, of the shade onesometimes finds in flowers, but only in the flowers of a deep and shadywood. In this wonderful colour--which seemed to borrow the richness ofits hue rather from its depth than from any pigment of its own, just asbeyond soundings the ocean changes from green to blue--an hundred moodsseem to rise slowly from within, to swim visible, even though the mereexpression of her face gave no sign of them. For instance, at thepresent moment her features were composed to the utmost gravity. Yet inher eyes bubbled gaiety and fun, as successive up-swellings of aspring; or, rather, as the riffles of sunlight and wind, or thepictured flight of birds across a pool whose surface alone is stirred. 

Bennington realized suddenly, with overwhelming fervency, that hepreferred to slide in solitude. 

The Vision in the starched pink gingham now poised above him like ahumming-bird over a flower. From behind her back she withdrew one hand. In the hand was the missing claim stake. 

"Is this what you are looking for?" she inquired demurely. 

The mesmeric spell broke, and Bennington was permitted to babbleincoherencies. 

She stamped her foot. 

"Is this what you're looking for?" she persisted. 

Bennington's chaos had not yet crystallized to relevancy. 

"Wh-where did you get it?" he stammered again. 

"IS THIS WHAT YOU'RE LOOKING FOR?" she demanded in very large capitals. 

The young man regained control of his faculties with an effort. 

"Yes, it is!" he rejoined sharply; and then, with the instinct thatbids us appreciate the extent of our relief by passing an annoyancealong, "Don't you know it's a penal offence to disturb claim stakes?"

He had suddenly discovered that he preferred to find claim stakes onclaims. 

The Vision's eyes opened wider. 

"It must be nice to know so much!" said she, in reverent admiration. 

Bennington flushed. As a de Laney, the girls he had known had alwaystaken him seriously. He disliked being made fun of. 

"This is nonsense, " he objected, with some impatience. "I must knowwhere it came from. "

In the background of his consciousness still whirled the moil of hiswonder and bewilderment. He clung to the claim stake as a stableobject. 

The Vision looked straight at him without winking, and those wonderfuleyes filled with tears. Yet underneath their mist seemed to sparklelittle points of light, as wavelets through a vapour which veils thesurface of the sea. Bennington became conscious-stricken because of thetears, and still he owned an uneasy suspicion that they were not real. 

"I'm so sorry!" she said contritely, after a moment; "I thought I washelping you so much! I found that stake just streaking it over the topof the hill. It had got loose and was running away. " The mist hadcleared up very suddenly, and the light-tipped sparkles of fun werechasing each other rapidly, as though impelled by a lively breeze. "Ithought you'd be ever so grateful, and, instead of that, you scold me!I don't believe I like you a bit!"

She looked him over reflectively, as though making up her mind. 

Bennington laughed outright, and scrambled to his feet. "You areabsolutely incorrigible!" he exclaimed, to cover his confusion at hischange of face. 

Her eyes fairly danced. 

"Oh, what a _lovely_ word!" she cried rapturously. "What _does_ itmean? Something nice, or I'm sure you wouldn't have said it about me. _Would_ you?" The eyes suddenly became grave. "Oh, please tell me!" shebegged appealingly. 

Bennington was thrown into confusion at this, for he did not knowwhether she was serious or not. He could do nothing but stammer and getred, and think what a ridiculous ass he was making of himself. He mighthave considered the help he was getting in that. 

"Well, then, you needn't, " she conceded, magnanimously, after a moment. "Only, you ought not to say things about girls that you don't dare tellthem in plain language. If you will say nice things about me, you mightas well say them so I can understand them; only, I do think it's alittle early in our acquaintance. "

This cast Bennington still more in perplexity. He had apretty-well-defined notion that he was being ridiculed, but concerningthis, just a last grain of doubt remained. She rattled on. 

"Well!" said she impatiently, "why don't you say something? Why don'tyou take this stick? I don't want it. Men are so stupid!"

That last remark has been made many, many times, and yet it never failsof its effect, which is at once to invest the speaker with daintinessindescribable, and to thrust the man addressed into nether inferiority. Bennington fell to its charm. He took the stake. 

"Where does it belong?" he asked. 

She pointed silently to a pile of stones. He deposited the stake in itsproper place, and returned to find her seated on the ground, plucking ahandful of the leaves of a little erect herb that grew abundantly inthe hollow. These she rubbed together and held to her face inside thesunbonnet. 

"Who are you, anyway?" asked Bennington abruptly, as he returned. 

"D' you ever see this before?" she inquired irrelevantly, looking upwith her eyes as she leaned over the handful. "Good for colds. Makesyour nose feel all funny and prickly. "

She turned her hands over and began to drop the leaves one by one. Bennington caught himself watching her with fascinated interest insilence. He began to find this one of her most potent charms--thefaculty of translating into a grace so exquisite as almost to realizethe fabled poetry of motion, the least shrug of her shoulders, thesmallest crook of her finger, the slightest toss of her small, well-balanced head. She looked up. 

"Want to smell?" she inquired, and held out her hands with a prettygesture. 

Not knowing what else to do, Bennington stepped forward obediently andstooped over. The two little palms held a single crushed bit of theherb in their cup. They were soft, pink little palms, all wrinkled, like crumpled rose leaves. Bennington stooped to smell the herb;instead, he kissed the palms. 

The girl sprang to her feet with one indignant motion and faced him. The eyes now flashed blue flame, and Bennington for the first timenoticed what had escaped him before--that the forehead was broad andthoughtful, and that above it the hair, instead of being blonde andcurly and sparkling with golden radiance, was of a peculiar wavy brownthat seemed sometimes full of light and sometimes lustreless and black, according as it caught the direct rays of the sun or not. Then heappreciated his offence. 

"Sir!" she exclaimed, and turned away with a haughty shoulder. 

"And we've never been introduced!" she said, half to herself, but herface was now concealed, so that Bennington could not see she laughed. She marched stiffly down the hill. Bennington turned to follow her, although the action was entirely mechanical, and he had no definiteidea in doing so. 

"Don't you dare, sir!" she cried. 

So he did not dare. 

This vexed her for a moment. Then, having gone quite out of sight, shesank down and laughed until the tears ran down her cheeks. 

"I didn't think he knew enough!" she said, with a final hystericalchuckle. 

This first impression of the Mountain Flower, Bennington would havebeen willing to acknowledge, was quite complicated enough, but he wasdestined to further surprises. 

When he returned to the Holy Smoke camp he found Old Mizzou in earnestconversation with a peculiar-looking stranger, whose hand he waspromptly requested to shake. 

The stranger was a tall, scraggly individual, dressed in the usualflannel shirt and blue jeans, the latter tucked into rusty cowhideboots. Bennington was interested in him because he was so phenomenallyugly. From the collar of his shirt projected a lean, sinewy neck, onwhich the too-abundant skin rolled and wrinkled in a dark red, wind-roughened manner particularly disagreeable to behold. The necksupported a small head. The face was wizened and tanned to a darkmahogany colour. It was ornamented with a grizzled goatee. 

The man smoked a stub pipe. His remarks were emphasized by the gesturesof a huge and gnarled pair of hands. 

"Mr. Lawton is from Old Mizzou, too, afore he moved to Illinoy, "commented Davidson. One became aware, from the loving tones in whichhe pronounced the two words, whence he derived his sobriquet. 

Lawton expressed the opinion that Chillicothe, of that State, was thefinest town on top of earth. 

Bennington presumed it might be, and then opportunely bethought him ofa bottle of Canadian Club, which, among other necessary articles, hehad brought with him from New York. This he produced. The oldMissourians brightened; Davidson went into the cabin after glasses anda corkscrew. He found the corkscrew all right, but apparently had somedifficulty in regard to the glasses. They could hear him callingvociferously for Mrs. Arthur. Mrs. Arthur had gone to the spring forwater. In a few moments Old Mizzou appeared in the doorway exceedinglyred of face. 

"Consarn them women folks!" he grumbled, depositing the tin cups on theporch. "They locks up an' conceals things most damnable. Ain't atumbler in th' place. "

"These yar is all right, " assured Lawton consolingly, picking up one ofthe cups and examining the bottom of it with great care. 

"I reckon they'll hold the likker, anyhow, " agreed Davidson. 

They passed the bottle politely to de Laney, and the latter helpedhimself. For his part, he was glad the tin cups had been necessary, forit enabled him to conceal the smallness of his dose. Lawton filled hisown up to the brim; Davidson followed suit. 

"Here's how!" observed the latter, and the two old turtlebacks drankthe raw whisky down, near a half pint of it, as though it had been somuch milk. 

Bennington fairly gasped with astonishment. "Don't you ever take anywater?" he asked. 

They turned slowly. Old Mizzou looked him in the eye with glimmeringreproach. 

"Not, if th' whisky's good, sonny, " said he impressively. 

"Wall, " commented Lawton, after a pause, "that is a good drink. ReckonI must be goin'. "

"Stay t' grub!" urged Old Mizzou heartily. 

"Folks waitin'. Remember!"

They looked at Bennington and chuckled a little, to that young man'sdiscomfort. 

"Lawton's a damn fine fella', " said Old Mizzou with emphasis. Bennington thought, with a shudder, of the loose-skinned, turkey-redneck, and was silent. 

After supper Bennington and Old Mizzou played cribbage by the light ofa kerosene lamp. 

"While I was hunting claims this afternoon, " said the Easternersuddenly, "I ran across a mighty pretty girl. "

"Yas?" observed Old Mizzou with indifference. "What fer a gal was it?"

"She didn't look as if she belonged around here. She was a slendergirl, very pretty, with a pink dress on. "

"Ain't no female strangers yar-abouts. Blue eyes?"

"Yes. "

"An' ha'r that sometimes looks black an' sometimes yaller-brown?"

"Yes, that's the one all right. Who is she?"

"Oh, that!" said Old Mizzou with slight interest, "that's BillLawton's girl. Live's down th' gulch. He's th' fella' that was yarafore grub, " he explained. 

For a full minute Bennington stared at the cards in his hand. Thepatriarch became impatient. 

"Yore play, sonny, " he suggested. 

"I don't believe you know the one I mean, " returned Bennington slowly. "She's a girl with a little mouth and a nose that is tipped up just atrifle----"

"Snub!" interrupted Old Mizzou, with some impatience. "Yas, I knows. Same critter. Only one like her in th' Hills. Sasshays all over th'scenery, an' don't do nothin' but sit on rocks. "

"So she's the daughter of that man!" said Bennington, still moreslowly. 

"Wall, so Mis' Lawton sez, " chuckled Mizzou. 

That night Bennington lay awake for some time. He had discovered theMountain Flower; the story-book West was complete at last. But he hadoffended his discovery. What was the etiquette in such a case? BackEast he would have felt called upon to apologize for being rude. Then, at the thought of apologizing to a daughter of that turkey-necked oldwhisky-guzzler he had to laugh. 

CHAPTER IV

THE SUN FAIRY

The next afternoon, after the day's writing and prospecting werefinished, Bennington resolved to go deer hunting. He had skippedthirteen chapters of his work to describe the heroine, Rhoda. She hadwonderful eyes, and was, I believe, dressed in a garment whose colourwas pink. 

"Keep yore moccasins greased, " Old Mizzou advised at parting; by whichhe meant that the young man was to step softly. 

This he found to be difficult. His course lay along the top of theridge where the obstructions were many. There were outcrops, boulders, ravines, broken twigs, old leaves, and dikes, all of which had to besurmounted or avoided. They were all aggravating, but the dikespossessed some intellectual interest which the others lacked. 

A dike, be it understood, is a hole in the earth made visible. That isto say, in old days, when mountains were much loftier than they arenow, various agencies brought it to pass that they split and crackedand yawned down to the innermost cores of their being in such hideousfashion that chasms and holes of great depth and perpendicularity wereopened in them. Thereupon the interior fires were released, and these, vomiting up a vast supply of molten material, filled said chasms andholes to the very brim. The molten material cooled into fire-hardenedrock. The rains descended and the snows melted. Under their erosiveinfluence the original mountains were cut down somewhat, but theerstwhile molten material, being, as we have said, fire-hardened, wasted very little, or not at all, and, as a consequence, stands forthabove its present surroundings in exact mould of the ancient cracks orholes. 

Now, some dikes are long and narrow, others are short and wide, andstill others are nearly round. All, however, are highest points, and, head and shoulders above the trees, look abroad over the land. 

When Bennington came to one of these dikes he was forced to pick hisway carefully in a detour around its base. Between times he foundhobnails much inclined to click against unforeseen stones. The brokentwig came to possess other than literary importance. After a little hisnerves asserted themselves. Unconsciously he relaxed his attention andbegan to think. 

The subject of his thoughts was the girl he had seen just twenty-fourhours before. He caught himself remembering little things he had notconsciously noticed at the time, as, for instance, the strange contrastbetween the mischief in her eyes and the austerity of her brow, or thequeer little fashion she had of winking rapidly four or five times, andthen opening her eyes wide and looking straight into the depths of hisown. He considered it quite a coincidence that he had unconsciouslyreturned to the spot on which they had met the day before--the richCrazy Horse lode. 

As though in answer to his recognition of this fact, her voice suddenlycalled to him from above. 

"Hullo, little boy!" it cried. 

He felt at once that he was pleased at the encounter. 

"Hullo!" he answered; "where are you?"

"Right here. "

He looked up, and then still up, until, at the flat top of thecastellated dike that stood over him, he caught a gleam of pink. Thecontrast between it, the blue of the sky, and the dark green of thetrees, was most beautiful and unusual. Nature rarely uses pink, exceptin sunsets and in flowers. Bennington thought pleasedly how everyimpression this girl made upon him was one of grace or beauty or brightcolour. The gleam of pink disappeared, and a great pine cone, heavywith pitch, came buzzing through the air to fall at his feet. 

"That's to show you where I am, " came the clear voice. "You ought tofeel honoured. I've only three cones left. "

The dike before which Bennington had paused was one of the roundvariety. It rose perhaps twenty feet above the _débris_ at its base, sheer, gray, its surface almost intact except for an insignificantnumber of frost fissures. From its base the hill fell rapidly, so that, even from his own inferior elevation, he was enabled to look over thetops of trees standing but a few rods away from him. He could see thatthe summit of this dike was probably nearly flat, and he surmised that, once up there, one would become master of a pretty enough littleplateau on which to sit; but his careful circumvallation could discoverno possible method of ascent. The walls afforded no chance for asquirrel's foothold even. He began to doubt whether he had guessedaright as to the girl's whereabouts, and began carefully to examine thetops of the trees. Discovering nothing in them, he cast another puzzledglance at the top of the dike. A pair of violet eyes was scrutinizinghim gravely over the edge of it. 

"How in the world did you get up there?" he cried. 

"Flew, " she explained, with great succinctness. 

"Look out you don't fall, " he warned hastily; her attitude wasalarming. 

"I am lying flat, " said she, "and I can't fall. "

"You haven't told me how you got up. I want to come up, too. "

"How do you know I want you?"

"I have such a lot of things to say!" cried Bennington, rather at aloss for a valid reason, but feeling the necessity keenly. 

"Well, sit down and say them. There's a big flat rock just behind you. "

This did not suit him in the least. "I wish you'd let me up, " he beggedpetulantly. "I can't say what I want from here. "

"I can hear you quite well. You'll have to talk from there, or elsekeep still. "

"That isn't fair!" persisted the young man, adopting a tone ofargument. "You're a girl----"

"Stop there! You are wrong to start with. Did you think that a creaturewho could fly to the tops of the rocks was a mere girl? Not at all. "

"What do you mean?" asked the easily bewildered Bennington. 

"What I say. I'm not a girl. "

"What are you then?"

"A sun fairy. "

"A sun fairy?"

"Yes; a real live one. See that cloud over toward the sun? The nicedowny one, I mean. That's my couch. I sleep on it all night. I've gotit near the sun so that it will warm up, you see. "

"I see, " cried Bennington. He could recognise foolery--provided it wereticketed plainly enough. He sat down on the flat rock before indicated, and clasped his knee with his hands, prepared to enjoy more. "Is thatyour throne up there, Sun Fairy?" he asked. She had withdrawn her headfrom sight. 

"It is, " her voice came down to him in grave tones. 

"It must be a very nice one. "

"The nicest throne you ever saw. "

"I never saw one, but I've often heard that thrones were unpleasantthings. "

"I am sitting, foolish mortal, " said she, in tones of deepcommiseration, "on a soft, thick cushion of moss--much morecomfortable, I imagine, than hard, flat rocks. And the nice warm sunis shining on me--it must be rather chilly in the woods to-day. Andthere is a breeze blowing from the Big Horn--old rocks are always dampand stuffy in the shade. And I am looking away out over the Hills--Ihope some people enjoy the sight of piles of quartzite. "

"Cruel sun fairy!" cried Bennington. "Why do you tantalize me so withthe delights from which you debar me? What have I done?"

There was a short silence. 

"Can't you think of anything you've done?" asked the voice, insinuatingly. 

Bennington's conscience-stricken memory stirred. It did not seem soridiculous, under the direct charm of the fresh young voice that camedown through the summer air from above, like a dove's note from atreetop, to apologize to Lawton's girl. The incongruity now was inforcing into this Arcadian incident anything savouring ofconventionality at all. It had been so idyllic, this talk of the sunfairy and the cloud; so like a passage from an old book of legends, this dainty episode in the great, strong, Western breezes, under thegreat, strong, Western sky. Everything should be perfect, not to beblamed. 

"Do sun fairies accept apologies?" he asked presently, in a subduedvoice. 

"They might. "

"This particular sun fairy is offered one by a man who is sorry. "

"Is it a good big one?"

"Indeed, yes. "

The head appeared over the edge of the rock, inspected him gravely fora moment, and was withdrawn. 

"Then it is accepted, " said the voice. 

"Thank you!" he replied sincerely. "And now are you going to let downyour rope ladder, or whatever it is? I really want to talk to you. "

"You are so persistent!" cried the petulant voice, "and so foolish! Itis like a man to spoil things by questionings!"

He suddenly felt the truth of this. One can not talk every day to a sunfairy, and the experience can never be repeated. He settled back on therock. 

"Pardon me, Sun Fairy!" he cried again. "Rope ladders, indeed, to onewho has but to close her eyes and she finds herself on a downy cloudnear the sun. My mortality blinded me!"

"Now you are a nice boy, " she approved more contentedly, "and as areward you may ask me one question. "

"All right, " he agreed; and then, with instinctive tact, "What do yousee up there?"

He could hear her clap her hands with delight, and he felt glad that hehad followed his impulse to ask just this question instead of one morepersonal and more in line with his curiosity. 

"Listen!" she began. "I see pines, many pines, just the tops of them, and they are all waving in the breeze. Did you ever see trees from ontop? They are quite different. And out from the pines come great roundhills made all of stone. I think they look like skulls. Then there arebreathless descents where the pines fall away. Once in a while a littlewhite road flashes out. "

"Yes, " urged Bennington, as the voice paused. "And what else do yousee?"

"I see the prairie, too, " she went on half dreamily. "It is brown now, but the green is beginning to shine through it just a very little. Andout beyond there is a sparkle. That is the Cheyenne. And beyond thatthere is something white, and that is the Bad Lands. "

The voice broke off with a happy little laugh. 

Bennington saw the scene as though it lay actually spread out beforehim. There was something in the choice of the words, clearcut, decisive, and descriptive; but more in the exquisite modulations of thevoice, adding here a tint, there a shade to the picture, and castingover the whole that poetic glamour which, rarely, is imitated ingrosser materials by Nature herself, when, just following sunset, shesuffuses the landscape with a mellow afterglow. 

The head, sunbonneted, reappeared perked inquiringly sideways. 

"Hello, stranger!" it called with a nasal inflection, "how air ye? Doy' think minin' is goin' t' pan out well this yar spring?" Then shecaught sight of his weapon. "What are you going to shoot?" she askedwith sudden interest. 

"I thought I might see a deer. "

"Deer! hoh!" she cried in lofty scorn, reassuming her nasal tone. "Youis shore a tenderfoot! Don' you-all know that blastin' scares all th'deer away from a minin' camp?"

Bennington looked confused. "No, I hadn't thought of that, " heconfessed stoutly enough. 

"I kind of like to shoot!" said she, a little wistfully. "What sort ofa gun is it?"

"A Savage smokeless, " answered Bennington perfunctorily. 

"One of the thirty-calibres?" inquired the sunbonnet with new interest. 

"Yes, " gasped Bennington, astonished at so much feminine knowledge offirearms. 

"Oh! I'd like to see it. I never saw any of those. May I shoot it, justonce?"

"Of course you may. More than once. Shall I come up?"

"No. I'll come down. You sit right still on that rock. "

The sunbonnet disappeared, and there ensued a momentary commotion onthe other side of the dike. In an instant the girl came around thecorner, picking her way over the loose blocks of stone. With thefinger-tips of either hand she held the pink starched skirt up, displaying a neat little foot in a heavy little shoe. Diagonally acrossthe skirt ran two irregular brown stains. She caught him looking atthem. 

"Naughty, naughty!" said she, glancing down at them with a grimace. 

She dropped her skirt, and stood up beside him with a pretty shake ofthe shoulders. 

"Now let's see it, " she begged. 

She examined the weapon with much interest, throwing down and back thelever in a manner that showed she was accustomed at least to theold-style arm. 

"How light it is!" she commented, squinting through the sights. "Doesn't it kick awfully?"

"Not a bit. Smokeless powder, you know. "

"Of course. What'll we shoot at?"

Bennington fumbled in his pockets and produced an envelope. 

"How's this?" he asked. 

She seized it and ran like an antelope--with the same _gliding_motion--to a tree about thirty paces distant, on which she pinned thebit of paper. They shot. Bennington hit the paper every time. The girlmissed it once. At this she looked a little vexed. 

"You are either very rude or very sincere, " was her comment. 

"You're the best shot I ever saw----"

"Now don't dare say 'for a girl!'" she interrupted quickly. "What's theprize?"

"Was this a match?"

"Of course it was, and I insist on paying up. "

Bennington considered. 

"I think I would like to go to the top of the rock there, and see thepines, and the skull-stones, and the prairies. "

She glanced toward him, knitting her brows. "It is my very own, " shesaid doubtfully. "I've never let anybody go up there before. "

One of the diminutive chipmunks of the hills scampered out from a cleftin the rocks and perched on a moss-covered log, chattering eagerly andjerking his tail in the well-known manner of chipmunks. 

"Oh, see! see!" she cried, all excitement in a moment. She seized therifle, and taking careful aim, fired. The chattering ceased; thechipmunk disappeared. 

Bennington ran to the log. Behind it lay the little animal. The longsteel-jacketed bullet had just grazed the base of its brain. He pickedit up gently in the palm of his hand and contemplated it. 

It was such a diminutive beast, not as large as a good-sized rat, quitesmaller than our own fence-corner chipmunks of the East. It's littlesides were daintily striped, its little whiskers were as perfect asthose of the great squirrels in the timber bottom. In its pouches werethe roots of pine cones. Bennington was not a sentimentalist, but theincident, against the background of the light-hearted day, seemed tohim just a little pathetic. Something of the feeling showed in hiseyes. 

The girl, who had drawn near, looked from him to the dead chipmunk, andback again. Then she burst suddenly into tears. 

"Oh, cruel, cruel!" she sobbed. "What did I do it for? What did you_let_ me do it for?"

Her distress was so keen that the young man hastened to relieve it. 

"There, " he reassured her lightly, "don't do that! Why, you are a greathunter. You got your game. And it was a splendid shot. We'll have himskinned when we get back home, and we'll cure the skin, and you canmake something out of it--a spectacle case, " he suggested at random. "Iknow how you feel, " he went on, to give her time to recover, "but allhunters feel that way occasionally. See, I'll put him just here untilwe get ready to go home, where nothing can get him. "

He deposited the squirrel in the cleft of a rock, quite out of sight, and stood back as though pleased. "There, that's fine!" he concluded. 

With one of those instantaneous transitions, which seemed so natural toher, and yet which appeared to reach not at all to her real nature, shehad changed from an aspect of passionate grief to one of solemninquiry. Bennington found her looking at him with the soul brimming tothe very surface of her great eyes. 

"I think you may come up on my rock, " she said simply after a moment. 

They skirted the base of the dike together until they had reached thewesternmost side. There Bennington was shown the means of ascent, whichhe had overlooked before because of his too close examination of thecliff itself. At a distance of about twenty feet from the dike grew alarge pine tree, the lowest branch of which extended directly over thelittle plateau and about a foot above it. Next to the large pine stoodtwo smaller saplings side by side and a few inches apart. These hadbeen converted into a ladder by the nailing across of rustic rounds. 

"That's how I get up, " explained the girl. "Now you go back around thecorner again, and when I'm ready I'll call. "

Bennington obeyed. In a few moments he heard again the voice in the airsummoning him to approach and climb. 

He ascended the natural ladder easily, but when within six or eightfeet of the large branch that reached across to the dike, the smallerof the two saplings ceased, and so, naturally, the ladder terminated. 

"Hi!" he called, "how did you get up this?"

He looked across the intervening space expectantly, and then, to hissurprise, he observed that the girl was blushing furiously. 

"I--I, " stammered a small voice after a moment's hesitation, "I guessI--_shinned_!"

A light broke across Bennington's mind as to the origin of the two darkstreaks on the gown, and he laughed. The girl eyed him reproachfullyfor a moment or so; then she too began to laugh in an embarrassedmanner. Whereupon Bennington laughed the harder. He shinned up thetree, to find that an ingenious hand rope had been fitted above thebridge limb, so that the crossing of the short interval to the rock wasa matter of no great difficulty. In another instant he stood upon thetop of the dike. 

It was, as he had anticipated, nearly flat. Under the pine branch, which might make a very good chair back, grew a thick cushion of moss. The one tree broke the freedom of the eye's sweep toward the west, butin all other directions it was uninterrupted. As the girl had said, thetops of pines alone met the view, miles on miles of them, undulating, rising, swelling, breaking against the barrier of a dike, or lappingthe foot of a great round boulder-mountain. Here and there a darkerspot suggested a break for a mountain peak; rarely a fleck of whitemarked a mountain road. Back of them all--ridge, mountain, cavernousvalley--towered old Harney, sun-browned, rock-diademed, a few wisps ofcloud streaming down the wind from his brow, locks heavy with the ageof the great Manitou whom he was supposed to represent. Eastward, theprairie like a peaceful sea. Above, the alert sky of the west. Andthrough all the air a humming--vast, murmurous, swelling--as themountain breeze touched simultaneously with strong hand the chords, notof one, but a thousand pine harps. 

Bennington drew in a deep breath, and looked about in all directions. The girl watched him. 

"Ah! it is beautiful!" he murmured at last with a half sigh, and lookedagain. 

She seized his hand eagerly. 

"Oh, I'm so glad you said that--and no more than that!" she cried. "Ifeel the sun fairy can make you welcome now. "

CHAPTER V

THE SPIRIT MOUNTAIN

"From now on, " said the girl, shaking out her skirts before sittingdown, "I am going to be a mystery. "

"You are already, " replied Bennington, for the first time aware thatsuch was the fact. 

"No fencing. I have a plain business proposition to make. You and I aregoing to be great friends. I can see that now. "

"I hope so. "

"And you, being a--well, an open-minded young man" (Now what does shemean by that? thought Bennington), "will be asking all about myself. Iam going to tell you nothing. I am going to be a mystery. "

"I'm sure----"

"No, you're not sure of anything, young man. Now I'll tell you this:that I am living down the gulch with my people. "

"I know--Mr. Lawton's. "

She looked at him a moment. "Exactly. If you were to walk straightahead--not out in the air, of course--you could see the roof of thehouse. Now, after we know each other better, the natural thing for youto do will be to come and see me at my house, won't it?"

Bennington agreed that it would. 

"Well, you mustn't. "

Bennington expressed his astonishment. 

"I will explain a very little. In a month occurs the Pioneer's Picnicat Rapid. You don't know what the Pioneer's Picnic is? Ignorant boy!It's our most important event of the year. Well, until that time I amgoing to try an experiment. I am going to see if--well, I'll tell you;I am going to try an experiment on a man, and the man is you, and I'llexplain the whole thing to you after the Pioneer's Picnic, and not amoment before. Aren't you curious?"

"I am indeed, " Bennington assured her sincerely. 

She took on a small air of tyranny. "Now understand me. I mean what Isay. If you want to see me again, you must do as I tell you. You musttake me as I am, and you must mind me. "

Bennington cast a fleeting wonder over the sublime self-confidencewhich made this girl so certain he would care to see her again. Then, with a grip at the heart, he owned that the self-confidence was wellfounded. 

"All right, " he assented meekly. 

"Good!" she cried, with a gleam of mischief. "Behold me! Old BillLawton's gal! If you want to be pards, put her thar!"

"And so you are a girl after all, and no sun fairy, " smiled Benningtonas he "put her thar. "

"My cloud has melted, " she replied quietly, pointing toward the brow ofHarney. 

They chatted of small things for a time. Bennington felt intuitivelythat there was something a little strange about this girl, something alittle out of the ordinary, something he had never been conscious of inany other girl. Yet he could never seize the impression and examine it. It was always just escaping; just taking shape to the point ofvisibility, and then melting away again; just rising in themodulations of her voice to a murmur that the ear thought to seize asa definite chord, and then dying into a hundred other cadences. Hetried to catch it in her eyes, where so much else was to be seen. Sometimes he perceived its influence, but never itself. It passed as ashadow in the lower deeps, as though the feather mass of a great seagrowth had lifted slowly on an undercurrent, and then as slowly hadsunk back to its bed, leaving but the haunting impression of somethingshapeless that had darkened the hue of the waters. It was most like asadness that had passed. Perhaps it was merely an unconscious trick ofthought or manner. 

After a time she asked him his first name, and he told her. 

"I'd like to know your's too, Miss Lawton, " he suggested. 

"I wish you wouldn't call me Miss Lawton, " she cried with suddenpetulance. 

"Why, certainly not, if you don't want me to, but what am I to callyou?"

"Do you know, " she confided with a pretty little gesture, "I havealways disliked my real name. It's ugly and horrid. I've often wishedI were a heroine in a book, and then I could have a name I reallyliked. Now here's a chance. I'm going to let you get up one for me, butit must be pretty, and we'll have it all for our very own. "

"I don't quite see----" objected the still conventional de Laney. 

"Your wits, your wits, haven't you any wits at _all_?" she cried withimpatience over his unresponsiveness. 

"Well, let me see. It isn't easy to do a thing like that on the spur ofthe moment, Sun Fairy. A fairy's a fay, isn't it? I might call youFay. "

"Fay, " she repeated in a startled tone. 

Bennington remembered that this was the name of the curly-haired youngman who had lent him the bucking horse, and frowned. 

"No, I don't believe I like that, " he recanted hastily. 

"Take time and think about it, " she suggested. 

"I think of one that would be appropriate, " he said after some littletime. "It is suggested by that little bird there. It is Phoebe. "

"Do you think it is appropriate, " she objected. "A Phoebe bird or aPhoebe girl always seemed to me to be demure and quiet and thoughtfuland sweet-voiced and fond of dim forests, while I am a frivolous, laughing, sunny individual who likes the open air and doesn't care forshadows at all. "

"Yet I feel it is appropriate, " he insisted. He paused and went on alittle timidly in the face of his new experience in giving expressionto the more subtle feelings. "I don't know whether I can express it ornot. You are laughing and sunny, as you say, but there is something inyou like the Phoebe bird just the same. It is like those cloudshadows. " He pointed out over the mountains. Overhead a number ofsummer clouds were winging their way from the west, casting on theearth those huge irregular shadows which sweep across it so swiftly, yet with such dignity; so rushingly, and yet so harmlessly. "The hillsare sunny and bright enough, and all at once one of the shadows crossesthem, and it is dark. Then in another moment it is bright again. "

"And do you really see that in me?" she asked curiously. "You are adear boy, " she continued, looking at him for some moments withreflective eyes. "It won't do though, " she said, rising at last. "It'stoo 'fancy. '"

"I don't know then, " he confessed with some helplessness. 

"I'll tell you what I've always _wanted_ to be called, " said she, "eversince I was a little girl. It is 'Mary. '"

"Mary!" he cried, astonished. "Why, it is such a common name. "

"It is a beautiful name, " she asserted. "Say it over. Aren't thesyllables soft and musical and caressing? It is a lovely name. Why Iremember, " she went on vivaciously, "a girl who was named Mary, and whodidn't like it. When she came to our school she changed it, but shedidn't dare to break it to the family all at once. The first letterhome she signed herself 'Mae. ' Her father wrote back, 'My deardaughter, if the name of the mother of Jesus isn't good enough for you, come home. '" She laughed at the recollection. 

"Then you have been away to school?" asked the young man. 

"Yes, " she replied shortly. 

She adroitly led him to talk of himself. He told her naively of NewYork and tennis, of brake parties and clubs, and even afternoon teasand balls, all of which, of course, interested a Western girlexceedingly. In this it so happened that his immaturity showed moreplainly than before. He did not boast openly, but he introducedextraneous details important in themselves. He mentioned knowingPennington the painter, and Brookes the writer, merely in a casualfashion, but with just the faintest flourish. It somehow became knownthat his family had a crest, that his position was high; in short, thathe was a de Laney on both sides. He liked to tell it to this girl, because it was evidently fresh and new to her, and because in thepresence of her inexperience in these matters he gained a confidence inhimself which he had never dared assume before. 

She looked straight in front of her and listened, throwing in acomment now and then to assist the stream of his talk. At last, when hefell silent, she reached swiftly out and patted his cheek with herhand. 

"You are a dear big _boy_, " she said quietly. "But I like it--oh, somuch!"

From the tree tops below the clear warble of the purple finchproclaimed that under the fronds twilight had fallen. The vast greensurface of the hills was streaked here and there with irregular peaksof darkness dwindling eastward. The sun was nearly down. 

A sudden gloom blotted out the fretwork of the pine shadows that had, during the latter part of the afternoon, lain athwart the rock. Theylooked up startled. 

The shadow of Harney had crept out to them, and, even as they looked, it stole on, cat-like, across the lower ridges toward the East. Oneafter another the rounded hills changed hue as it crossed them. For amoment it lingered in the tangle of woods at the outermost edge, andthen without further pause glided out over the prairie. They watched itfascinated. The sparkle was quenched in the Cheyenne; the white gleamof the Bad Lands became a dull gray, scarce distinguishable from thegray of the twilight. Though a single mysterious cleft a long yellowbar pointed down across the plains, paused at the horizon, and slowlylifted into the air. The mountain shadow followed it steadily up intothe sky, growing and growing against the dullness of the east, until atlast over against them in the heavens was the huge phantom of amountain, infinitely greater, infinitely grander than any mountain everseen by mortal eyes, and lifting higher and higher, commanded upward bythat single wand of golden light. Then suddenly the wand was withdrawnand the ghost mountain merged into the yellow afterglow of evening. 

The girl had watched it breathless. At its dissolution she seized theyoung man excitedly by the arm. 

"The Spirit Mountain!" she cried. "I have never seen it before; and nowI see it--with you. "

She looked at him with startled eyes. 

"With you, " she repeated. 

"What is it? I don't understand. "

She did not seem to hear his question. 

"What is it?" he asked again. 

"Why--nothing. " She caught her breath and recovered command of herselfsomewhat. "That is, it is just an old legend that I have often heard, and it startled me for a minute. "

"Will you tell me the legend?"

"Not now; some time. We must go now, for it will soon be dark. "

They wandered along the ridge toward Deerfoot Gulch in silence. She hadtaken her sunbonnet off, and was enjoying the cool of the evening. Hecarried the rifle over the crook of his arm, and watched her pensiveface. The poor little chipmunk lay stiffening in the cleft of the rock, forgotten. The next morning a prying jay discovered him and carried himaway. He was only a little chipmunk after all--a very littlechipmunk--and nobody and nothing missed him in all the wide world, noteven his mate and his young, for mercifully grief in the animal worldis generally short-lived where tragedies are frequent. His life meantlittle. His death----

At the dip of the gulch they paused. 

"I live just down there, " she said, "and now, good-night. "

"Mayn't I take you home?"

"Remember your promise. "

"Oh, very well. "

She looked at him seriously. "I am going to ask you to do what I havenever asked any man before, " she said slowly--"to meet me. I want youto come to the rock to-morrow afternoon. I want to hear more about NewYork. "

"Of course I'll come, " he agreed delightedly. "I feel as if I had knownyou years already. "

They said good-bye. She walked a few steps irresolutely down thehillside, and then, with a sudden impulsive movement, returned. Shelifted her face gravely, searchingly to his. 

"I like you, " said she earnestly. "You have kind eyes, " and was gonedown through the graceful alder saplings. 

Bennington stood and watched the swaying of the leaf tops that markedher progress until she emerged into the lower gulch. There she turnedand looked back toward the ridge, but apparently could not see him, though he waved his hand. The next instant Jim Fay strolled into the"park" from the direction of Lawton's cabin. Bennington saw her springto meet him, holding out both hands, and then the two strolled backdown the gulch talking earnestly, their heads close together. 

Why should he care? "Mary, Mary, Mary!" he cried within himself as hehurried home. And in remote burial grounds the ancient de Laneys onboth sides turned over in their lead-lined coffins. 

CHAPTER VI

BENNINGTON AS A MAN OF BUSINESS

That evening Old Mizzou returned from town with a watery eye and a mindthat ran to horses. 

"He is shore a fine cayuse, " he asserted with extreme impressiveness. "He is one of them broncs you jest _loves_. An' he's jes 's cheap! Ilikes you a lot, sonny; I deems you as a face-card shore, an' ef anyone ever tries fer to climb yore hump, you jest calls on pore OldMizzou an' he mingles in them troubles immediate. You must have thatcayuse an' go scoutin' in th' hills, yo' shore must! Ol' manDavidson'll do th' work fer ye, but ye shore must scout. 'Taint healthynot t' git exercise on a cayuse. It shorely ain't! An' you must git t'know these yar hills, you must. They is beautiful an' picturesque, andis full of scenery. When you goes back East, you wants to know allabout 'em. I wouldn't hev you go back East without knowin' all about'em for anythin' in the worl', I likes ye thet much!"

Old Mizzou paused to wipe away a sympathetic tear with a ratheruncertain hand. 

"Y' wants to start right off too, thet's th' worst of it, so's t' see'em all afore you goes, 'cause they is lots of hills and I'm 'fearedyou won't stay long, sonny; I am that! I has my ideas these yar claimsis no good, I has fer a fact, and they won't need no one here long, andthen we'll lose ye, sonny, so you mus' shore hev that cayuse. "

Old Mizzou rambled on in like fashion most of the evening, toBennington's great amusement, and, though next morning he was quitehimself again, he still clung to the idea that Bennington shouldexamine the pony. 

"He is a fine bronc, fer shore, " he claimed, "an' you'd better gitarter him afore some one else gits him. "

As Bennington had for some time tentatively revolved in his mind thedesirability of something to ride, this struck him as being a goodidea. All Westerners had horses--in the books. So he abandoned_Aliris: A Romance of all Time_, for the morning, and drove down toSpanish Gulch with Old Mizzou. 

He was mentally braced for devilment, but his arch-enemy, Fay, was notin sight. To his surprise, he got to the post office quite withoutmolestation. There he was handed two letters. One was from his parents. The other, his first business document, proved to be from the miningcapitalist. The latter he found to inclose separate drafts for variousamounts in favour of six men. Bishop wrote that the young man was tohand these drafts to their owners, and to take receipts for the amountsof each. He promised a further installment in a few weeks. 

Bennington felt very important. He looked the letter all over again, and examined the envelope idly. The Spanish Gulch postmark bore date ofthe day before. 

"That's funny, " said Bennington to himself. "I wonder why Mizzou didn'tbring it up with him last night?" Then he remembered the old man'swatery eye and laughed. "I guess I know, " he thought. 

The next thing was to find the men named in the letter. He did not knowthem from Adam. Mizzou saw no difficulty, however, when the matter waslaid before him. 

"They're in th' Straight Flush!" he asserted positively. 

This was astounding. How should Old Mizzou know that?

"I don't exactly know, " the old man explained this discrepancy, "butthey generally is!"

"Don't they ever work?"

"Work's purty slack, " crawfished Davidson. "But I tells you I don't_know_. We has to find out, " and he shuffled away toward the saloon. 

Anybody but Bennington would have suspected something. There was thedelayed letter, the supernatural knowledge of Old Mizzou, the absenceof Fay. Even the Easterner might have been puzzled to account for thecrowded condition of the Straight Flush at ten in the morning, if hisattention had not been quite fully occupied in posing before himself asthe man of business. 

When Mizzou and his companion entered the room, the hum of talk died, and every one turned expectantly in the direction of the newcomers. 

"Gents, " said Old Mizzou, "this is Mr. De Laney, th' new sup'rintendentof th' Holy Smoke. Mr. De Laney, gents!"

There was a nodding of heads. 

Every one looked eagerly expectant. The man behind the bar turned backhis cuffs. De Laney, feeling himself the centre of observation, grewnervous. He drew from his pocket Bishop's letter, and read out the fivenames. "I'd like to see those men, " he said. 

The men designated came forward. After a moment's conversation, the sixadjourned to the hotel, where paper and ink could be procured. 

After their exit a silence fell, and the miners looked at each otherwith ludicrous faces. 

"An' he never asked us to take a drink!" exclaimed one sorrowfully. "That settles it. It may not be fer th' good of th' camp, Jim Fay, butI reckons it ain't much fer th' harm of it. I goes you. "

"Me to, " "and me, " "and me, " shouted other voices. 

Fay leaped on the bar and spread his arms abroad. 

"Speech! Speech!" they cried. 

"Gentlemen of the great and glorious West!" he began. "It rejoices meto observe this spirit animating your bosoms. Trampling down the finerfeelings that you all possess to such an unlimited degree, puttingaside all thought of merely material prosperity, you are now prepared, at whatever cost, to ally yourselves with that higher poetic justicewhich is above barter, above mere expediency, above even the ordinarythis-for-that fairness which often passes as justice among the effeteand unenlightened savages of the East. Gentlemen of the great andglorious West, I congratulate you!"

The miners stood close around the bar. Every man's face bore a broadgrin. At this point they interrupted with howls and cat-calls ofapplause. "Ain't he a _peach_!" said one to another, and composedhimself again to listen. At the conclusion of a long harangue theyyelled enthusiastically, and immediately began the more informaldiscussion of what was evidently a popular proposition. When the fivewho had been paid off returned, everybody had a drink, while thenewcomers were made acquainted with the subject. Old Mizzou, who hadlistened silently but with a twinkle in his eye, went to hunt upBennington. 

They examined the horse together. The owner named thirty dollars as hisprice. Old Mizzou said this was cheap. It was not. Bennington agreed totake the animal on trial for a day or two, so they hitched a lariataround its neck and led it over to the wagon. After despatching a fewerrands they returned to camp. Bennington got out his ledger andjournal and made entries importantly. Old Mizzou disappeared in thedirection of the corral, where he was joined presently by the manArthur. 

CHAPTER VII

THE MEETING AT THE ROCK

On his way to keep the appointment of the afternoon, Bennington deLaney discovered within himself a new psychological experience. Hefound that, since the evening before, he had been observing thingsabout him for the purpose of detailing them to his new friend. Littlebeauties of nature--as when a strange bird shone for an instant invivid contrast to the mountain laurel near his window; an unusualeffect of pine silhouettes near the sky; a weird, semi-poeticsuggestion of one of Poe's stories implied in a contorted shadow castby a gnarled little oak in the light of the moon--these he had noticedand remembered, and was now eager to tell his companion, with fullassurance of her sympathy and understanding. Three days earlier hewould have passed them by. 

But stranger still was his discovery that he had _always_ noticed suchthings, and had remembered them. Observations of the sort hadheretofore been quite unconscious. Without knowing it he had alwaysbeen a Nature lover, one who appreciated the poetry of her moods, onewho saw the beauty of her smiles, or, what is more rare, the greaterbeauty of her frown. The influence had entered into his being, but hadlain neglected. Now it stole forth as the odour of a dried balsam boughsteals from the corner of a loft whither it has been thrown carelessly. It was all delightful and new, and he wanted to tell her of it. 

He did so. After a little he told her about _Aliris: A Romance of allTime_, in which she appeared so interested that he detailed the mainidea and the plot. At her request, he promised to read it to her. Hewas very young, you see, and very inexperienced; he threw himselfgenerously, without reserve, on this girl's sympathies in a manner ofwhich, assuredly, he should have been quite ashamed. Only the veryyoung are not ashamed. 

The girl listened, at first half amused. Then she was touched, for shesaw that it was sincere, and youthful, and indicative of clear faithin what is beautiful, and in fine ideals of what is fitting. Perhaps, dimly, she perceived that this is good stuff of which to make a man, provided it springs from immaturity, and not from the sentimentalism ofdegeneracy. The loss of it is a price we pay for wisdom. Some think theprice too high. 

As he talked on in this moonshiny way, really believing his ridiculousabstractions the most important things in the world, gradually she toobecame young. She listened with parted lips, and in her great eyes thesoul rose and rose within, clearing away the surface moods as twilightclears the land of everything but peace. 

He was telling of the East again with a certain felicity ofexpression--have we not said he had the gift of words?--and an abandonof sentiment which showed how thoroughly he confided in the sympathy ofhis listener. When we are young we are apt to confide in the sympathyof every listener, and so we make fools of ourselves, and it takes us along time to live down our reputations. As we grow older, we believeless and less in its reality. Perhaps by and by we do not trust toanybody's sympathy, not even our own. 

"We have an old country place, " he was saying; "it belonged to mygrandfather. My grandfather came by it when the little town was verysmall indeed, so he built an old-fashioned stone house and surroundedit with large grounds. " He was seeing the stone house and the largegrounds with that new inner observation which he had just discovered, and he was trying to the best of his ability to tell what he saw. Aftera little he spoke more rhythmically. Many might have thought he spokesentimentally, because with feeling; but in reality he was merelytrying with great earnestness for expression. A jarring word would havebrought him back to his everyday mood, but for the time being he waswrapt in what he saw. This is a condition which all writers, and somelovers, will recognise. "Now the place is empty--except insummer--except that we have an old woman who lives tucked away in onecorner of it. I lived there one summer just after I finished college. Outside my window there was an apple tree that just brushed againstthe ledge; there were rose vines, the climbing sort, on the wall; andthen, too, there was a hickory tree that towered 'way over the roof. Inthe front yard is what is known all over town as the 'big tree, ' asilver maple, at least twice as tall as the house. It is so broad thatits shade falls over the whole front of the place. In the back is anorchard of old apple trees, and trellises of big blue grapes. On oneside is a broad lawn, at the back of which is one of the goodold-fashioned flower gardens that does one good to look at. There arelittle pink primroses dotting the sod, sweet-william, lavender, nasturtiums, sweet peas, hollyhocks, bachelor's buttons, portulaca, anda row of tall sunflowers, the delight of a sleepy colony of hens. Ilearned all the flowers that summer. " He clasped his hands comfortablyback of his head and looked at her. She was gazing out over the BadLands to the East. "In the very centre, as a sort of protecting nurseto all the littler flowers, " he went on, "is a big lilac bush, andthere the bees and humming birds are thick on a warm spring day. Thereare plenty of birds too, but I didn't know so many of them. Theynested everywhere--in the 'big tree, ' the orchard, the evergreens, thehedges, and in the long row of maple trees with trunks as big as abarrel and limbs that touch across the street. "

"It must be beautiful!" said the girl quietly without looking around. 

Then he began to "suppose. " This, as every woman knows, is dangerousbusiness. 

"It _was_ beautiful, " said he. "I can't tell you about it. The wordsdon't seem to fit some way. I wish you could see it for yourself. Iknow you'd enjoy it. I always wanted some one with me to enjoy it too. Suppose some way we were placed so we could watch the year go by inthose deep windows. First there is the spring and the birds and theflowers, all of which I've been talking about. Then there is thesummer, when the shades are drawn, when the shadows of the roses waveslowly across the curtains, when the air outside quivers with heat, andthe air inside tastes like a draught of cool water. All the bird songsare stilled except that one little fellow still warbles, swaying inthe breeze on the tiptop of the 'big tree, ' his notes sliding down thelong sunbeams like beads on a golden thread. Then we would readtogether, in the half-darkened 'parlour, ' something not very deep, butbeautiful, like Hawthorne's stories; or we would together seek forthese perfect lines of poetry which haunt the memory. In the evening wewould go out to hear the crickets and the tree toads, to see the nightbreeze toss the leaves across the calm face of the moon, to be silencedin spirit by the peace of the stars. Then the autumn would come. Wewould taste the 'Concords' and the little red grapes and the big redgrapes. We would take our choice of the yellow sweetings, the hardwhite snow apples, or the little red-cheeked fellows from the westtree. And then, of course, there are the russets! Then there are thepears, and all the hickory nuts which rattle down on us every time thewind blows. The leaves are everywhere. We would rake them up into bigpiles, and jump into them, and 'swish' about in them. How bracing theair is! How silvery the sun! How red your cheeks would get! And thinkof the bonfires!"

"And in winter?" murmured the girl. Her eyes were shining. 

"In the winter the wind would howl through the 'big tree, ' andeverything would be bleak and cold out doors. We would be inside, ofcourse, and we would sit on the fur rug in front of the fireplace, while the evening passed by, watching the 'geese in the chimney' flyingslowly away. "

"'Suppose' some more, " she begged dreamily. "I love it. It rests me. "

She clasped her hands back of her head and closed her eyes. 

The young man looked quietly about him. 

"This is a wild and beautiful country, " said he, "but it lackssomething. I think it is the soul. The little wood lots of the Easthave so much of it. " He paused in surprise at his own thoughts. Hisonly experiences in the woods East had been when out picnicking, orberrying, and he had never noticed these things. "I don't know as Iever thought of it there, " he went on slowly, as though trying to behonest with her, "but here it comes to me somehow or another. " A littlefly-catcher shot up from the frond below, poised a moment, and droppedback with closed wings. 

"Do you know the birds?" she asked. 

"I'm afraid not, " he admitted; "I don't really _know_ much aboutNature, but I love it, and I'm going to learn more. I know only thevery common birds, and one other. Did you ever hear the hermit thrushsing?"

"Never. "

"Oh!" he cried in sudden enthusiasm, "then there is another 'suppose'for us, the best of all. "

"I love the dear old house!" she objected doubtfully. 

"But the hermit thrush is better. The old country minister took me tohear him one Sunday afternoon and I shall never forget it. "

She glanced at his animated face through half-closed eyes. 

"Tell me, " she urged softly. 

"'Suppose' we were back East, " he began, "and in the country, justabout this time of year. We would wait until the afternoon--why! justabout this time, when the sun is getting low. We would push through thebushes at the edge of the woods where the little tinkling birds sing inthe fence corners, and would enter the deep high woods where the treesare tall and still. The moss is thick and soft in there, and there arelittle pools lying calm and dark, and there is a kind of a _hush_ inthe air--not silence, you know, but like when a big crowd of people arekeeping still. And then we would walk very carefully, and speak low, and we would sit by the side of a fallen log and wait. After a whilethe thrush would sing, a deep note, with a thrill in it, like a bellslow and solemn. When you hear it you too feel a thrill as though youhad heard a great and noble thought. Why, it is almost _holy_!"

He turned to the girl. She was looking at him. 

"Why, hullo!" he exclaimed, "what's the matter?"

Her eyes were brimming with tears. 

"Nothing, " she said. "I never heard a man talk as you have beentalking, that is all. The rest of them are cynical and hard and cold. They would be ashamed to say the things you have said. No, no!" shecried, laying her hand on his arm as he made a little uneasy movement, "do not misunderstand me. I like it. I love it. It does me good. I hadlost faith. It is not nice to know the other kind--well. "

"You speak bitterly, " he expostulated. 

She laughed. "It is a common experience enough. Pray that you may neverknow it. I began as a little child, loving and trusting every one, andgiving my full free heart and confidence to every one who offered hisbest to me. All I can say is, that I am thankful for you that you haveescaped the suffering such blind trust leads to. "

She laughed again, bitterly, and threw her arms out. 

"I suppose I shall go on trusting people forever. It's in my nature, and I can't help it. "

"I hope you will feel you can trust me, " said he, troubled at thispassion so much beyond his experience. "I would do anything for you. "

"Do! do!" she cried with contempt. "Yes. Any number of people will _do_anything for me. I want some one to _be_ for me!"

"I'm so sorry!" he said simply, but with great feeling. 

"Don't pity me, don't believe in me!" she cried suddenly in a passion. "I am not worth it. I am cruel and hard and cold, and I'll never carefor anybody in any way. My nature has been hardened. I _can't_ be good. I can't care for people. I _can't_ think of giving way to it. Itfrightens me. "

She burst into sudden tears and sobbed convulsively. In a moment shebecame calm. Then she took her hands from her eyes and smiled. In thedistress of his sympathy Bennington thought he had never seen anythingmore beautiful than this breaking forth of the light. 

"You must think I am a very peculiar young person, " she said, "but Itold you I was a mystery. I am a little tired to-day, that's all. "

The conversation took a lighter tone and ran on the subject of the newhorse. She was much interested, inquiring of his colour, his size, hisgaits, whether he had been tried. 

"I'll tell you what we will do, " she suggested; "we'll go on anexpedition some day. I have a pony too. We will fill up our saddlebagsand cook our own dinner. I know a nice little place over toward BlueLead. "

"I've one suggestion to add, " put in Bennington, "and that is, that wego to-morrow. "

She looked a trifle doubtful. 

"I don't know. Aren't we seeing a good deal of each other?"

"Oh, if it is going to bore you, by all means put it off!" criedBennington in genuine alarm. 

She laughed contentedly over his way of looking at it. "I'm not tiredthen, so please you; and when I am, I'll let you know. To-morrow itis. "

"Shall I come after you? What time shall I start?"

"No, I'd rather meet you somewhere. Let's see. You watch for me, andI'll ride by in the lower gulch about nine o'clock. "

"Very well. By the way, the band's going to practise in town to-night. Don't you want to go?"

"I'd like to, but I promised Jim I'd go with him. "

"Jim?"

"Jim Fay. "

Bennington felt this as a discordant note. 

"Do you know him very well?" he asked jealously. 

"He's my best friend. I like him very much. He is a fine fellow. Youmust meet him. "

"I've met him, " said Bennington shortly. 

"Now you must go, " she commanded, after a pause. "I want to stay herefor a while. " "No, " as he opened his mouth to object. "I mean it!Please be good!"

After he had gone she sat still until sundown. Once she shook hershoulders impatiently. "It is _silly_!" she assured herself. As before, the shadow of Harney crept out to the horizon's edge. There itstopped. Twilight fell. 

"No Spirit Mountain to-night, " she murmured wistfully at last. "Almostdo I believe in the old legend. "

CHAPTER VIII

AN ADVENTURE IN THE NIGHT

After supper that night Bennington found himself unaccountably alone incamp. Old Mizzou had wandered off up the gulch. Arthur had wandered offdown the gulch. The woman had locked herself in her cabin. 

So, having nothing else to do, he got out the manuscript of _Aliris: ARomance of all Time_, and read it through carefully from the beginning. To his surprise he found it very poor. Its language was felicitous insome spots, but stilted in most; the erudition was pedantic, anddragged in by the ears; the action was idiotic; and the proportionswere padded until they no longer existed as proportions. He wasastounded. He began to see that he had misconceived the whole treatmentof it. It would have to be written all over again, with the love storyas the ruling _motif_. He felt very capable of doing the love story. He drew some paper toward him and began to write. 

You see he was already developing. Every time a writer is made toappreciate that his work is poor he has taken a step in advance of it. Although he did not know that was the reason of it, Benningtonperceived the deficiencies of _Aliris_, because he had promised to readit to the girl. He saw it through her eyes. 

The young man became absorbed in redescribing the heroine with violeteyes. A sudden slamming of the door behind him brought him, startled, to his feet. He laughed, and was about to sit down again, but noticedthat the door had remained open. He arose to shut it. Over the trunksof the nearer pines played a strange flickering light, throwing themnow into relief, now into shadow. "Strange!" murmured Bennington tohimself, and stepped outside to investigate. As he crossed the sill hewas seized on either side. 

He cried out and struggled blindly, but was held as in a vice. Hiscaptors, whom he dimly perceived to be large men in masks, whirled himsharply to the left, and he found himself face to face with a thirdman, also masked. Beyond him were a score or so more, some of whom borepine torches, which, partly blazing and partly smoking, served to castthe weird light he had seen flickering on the tree trunks. Perfectsilence reigned. The man with whom Bennington was fronted eyed himgravely through the holes in his mask. 

"I'd like to know what this means?" broke out the Easterner angrily. 

The men did not reply. They stood motionless, as silent as the night. In spite of his indignation, the young man was impressed. He twistedhis shoulders again. The men at either arm never tightened a muscle toresist, and yet he was held beyond the possibility of escape. 

"What's the matter? What're you trying to do? Take your hands off me!"he cried. 

Again the silence fell. 

Then at the end of what seemed to the Easterner a full minute themasked figure in front spoke. 

"Thar is them that thinks as how it ain't noways needful thet yeknows, " it said in slow and solemn accents, "but by the mercy of th'others we gives y' thet much satisfaction. "

"You comes hyar from a great corp'ration thet in times gone by wethinks is public spirited an' enterprisin', which is a mistake. Youpays th' debt of said corp'ration, so they sez, an' tharfore wewelcomes you to our bosom cordial. What happens? You insults us bypaying such low-down ornary cusses as Snowie. Th' camp is just. Shearises an' avenges said insult by stringin' of you up all right an'proper. We gives you five minutes to get ready. "

"What do you mean?"

"We hangs you in five minutes. "

The slow, even voice ceased, and again the silence was broken only bythe occasional bursting crackle of a blister in the pine torches. Bennington tried to realize the situation. It had all come about sosuddenly. 

"I guess you've got the joke on me, boys, " he ventured with a nervouslittle laugh. And then his voice died away against the stonyimmobility of the man opposite as laughter sinks to nothing againstthe horror of a great darkness. Bennington began to feel impressed inearnest. Across his mind crept doubts as to the outcome. He almostscreamed aloud as some one stole up behind and dropped over his throatthe soft cold coil of a lariat. Then, at a signal from the chief, thetwo men haled him away. 

They stopped beneath a gnarled oak halfway down the slope to the gulchbottom, from which protruded, like a long witch arm, a single witheredbranch. Over this the unseen threw the end of the lariat. Benningtonfaced the expressionless gaze of twenty masks, on which the torchlightthrew Strong black shadows. Directly in front of him the leader postedhimself, watch in hand. 

"Any last requests?" he inquired in his measured tones. 

Bennington felt the need of thinking quickly, but, being unused toemergencies, he could not. 

"Anywhar y' want yore stuff sent?" the other pursued relentlessly. 

Bennington swallowed, and found his voice at last. 

"Now be reasonable, " he pleaded. "It isn't going to do you any good tohang me. I didn't mean to make any distinctions. I just paid the oldestdebts, that's all. You'll all get paid. There'll be some more moneyafter a while, and then I can pay some more of you. If you kill me, youwon't get any at all. "

"Won't get any any way, " some one muttered audibly from the crowd. 

The man with the watch never stirred. 

"Two minutes more, " he said simply. 

One of the men, who had been holding the young man's arms, had fallenback into the crowd when the lariat was thrown over the oak limb. During the short colloquy just detailed, the attention of the other hadbecome somewhat distracted. Bennington wrenched himself free, andstruck this man full in the face. 

He had never in his well-ordered life hit in anger, but behind thisblow was desperation, and the weight of a young and active body. Theman went down. Bennington seized the lariat with both hands and triedto wrench it over his head. 

The individual who had done all the talking leaped forward toward him, and dodging a hastily aimed blow, seized him about the waist and threwhim neatly to the ground. Bennington struggled furiously and silently. The other had great difficulty in holding him down. 

"Come here, some of you fellows, " he cried, panting and laughing alittle. "Tie his hands, for the love of Heaven. "

In another moment the Easterner, his arms securely pinioned, stood asbefore. He was breathing hard and the short struggle had heated hisblood through and through. Bunker Hill had waked up. He set his teeth, resolving that they should not get another word out of him. 

The timekeeper raised one hand warningly. Over his shoulder Benningtondimly saw a tall muscular figure, tense with the expectation of effort, lean forward to the slack of the lariat. He stared back to the front. 

The leader raised his pistol to give the signal. Bennington shut hiseyes. Then ensued a pause and a murmuring of low voices. Benningtonlooked, and, to his surprise, perceived Lawton's girl in earnestexpostulation with the leader of the band. As he listened their voicesrose, so he caught snatches of their talk. 

"Confound it all!" objected the man in exasperated tones, "you don'tplay fair. That wasn't the agreement at all. "

"Agreement or no agreement, this thing's gone far enough, " she rejoinedsharply. "I've watched the whole performance, and I've been expectingfor the last ten minutes you'd have sense enough to quit. "

The voices died to a murmuring. Once the girl stamped her foot, andonce the man spread his hands out in deprecation. The maskers groupedabout in silent enjoyment of the scene. At last the discussionterminated. 

"It's all up, boys, " cried the man savagely, tearing off his mask. ToBennington's vast surprise, the features of Jim Fay were discovered. Heapproached and began sullenly to undo the young man's pinioned arms. The others rolled up their masks and put them in their pockets. Theylaughed to each other consumedly. The tall man approached, rubbing hisjaw. 

"You hits hard, sonny, " said he, "and you don't go down in yoreboots[A] a little bit. "

The group began to break up and move down the gulch, most of the menshouting out a good-natured word or so of farewell. Bennington, recovering from his daze at the rapid passage of these events, steppedforward to where Fay and the girl had resumed their discussion. He sawthat the young miner had recovered his habitual tone of raillery, andthat the girl was now looking up at him with eyes full of deprecation. 

"Miss Lawton, " said Bennington with formality, "I hope you will allowme, after your great kindness, to see that you get down the gulchsafely. "

Fay cut in before the girl could reply. 

"Don't bother about that, de Laney, " said he, in a most cavalierfashion. "I'll see to it. "

"I did not address you, sir!" returned Bennington coldly. TheWesterner's eyes twinkled with amusement. The girl interrupted. 

"Thank you very much, Mr. De Laney, but Mr. Fay is right--I wouldn'ttrouble you. " Her eyes commanded Fay, and he moved a little apart. 

"Don't be angry, " she pleaded hurriedly, in an undertone, "but it'sbetter that way to-night. And I think you acted grandly. "

"You are the one who acted grandly, " he replied, a little mollified. "How can I ever thank you? You came just in time. "

She laughed. 

"You're not angry, are you?" she coaxed. 

"No, of course not; what right have I to be?"

"I don't like that--quite--but I suppose it will do. You'll be thereto-morrow?"

"You know I will. "

"Then good-night. " She gave his folded arm a hasty pat and ran on downthe hill after Fay, who had gone on. Bennington saw her seize hisshoulders, as she overtook him, and give them a severe shake. 

The light of the torches down the gulch wavered and disappeared. Bennington returned to his room. On the table lay his manuscript, andthe ink was hardly dried on the last word of it. Outside a poor-willbegan to utter its weird call. The candle before him sputtered, andburned again with a clear flame. 

[Footnote A: Western--to become frightened. ]

CHAPTER IX

THE HEAVENS OPENED

Bennington awoke early the next morning, a pleased glow of anticipationwarming his heart, and almost before his eyes were opened he had raisedhimself to leap out of the bunk. Then with a disappointed sigh he sankback. On the roof fell the heavy patter of raindrops. 

After a time he arose and pulled aside the curtains of a window. Thenearer world was dripping; the farther world was hidden or obscured bylong veils of rain, driven in ragged clouds before a west wind. Yesterday the leaves had waved lightly, the undergrowth of shrubs haduplifted in feathery airiness of texture, the ground beneath had beencrisp and aromatic with pine needles. Now everything bore a drooping, sodden aspect which spoke rather of decay than of the life of spring. Even the chickens had wisely remained indoors, with the exception of asingle bedraggled old rooster, whose melancholy appearance addedanother shade of gloom to the dismal outlook. The wind twisted his longtail feathers from side to side so energetically that, even asBennington looked, the poor fowl, perforce, had to scud, careened fromone side to the other, like a heavily-laden craft, into the shelter ofhis coop. The wind, left to its own devices, skittered acrosscold-looking little pools of water, and tried in vain to induce thesoaked leaves of the autumn before to essay an aerial flight. 

The rain hit the roof now in heavy gusts as though some one had dashedit from a pail. The wind whistled through a loosened shingle andrattled around an ill-made joint. Within the house itself some slightsounds of preparation for breakfast sounded the clearer against theturmoil outside. And then Bennington became conscious that for sometime he had _felt_ another sound underneath all the rest. It was grandand organlike in tone, resembling the roar of surf on a sand beach asmuch as anything else. He looked out again, and saw that it was thewind in the trees. The same conditions that had before touched the harpmurmur of a stiller day now struck out a rush and roar almostawe-inspiring in its volume. Bennington impulsively threw open thewindow and leaned out. 

The great hill back of the camp was so steep that the pines growing onits slope offered to the breeze an almost perpendicular screen ofbranches. Instead of one, or at most a dozen trees, the wind herepassed through a thousand at once. As a consequence, the stir of airthat in a level woodland would arouse but a faint whisper, here wouldpass with a rustling murmur; a murmur would be magnified into a noiseas of the mellow falling of waters; and now that the storm hadawakened, the hill caught up its cry with a howl so awful and sustainedthat, as the open window let in the full volume of its blast, Bennington involuntarily drew back. He closed the sash and turned todress. 

After the first disappointment, strange to say, Bennington became quiteresigned. He had felt, a little illogically, that this giving of awhole day to the picnic was not quite the thing. His Puritan conscienceimpressed him with the sacredness of work. He settled down to the factof the rainstorm with a pleasant recognition of its inevitability, anda resolve to improve his time. 

To that end, after breakfast, he drew on a pair of fleece-linedslippers, donned a sweater, occupied two chairs in the well-knownfashion, and attacked with energy the pages of Le Conte's _Geology_. This book, as you very well know, discourses at first with greatinterest concerning erosions. Among other things it convinces you thata current of water, being doubled in swiftness, can transport a masssixty-four times as heavy as when it ran half as fast. This astoundingproposition is abstrusely proved. As Bennington had resolved not tomake his reading mere recreation, he drew diagrams conscientiouslyuntil he understood it. Then he passed on to an earnest considerationof why the revolution of the globe and the resistance of continentscause oceanic currents of a particular direction and velocity. Besidesthis, there was much easier reading concerning alluvial deposits. Sointerested did he grow that Old Mizzou, coming in, muddy-hoofed andglistening from a round of the stock, found him quite unapproachable onthe subject of cribbage. The patriarch then stumped over to Arthur'scabin. 

After dinner, Bennington picked up the book again, but found that hisbrain had reached the limit of spontaneous mental effort. He looked forOld Mizzou and the cribbage game. The miner had gone to visit Arthuragain. Bennington wandered about disconsolately. 

For a time he drummed idly on the window pane. Then he took out hisrevolver and tried to practise through the open doorway. The smoke fromthe discharges hung heavy in the damp air, filling the room in a mostdisagreeable fashion. Bennington's trips to see the effect of his shotsproved to him the fiendish propensity of everything he touched, were itnever so lightly, to sprinkle him with cold water. Above all, his skillwith the weapon was not great enough as yet to make it much fun. Heabandoned pistol shooting and yawned extensively, wishing it were timeto go to bed. 

In the evening he played cribbage with Old Mizzou. After a time Arthurand his wife came in and they had a dreary game of "cinch, " the manspeaking but little, the woman not at all. Old Mizzou smokedincessantly on a corncob pipe charged with a peculiarly pungent varietyof tobacco, which filled the air with a blue vapour, and penetratedunpleasantly into Bennington's mucous membranes. 

The next morning it was still raining. 

Bennington became very impatient indeed, but he tackled Le Conteindustriously, and did well enough until he tried to get it into hishead why various things happen to glaciers. Then viscosity, the linesof swiftest motion, relegation, and directions of pressure came forthfrom the printed pages and mocked him. He arose in his might and wentforth into the open air. 

Before going out he had put on his canvas shooting coat and a pair ofhobnailed leather hunting boots, laced for a little distance at thefront and sides. He visited the horses, standing disconsolate under anopen shed in the corral; he slopped, with constantly accruing masses ofsticky earth at his feet, to the chicken coop, into which he cast aneye; he even took the kitchen pails and tramped down to the spring andback. In the gulch he did not see or hear a living thing. A newly-bornand dirty little stream was trickling destructively through all mannerof shivering grasses and flowers. The water from Bennington's sleevesran down over the harsh canvas cuffs and turned his hands purple withthe cold. He returned to the cabin and changed his clothes. 

The short walk had refreshed him, but it had spurred his impatience. Outside, the world seemed to have changed. His experience with theHills, up to now, had always been in one phase of their beauty--that ofclear, bright sunshine and soft skies. Now it was as a differentcountry. He could not get rid of the feeling, foolish as it was, thatit was in reality different; and that the whole episode of the girl andthe rock was as a vision which had passed. It grew indistinct in thepresence of this iron reality of cold and wet. He could not assurehimself he had not imagined it all. Thus, belated, he came to thinkingof her again, and having now nothing else to do, he fell into daydreamsthat had no other effect than to reveal to him the impatience which hadbeen, from the first, the real cause of his restlessness under thetemporary confinement. Now the impatience grew in intensity. Heresolved that if the morrow did not end the storm, he would tramp downthe gulch to make a call. All this time _Aliris_ lay quite untouched. 

The next day dawned darker than ever. After breakfast Old Mizzou, asusual, went out to feed the horses, and Bennington, through sheeridleness, accompanied him. They distributed the oats and hay, and thenstood, sheltered from the direct rain, conversing idly. 

Suddenly the wind died and the rain ceased. In the place of the gloomsucceeded a strange sulphur-yellow glare which lay on the spirit withalmost physical oppression. Old Mizzou shouted something, and scrambledexcitedly to the house. Bennington looked about him bewildered. 

Over back of the hill, dimly discernible through the trees, loomed theblack irregular shape of a cloud, in dismal contrast to the yellowglare which now filled all the sky. The horses, frightened, crowded upclose to Bennington, trying to push their noses over his shoulder. Anumber of jays and finches rushed down through the woods and dartedrapidly, each with its peculiar flight, toward a clump of trees andbushes standing on a ridge across the valley. 

From the cabin Old Mizzou was shouting to him. He turned to follow theold man. Back of him something vast and awful roared out, and then allat once he felt himself struggling with a rush of waters. He was jammedviolently against the posts of the corral. There he worked to his feet. 

The whole side of the hill was one vast spread of shallow tossingwater, as though a lake had been let fall on the summit of the ridge. The smaller bushes were uprooted and swept along, but the trees andsaplings held their own. 

In a moment the stones and ridgelets began to show. It was over. Not adrop of rain had fallen. 

Bennington climbed the corral fence and walked slowly to the house. Theblacksmith shop was filled to the window, and Arthur's cabin was notmuch better. He entered the kitchen. The floor there was some twoinches submerged, but the water was slowly escaping through thedown-hill door by which Bennington had come in. Across the dining-roomdoor Mrs. Arthur had laid a folded rug. In front of the barrier stoodthe lady herself, vigorously sweeping back the threatening water fromher only glorious apartment. 

Bennington took the broom from her and swept until the cessation of theflood made it no longer necessary. Mrs. Arthur commenced to mop thefloor. The young man stepped outside. There he was joined a momentlater by the other two. 

They offered no explanation of their whereabouts during the trouble, but Bennington surmised shrewdly that they had hunted a dry place. 

"Glory!" cried Old Mizzou. "Lucky she misses us!"

"What was it? Where'd it come from?" inquired Bennington, shaking thesurface drops from his shoulders. He was wet through. 

"Cloud-burst, " replied the miner. "She hit up th' ridge a ways. Ifshe'd ever burst yere, sonny, ye'd never know what drownded ye. Look atthat gulch!"

The water had now drained from the hill entirely. It could be seen thatmost of the surface earth had been washed away, leaving the skeleton ofthe mountain bare. Some of the more slightly rooted trees had fallen, or clung precariously to the earth with bony fingers. But the gulchitself was terrible. The mountain laurel, the elders, the sarvisbushes, the wild roses which, a few days before, had been fragrant andbeautiful with blossom and leaf and musical with birds, haddisappeared. In their stead rolled an angry brown flood whirling inalmost unbroken surface from bank to bank. Several oaks, submerged totheir branches, raised their arms helplessly. As Bennington looked, one of these bent slowly and sank from sight. A moment later it shotwith great suddenness half its length into the air, was seized by theeager waters, and whisked away as lightly as though it had been a treeof straw. Dark objects began to come down with the stream. They seemedto be trying to preserve a semblance of dignity in their statelybobbing up and down, but apparently found the attempt difficult. Theroar was almost deafening, but even above it a strangely deliberategrinding noise was audible. Old Mizzou said it was the grating ofboulders as they were rolled along the bed of the stream. The yellowglow had disappeared from the air, and the gloom of rain had taken itsplace. 

A fine mist began to fall. Bennington for the first time realized hewas wet and shivering, and so he turned inside to change his clothes. 

"It'll all be over in a few hours, " remarked Arthur. "I reckon themSpanish Gulch people'll wish they lived up-stream. "

Bennington paused at the doorway. 

"That's so, " he commented. "How about Spanish Gulch? Will it all bedrowned out?"

"No, I reckon not, " replied Arthur. "They'll get wet down a lot, andhave wet blankets to sleep in to-night, that's all. You see the gulchspraddles out down there, an' then too all this timber'll jam down thisgulch a-ways. That'll back up th' water some, and so she won't come allof a rush. "

"I see, " said Bennington. 

The afternoon was well enough occupied in repairing to some extent theravages of the brief storm. A length of the corral had succumbed to theflood, many valuable tools in the blacksmith shop were in danger ofrust from the dampness, and Arthur and his wife had been completelywashed out. All three men worked hard setting things to rights. Thetwilight caught them before their work was done. 

Bennington found himself too weary to attempt an unknown, _débris_-covered road by dark. He played cribbage with Old Mizzou andwon. 

About half past nine he pushed back his chair and went outside. Thestars had come out by the thousand, and a solitary cricket, which hadin some way escaped the deluge, was chirping in the middle distance. With a sudden uplift of the heart he realized that he would see "her"on the morrow. He learned that no matter how philosophically we mayhave borne a separation, the prospect of its near end shows us howstrong the repression has been; the lifting of the bonds makes evidenthow much they have galled. 

CHAPTER X

THE WORLD MADE YOUNG

The morning fulfilled the promise of the night before. Bennington deLaney awoke to a sun-bright world, fresh with the early breezes. Amultitude of birds outside the window bubbled and warbled and carolledaway with all their little mights, either in joy at the return ofpeace, or in sorrow at the loss of their new-built houses. Sorrow andjoy sound much alike as nature tells them. The farther ridges and theprairies were once more in view, but now, oh, wonder! the great plainhad cast aside its robes of monk brown, and had stepped forth in jollygreen-o'Lincoln. The air was full of tingling life. Altogether amorning to cry one to leap eagerly from bed, to rush to the window, todrink in deep draughts of electric balmy ozone, and to thank heaven forthe grace of mere existence. 

That at least is what Bennington did. And he did more. He despatched ahasty breakfast, and went forth and saddled his steed, and rode awaydown the gulch, with never a thought of sample tests, and never a carewhether the day's work were done or not. For this was springtime, andthe air was snapping with it. Near the chickens' shelter the burnishedold gobbler spread his tail and dragged his wings and puffed hisfeathers and swelled himself red in the face, to the great admirationof a demure gray-brown little turkey hen. Overhead wheeled two smallhawks screaming. They clashed, and light feathers came floating downfrom the encounter; yet presently they flew away together to a hole ina dead tree. Three song sparrows dashed almost to his very feet, sobusily fighting that they hardly escaped the pony's hoofs. Everywherelove songs trilled from the underbrush; and Bennington de Laney, asyoung, as full of life, as unmated as they, rode slowly along thinkingof his lady love, and----

"Hullo! Where are you going?" cried she. 

He looked up with eager joy, to find that they had met in the middleof what used to be the road. The gulch had been swept bare by theflood, not only of every representative of the vegetable world, butalso of the very earth in which it had grown. From the remains of theroadbed projected sharp flints and rocks, among which the broncospicked their way. 

"Good-morning, Mary, " he cried. "I was just coming to see you. Wasn'tit a great rain?"

"And isn't the gulch awful? Down near our way the timber began to jam, and it is all choked up; but up here it is desolate. "

He turned his horse about, and they paced slowly along together, telling each other their respective experiences in the storm. It seemedthat the Lawtons had known nothing of the cloud-burst itself, exceptfrom its effects in filling up the ravine. Rumours of the drowning of aminer were about. 

It soon became evident that the brightness of the morning was reflectedfrom the girl's mood. She fairly sparkled with gaiety and high spirits. The two got along famously. 

"Where are you going?" asked Bennington at last. 

"On the picnic, of course, " she rejoined promptly. "Weren't youinvited? I thought you were. "

"I thought it would be too wet, " he averred in explanation. 

"Not a bit! The rain dries quickly in the hills, and the cloud-burstonly came into this gulch. I have here, " she went on, twisting aroundin her saddle to inspect a large bundle and a pair of well-stuffedsaddle bags, "I have here a coffee pot, a frying pan, a little kettle, two tin cups, and various sorts of grub. I am fixed for a scout sure. Now when we get near your camp you must run up and get an axe and somematches. "

Bennington observed with approval the corpulency of the bundle and theskilful manner with which it was tied on. He noted, with perhaps moreapproval, her lithe figure in its old-fashioned painter's blouse andrough skirt, and the rosiness of her cheeks under a cloth cap caught onawry. As the ponies sought a path at a snail's pace through the sharpflints, she showed in a thousand ways how high the gaiety of heranimal spirits had mounted. She sang airy little pieces of songs. Sheuttered single clear notes. She mocked, with a ludicrously femininecroak, the hoarse voice of a crow sailing over them. She ralliedBennington mercilessly on his corduroys, his yellow flapped pistolholster, his laced boots. She went over in ridiculous pantomime thescene of the mock lynching, until Bennington rolled in his saddle withlight-hearted laughter, and wondered how it was possible he had evertaken the affair seriously. When he returned with the axe she washugely alarmed lest he harm himself by his awkward way of carrying it, and gave him much wholesome advice in her most maternal manner. Afterall of which she would catch his eye, and they would both laugh tostartle the birds. 

Blue Lead proved to be some distance away, for which fact Benningtonwas not sorry. At length they surmounted a little ridge. Over itssummit there started into being a long cool "draw, " broad and shallownear the top, but deepening by insensible degrees into a cańon filledalready with broad-leaved shrubs, and thickly grown with saplings ofbeech and ash. Through the screen of slender trunks could be seenminiature open parks carpeted with a soft tiny fern, not high enough toconceal the ears of a rabbit, or to quench the flame of the tiger lilythat grew there. Soon a little brook sprang from nowhere, and crepttimidly through and under thick mosses. After a time it increased insize, and when it had become large enough to bubble over clear gravel, Mary called a halt. 

"We'll have our picnic here, " she decided. 

The ravine at this point received another little gulch into itself, andwhere the two came together the bottom widened out into almost parklikeproportions. On one side was a grass-plot encroached upon by numerousraspberry vines. On the other was the brook, flowing noisily in theshade of saplings and of ferns. 

Bennington unsaddled the horses and led them over to the grass-plot, where he picketed them securely in such a manner that they could notbecome entangled. When he returned to the brookside he found that Maryhad undone her bundle and spread out its contents. There were variousutensils, some corn meal, coffee, two slices of ham, raw potatoes, asmall bottle of milk, some eggs wonderfully preserved by moss insidethe pail, and some bread and cake. Bennington eyed all this in dismay. She caught his look and laughed. 

"Can't you cook? Well, I can; you just obey orders. "

"We won't get anything to eat before night, " objected Benningtondolefully as he looked over the decidedly raw material. 

"And he's _so_ hungry!" she teased. "Never mind, you build a fire. "

Bennington brightened. He had one outdoor knack--that of lightingmatches in a wind and inducing refractory wood to burn. His skill hadoften been called into requisition in the igniting of beach fires, andthe so-called "camp fires" of girls. He collected dry twigs from thesunny places, cut slivers with his knife, built over the whole awigwam-shaped pyramid of heavier twigs, against which he leaned hisfirewood. Then he touched off the combination. The slivers ignited thetwigs, the twigs set fire to the wigwam, the wigwam started thefirewood. Bennington's honour was vindicated. He felt proud. 

Mary, who had been filling the coffee pot at the creek, approached andviewed the triumph. She cast upon it the glance of scorn. 

"That's no cooking fire, " said she. 

So Bennington, under her directions, placed together the two parallellogs with the hewn sides and built the small bright fire between them. 

"Now you see, " she explained, "I can put my frying pan, and coffee pot, and kettle across the two logs. I can get at them easy, and don't burnmy fingers. Now you may peel the potatoes. "

The Easterner peeled potatoes under constant laughing amendment as tomethod. Then the small cook collected her materials about her, in grandpreparation for the final rites. She turned back the loose sleeves ofher blouse to the elbow. 

This drew an exclamation from Bennington. 

"Why, Mary, how white your arms are!" he cried, astonished. 

She surveyed her forearm with a little blush, turning it back andforth. 

"I _am_ pretty tanned, " she agreed. 

The coffee pot was filled and placed across the logs at one end, andleft to its own devices a little removed from the hottest of the fire. The kettle stood next, half filled with salted water, in which nestledthe potatoes like so many nested eggs. Mary mixed a mysteriousconcoction of corn meal, eggs, butter, and some white powder, mushingthe whole up with milk and water. The mixture she spread evenly in thebottom of the frying pan, which she set in a warm place. 

"It isn't much of a baking tin, " she commented, eyeing it critically, "but it'll do. "

Under her direction Bennington impaled the two slices of ham on longgreen switches, and stuck these upright in the ground in such aposition that the warmth from the flames could just reach them. 

"They'll never cook there, " he objected. 

"Didn't expect they would, " she retorted briefly. Then relenting, "They finish better if they're warmed through first, " she explained. 

By this time the potatoes were bubbling energetically and the coffeewas sending out a fragrant steam. Mary stabbed experimentally at thevegetables with a sharpened sliver. Apparently satisfied, she drew backwith a happy sigh. She shook her hair from her eyes and smiled acrossat Bennington. 

"Ready! Go!" cried she. 

The frying pan was covered with a tin plate on which were heaped livecoals. More coals were poked from between the logs on to a flat place, were spread out thin, and were crowned by the frying pan and itsglowing freight. Bennington held over the fire a switch of ham in eachhand, taking care, according to directions, not to approach the actualblaze. Mary borrowed his hunting knife and disappeared into thethicket. In a moment she returned with a kettle-lifter, improvised verysimply from a forked branch of a sapling. One of the forks was leftlong for the hand, the other was cut short. The result was like anEsquimaux fishhook. She then relieved Bennington of his task, whilethat young man lifted the kettle from the fire and carefully drainedaway the water. 

"Dinner!" she called gaily. 

Bennington looked up surprised. He had been so absorbed in the spellswrought by this dainty woods fairy that he had forgotten the flight oftime. It was enough for him to watch the turn of her wrist, the swiftcertainty of her movements, to catch the glow lit in her face by thefire over which she bent. Then he suddenly remembered that hermovements had all along tended toward dinner, and were not got upsimply and merely that he might discover new charms in the smallhousekeeper. 

He found himself seated on a rock with a tin plate in his lap, a tincup at his side, and an eager little lady in front of him, anxious thathe should taste all her dishes and deliver an opinion forthwith. 

The coffee he pronounced nectar; the ham and mealy potatoes, delicious;the "johnny-cake" of a yellow golden crispness which the originator ofjohnny-cake might envy; and the bread and cake and butter and sugaronly the less meritorious that they had not been prepared by her ownhands and on the spot. 

"And see!" she cried, clapping her hands, "the sun is still directlyover us. It is not night yet, silly boy!"

CHAPTER XI

AND HE DID EAT

After the meal he wanted to lie down in the grasses and watch theclouds sail by, but she would have none of it. She haled him away tothe brookside. There she showed him how to wash dishes by filling themhalf full of water in which fine gravel has been mixed, and thenwhirling the whole rapidly until the tin is rubbed quite clean. Neverwas prosaic task more delightful. They knelt side by side on the bank, under the dense leaves, and dabbled in the water happily. The fernswere fresh and cool. Once a redbird shot confidently down from above onhalf-closed wing, caught sight of these intruders, brought up with aswish of feathers, and eyed them gravely for some time from aneighbouring treelet. Apparently he was satisfied with his inspection, for after a few minutes he paid no further attention to them, but wentabout his business quietly. When the dishes had been washed, Marystood over Bennington while he packed them in the bundle and strappedthem on the saddle. 

"Now, " said she at last, "we have nothing more to think of until we gohome. "

She was like a child, playing with exhaustless spirits at the mosttrivial games. Not for a moment would she listen to anything of aserious nature. Bennington, with the heavier pertinacity of men whenthey have struck a congenial vein, tried to repeat to some extent theexperience of the last afternoon at the rock. Mary laughed hissentiment to ridicule and his poetics to scorn. Everything he said shetwisted into something funny or ridiculous. He wanted to sit down andenjoy the calm peace of the little ravine in which they had pitchedtheir temporary camp, but she made a quiet life miserable to him. Atlast in sheer desperation he arose to pursue, whereupon she vanishedlightly into the underbrush. A moment later he heard her clear laughmocking him from some elder thickets a hundred yards away. Benningtonpursued with ardour. It was as though a slow-turning ocean liner wereto try to run down a lively little yacht. 

Bennington had always considered girls as weak creatures, incapable ofswift motion, and needing assistance whenever the country departed fromthe artificial level of macadam. He had also thought himself fairlyactive. He revised these ideas. This girl could travel through the thinbrush of the creek bottom two feet to his one, because she ran morelightly and surely, and her endurance was not a matter for discussion. The question of second wind did not concern her any more than it does achild, whose ordinary mode of progression is heartbreaking. Benningtonfound that he was engaged in the most delightful play of his life. Heshouted aloud with the fun of it. He had the feeling that he wasgrasping at a sunbeam, or a mist-shape that always eluded him. 

He would lose her utterly, and would stand quite motionless, listening, for a long time. Suddenly, without warning, an exaggerated leaf crownwould fall about his neck, and he would be overwhelmed with ridicule atthe outrageous figure he presented. Then for a time she seemedeverywhere at once. The mottled sunlight under the trees danced andquivered after her, smiling and darkening as she dimpled or was grave. The little whirlwinds of the gulches seized the leaves and danced withher too, the birches and aspens tossed their hands, and rising everhigher and wilder and more elf-like came the mocking cadences of herlaughter. 

After a time she disappeared again. Bennington stood still, waiting forsome new prank, but he waited in vain. He instituted a search, but thesearch was fruitless. He called, but received no reply. At last he madehis way again to the dell in which they had lunched, and there he foundher, flat on her back, looking at the little summer clouds throughwide-open eyes. 

Her mood appeared to have changed. Indeed that seemed to becharacteristic of her; that her lightness was not so much the lightnessof thistle down, which is ever airy, the sport of every wind, butrather that of the rose vine, mobile and swaying in every breeze, yetat the same time rooted well in the wholesome garden earth. She carednow to be silent. In a little while Bennington saw that she had fallenasleep. For the first time he looked upon her face in absolute repose. 

Feature by feature, line by line, he went over it, and into his heartcrept that peculiar yearning which seems, on analysis, half pity forwhat has past and half fear for what may come. It is bestowed on littlechildren, and on those whose natures, in spite of their years, areessentially childlike. For this girl's face was so pathetically young. Its sensitive lips pouted with a child's pout, its pointed chin wasdelicate with the delicacy that is lost when the teeth have had oftento be clenched in resolve; its cheek was curved so softly, its longeyelashes shaded that cheek so purely. Yet somewhere, like anintangible spirit which dwelt in it, unseen except through its littlesteffects, Bennington seemed to trace that subtle sadness, or still moresubtle mystery, which at times showed so strongly in her eyes. Hecaught himself puzzling over it, trying to seize it. It was most like asorrow, and yet like a sorrow which had been outlived. Or, if amystery, it was as a mystery which was such only to others, no longerto herself. The whole line of thought was too fine-drawn forBennington's untrained perceptions. Yet again, all at once, he realizedthat this very fact was one of the girl's charms to him; that her merepresence stirred in him perceptions, intuitions, thoughts--yes, evenpowers--which he had never known before. He felt that she developedhim. He found that instead of being weak he was merely latent; that nowthe latent perceptions were unfolding. Since he had known her he hadfelt himself more of a man, more ready to grapple with facts andconditions on his own behalf, more inclined to take his own view of theworld and to act on it. She had given him independence, for she hadmade him believe in himself, and belief in one's self is the firstprinciple of independence. Bennington de Laney looked back on his oldNew York self as on a being infinitely remote. 

She awoke and opened her eyes slowly, and looked at him withoutblinking. The sun had gone nearly to the ridge top, and a Wilson'sthrush was celebrating with his hollow notes the artificial twilightof its shadow. 

She smiled at him a little vaguely, the mists of sleep clouding hereyes. It is the unguarded moment, the instant of awakening. At such aninstant the mask falls from before the features of the soul. I do notknow what Bennington saw. 

"Mary, Mary!" he cried uncontrolledly, "I love you! I love you, girl. "

He had never before seen any one so vexed. She sat up at once. 

"Oh, _why_ did you have to say that!" she cried angrily. "Why did youhave to spoil things! Why couldn't you have let it go along as it waswithout bringing _that_ into it!"

She arose and began to walk angrily up and down, kicking aside thesticks and stones as she encountered them. 

"I was just beginning to like you, and now you do this. _Oh_, I am soangry!" She stamped her little foot. "I thought I had found a man foronce who could be a good friend to me, whom I could meet unguardedly, and behold! the third day he tells me this!"

"I am sorry, " stammered Bennington, his new tenderness fleeing, frightened, into the inner recesses of his being. "I beg your pardon, Ididn't know--_Don't_! I won't say it again. Please!"

The declaration had been manly. This was ridiculously boyish. The girlfrowned at him in two minds as to what to do. 

"Really, truly, " he assured her. 

She laughed a little, scornfully. "Very well, I'll give you one morechance. I like you too well to drop you entirely. " (What an air ofautocracy she took, to be sure!) "You mustn't speak of that again. Andyou must forget it entirely. " She lowered at him, a delicious pictureof wrath. 

They saddled the horses and took their way homeward in silence. Thetenderness put out its flower head from the inner sanctuary. Apparentlythe coast was clear. It ventured a little further. The evening was veryshadowy and sweet and musical with birds. The tenderness boldly invadedBennington's eyes, and spoke, oh, so timidly, from his lips. 

"I will do just as you say, " it hesitated, "and I'll be very, verygood indeed. But am I to have no hope at all?"

"Why can't you keep off that standpoint entirely?"

"Just that one question; then I will. "

"Well, " grudgingly, "I suppose nothing on earth could keep the averagemortal from hoping; but I can't answer that there is any ground forit. "

"When can I speak of it again?"

"I don't know--after the Pioneer's Picnic. "

"That is when you cease to be a mystery, isn't it?"

She sighed. "That is when I become a greater mystery--even to myself, Ifear, " she added in a murmur too low for him to catch. 

They rode on in silence for a little space more. The night shadows wereflowing down between the trees like vapour. The girl of her own accordreturned to the subject. 

"You are greatly to be envied, " she said a little sadly, "for you arereally young. I am old, oh, very, very old! You have trust andconfidence. I have not. I can sympathize; I can understand. But thatis all. There is something within me that binds all my emotions so fastthat I can not give way to them. I want to. I wish I could. But it isgetting harder and harder for me to think of absolutely trusting, inthe sense of giving out the self that is my own. Ah, but you are to beenvied! You have saved up and accumulated the beautiful in your nature. I have wasted mine, and now I sit by the roadside and cry for it. Myonly hope and prayer is that a higher and better something will begiven me in place of the wasted, and yet I have no right to expect it. Silly, isn't it?" she concluded bitterly. 

Bennington made no reply. 

They drew near the gulch, and could hear the mellow sound of bells asthe town herd defiled slowly down it toward town. 

"We part here, " the young man broke the long silence. "When do I seeyou again?"

"I do not know. "

"To-morrow?"

"No. "

"Day after?"

The girl shook herself from a reverie. "If you want me to believe you, come every afternoon to the Rock, and wait. Some day I will meet youthere. "

She was gone. 

CHAPTER XII

OLD MIZZOU RESIGNS

Bennington went faithfully to the Rock for four days. During wholeafternoons he sat there looking out over the Bad Lands. At sunset hereturned to camp. _Aliris: A Romance of all Time_ gathered dust. Letters home remained unwritten. Prospecting was left to the capablehands of Old Mizzou until, much to Bennington's surprise, thatindividual resigned his position. 

The samples lay in neatly tied coffee sacks just outside the door. Thetabulations and statistics only needed copying to prepare them for thecapitalist's eye. The information necessary to the understanding ofthem reposed in a grimy notebook, requiring merely throwing into shapeas a letter to make them valuable to the Eastern owner of the property. Anybody could do that. 

Old Mizzou explained these things to Bennington. 

"You-all does this jes's well's I, " he said. "You expresses themsamples East, so as they kin assay 'em; an' you sends them notes andstatistics. Then all they is to do is to pay th' rest of the boys whenth' money rolls in. That ain't none of my funeral. "

"But there's the assessment work, " Bennington objected. 

"That comes along all right. I aims to live yere in the camp jest th'same as usual; and I'll help yo' git started when you-all aims to doth' work. "

"What do you want to quit for, then? If you live here, you may as welldraw your pay. "

"No, sonny, that ain't my way. I has some prospectin' of my own to do, an' as long as I is a employay of Bishop, I don't like to take his timefer my work. "

Bennington thought this very high-minded on the part of Old Mizzou. 

"Very well, " he agreed, "I'll write Bishop. "

"Oh, no, " put in the miner hastily, "no need to trouble. I resigns inwritin', of course; an' I sees to it myself. "

"Well, then, if you'll help me with the assessment work, when shall webegin?"

"C'yant jest now, " reflected Old Mizzou, "'cause, as I tells you, Iwants to do some work of my own. A'ter th' Pioneer's Picnic, Ireckons. "

The Pioneer's Picnic seemed to limit many things. 

Bennington shipped the ore East, tabulated the statistics, and wrotehis report. About two weeks later he received a letter from Bishopsaying that the assay of the samples had been very poor--not at all upto expectations--and asking some further information. As to the latter, Bennington consulted Old Mizzou. The miner said, "I told you so, " andhelped on the answer. After this the young man heard nothing furtherfrom his employer. As no more checks came from the East, he foundhimself with nothing to do. 

For four afternoons, as has been said, he fruitlessly haunted the Rock. On the fifth morning he met the girl on horseback. She was quite thesame as at first, and they resumed their old relations as if the fatalpicnic had never taken place. In a very few days they were as intimateas though they had known each other for years. 

Bennington read to her certain rewritten parts of _Aliris: A Romance ofall Time, _ which would have been ridiculous to any but these two. Theysaw it through the glamour of youth; for, in spite of her assertions ofgreat age, the girl, too, felt the whirl of that elixir in her veins. Yousee, he was twenty-one and she was twenty: magic years, more venerablethan threescore and ten. She gave him sympathy, which was just what heneeded for the sake of his self-confidence and development, just theright thing for him in that effervescent period which is so necessary aconcomitant of growth. The young business man indulges in a hundred wildschemes, to be corrected by older heads. The young artist paints strangeimpressionism, stranger symbolism, and perhaps a strangest other-ism, before at last he reaches the medium of his individual genius. The youngwriter thinks deep and philosophical thoughts which he expresses inmeasured polysyllabic language; he dreams wild dreams of ideal motive, which he sets forth in beautiful allegorical tales full of imagery; andhe delights in Rhetoric--flower-crowned, flashing-eyed, deep-voicedRhetoric, whom he clasps to his heart and believes to be true, althoughthe whole world declares her to be false; and then, after a time, hedecides not to introduce a new system of metaphysics, but to tell a plainstory plainly. Ah, it is a beautiful time to those who dwell in it, andsuch a funny time to those who do not!

They came to possess an influence over each other. She decided how theyshould meet; he, how they should act. She had only to be gay, and hewas gay; to be sad, and he was sad; to show her preference for seriousdiscourse, and he talked quietly of serious things; to sigh for dreams, and he would rhapsodize. It sometimes terrified her almost when she sawhow much his mood depended on hers. But once the mood was established, her dominance ceased and his began. If they were sad or gay orthoughtful or poetic, it was in his way and not in hers. He took thelead masterfully, and perhaps the more effectually in that it was doneunconsciously. And in a way which every reader will understand, butwhich genius alone could put into words, this mutual psychicaldependence made them feel the need of each other more strongly than anymerely physical dependence ever could. 

There is much to do in a new and romantic country, where the imminenceof a sordid, dreary future, when the soil will raise its own people andthe crop will be poor, is mercifully veiled. The future then countslittle in the face of the Past--the Past with its bearded strong men ofother lands, bringing their power and vigour here to be moulded anddirected by the influences of the frontier. Its shadow still lies overthe land. 

They did it all. The Rock was still the favourite place to read ortalk--crossbars nailed on firmly made "shinning" unnecessary now--butit was often deserted for days while they explored. Bennington hadbought the little bronco, and together they extended theirinvestigations of the country in all directions. They rode to SpringCreek Valley. They passed the Range over into Custer Valley. Once theyclimbed Harney by way of Grizzly Gulch. 

Thus they grew to know the Hills intimately. From the summit of theRock they would often look abroad over the tangle of valleys andridges, selecting the objective points for their next expedition. Manysurprises awaited them, for they found that here, as everywhere, aseemingly uniform exterior covered an almost infinite variety. 

Or again, the horses were given a rest. The sarvis-berries ripened, andthey picked hatfuls. Then followed the raspberries on the stony hills. They walked four unnecessary miles to see a forest fire, and six to buybuckskin work from a band of Sioux who had come up into the timber fortheir annual supply of tepee poles. They taught their ponies tricks. They even went wading together, like two small children, in a pool ofBattle Creek. 

Bennington was deliciously, carelessly, forgetfully happy. Only therewas Jim Fay. That individual was as much of a persecution as ever, andhe seemed to enjoy a greater intimacy with the girl than did theEasterner. He did not see her as often as did the latter, but heappeared to be more in her confidence. Bennington hated Jim Fay. 

CHAPTER XIII

THE SPIRES OF STONE

One afternoon they had pushed over back of Harney, up a very steeplittle trail in a very tiny cleft-like cańon, verdant and cool. All atonce the trail had stood straight on end. The ponies scrambled upsomehow, and they found themselves on a narrow open _mesa_ splashedwith green moss and matted with an aromatic covering of pine needles. 

Beyond the easternmost edge of the plateau stood great spires of stone, a dozen in all, several hundred feet high, and of solid granite. Theysoared up grandly into the open blue, like so many cathedral spires, drawing about them that air of solitude and stillness which accompaniesalways the sublime in Nature. Even boundless space was amplified at thebidding of their solemn uplifted fingers. The girl reined in her horse. 

"Oh!" she murmured in a hushed voice, "I feel impertinent--as though Iwere intruding. "

A squirrel many hundreds of feet below could be heard faintly barking. 

"There _is_ something solemn about them, " the boy agreed in the sametone, "but, after all, we are nothing to them. They are thinking theirown thoughts, far above everything in the world. "

She slipped from her horse. 

"Let's sit here and watch them, " she said. "I want to look at them, and_feel_ them. "

They sat on the moss, and stared solemnly across at the great spires ofstone. 

"They are waiting for something there, " she observed; "for somethingthat has not come to pass, and they are looking for it always towardthe East. Don't you see how they are waiting?"

"Yes, like Indian warriors wrapped each in his blanket. They might bethe Manitous. They say there are lots of them in the Hills. "

"Yes, of course!" she cried, on fire with the idea. "They are the Godsof the people, and they are waiting for something that iscoming--something from the East. What is it?"

"Civilization, " he suggested. 

"Yes! And when this something, this Civilization, comes, then theIndians are to be destroyed, and so their Gods are always watching forit toward the East. "

"And, " he went on, "when it comes at last, then the Manitous will haveto die, and so the Indians know that their hour has struck when thesegreat stone needles fall. "

"Why, we have made a legend, " she exclaimed with wonder. 

They stretched out on their backs along the slope, and stared up at thenewly dignified Manitous in delicious silence. 

"There was a legend once, you remember?" he began hesitatingly, "thefirst day we were on the Rock together. It was about a SpiritMountain. "

"Yes, I remember, the day we saw the Shadow. "

"You said you'd tell it to me some time. "

"Did I?"

"Don't you think now is a good time?"

She considered a moment idly. 

"Why, yes, I suppose so, " she assented, after a pause. "It isn't muchof a legend though. " She clasped her hands back of her head. "It goeslike this, " she began comfortably:

"Once upon a time, when the world was very young, there was an evilManitou named _Ne-naw-bo-shoo_. He was a very wicked Manitou, but hewas also very accomplished, for he could change himself into any shapehe wished to assume, and he could travel swifter than the wind. But hewas also very wicked. In old times the centres of all the trees werefat, and people could get food from them, but _Ne-naw-bo-shoo_ walkedthrough the forest and pushed his staff down through the middle of thetrunks, and that is why the cores of the trees are dark-coloured. Maplesap used to be pure sirup once, too, but _Ne-naw-bo-shoo_ diluted itwith rain water just out of spite. But there was one peculiar thingabout _Ne-naw-bo-shoo_. He could not cross a vein of gold or of silver. There was some sort of magic in them that turned him back--repelledhim. 

"Now, one day two lovers were wandering about on the prairie away eastof here. One of them was named _Mon-e-dowa_, or the Bird Lover, and theother was _Muj-e-ah-je-wan_, or Rippling Water. And as these two walkedover the plains talking together, along came the evil spirit, _Ne-naw-bo-shoo_, and as soon as he saw them he chased them, intendingto kill them and drink their blood, as was his custom. 

"They fled far over the prairie. Everywhere that _Muj-e-ah-je-wan_stepped, prairie violets grew up; and everywhere that _Mon-e-dowa_stepped, a lark sprang up and began to sing. But the wicked_Ne-naw-bo-shoo_ gained on them fast, for he could run very swiftly. 

"Then suddenly they saw in front of them a great mountain, grown withpines and seamed with fissures. This astonished them greatly, for theyknew there were no mountains in the prairie country at all; but theyhad no time to spare, so they climbed quickly up a broad cańon andconcealed themselves. 

"Now, when the wicked Manitou came along he tried to enter the cańontoo, but he had to stop, because down in the depths of the mountainwere veins of gold and silver which he could not cross. For many dayshe raged back and forth, but in vain. At last he got tired and wentaway. 

"Then _Mon-e-dowa_ and _Muj-e-ah-je-wan_, who had been living quitepeacefully on the game with which the mountain swarmed, came out of thecańon and turned toward home. But as soon as they had set foot on thelevel prairie again, the mountain vanished like a cloud, and then theyknew they had been aided by _Man-a-boo-sho_, the good Manitou. "

The girl arose and shook her skirt free of the pine needles that clungto it. 

"Ever since then, " she went on, eyeing Bennington saucily sideways, "the mountain has been invisible except to a very few. The legend saysthat when a maid and a warrior see it together they will be----"

"What?" asked Bennington as she paused. 

"Dead within the year!" she cried gaily, and ran lightly to her pony. 

"Did you like my legend?" she asked, as the ponies, foot-bunched, minced down the steepest of the trail. 

"Very much; all but the moral. "

"Don't you want to die?"

"Not a bit. "

"Then I'll have to. "

"That would be the same thing. "

And Bennington dared talk in this way, for the next day began thePioneer's Picnic, and lately she had been very kind. 

CHAPTER XIV

THE PIONEER'S PICNIC

The Lawtons were not going to the picnic. Bennington was to take Marydown to Rapid, where the girl was to stay with a certain Dr. McPhersonof the School of Mines. 

An early start was accomplished. They rode down the gulch through thedwarf oaks, past the farthermost point, and so out into the hard leveldirt road of Battle Creek cańon. Beyond were the pines, and a ruggedroad, flint-edged, full of dips and rises, turns and twists, hoveringon edges, or bosoming itself in deep rock-strewn cuts. Mary's littlepony cantered recklessly through it all, scampering along like aplayful dog after a stone, leading Bennington's larger animal byseveral feet. He had full leisure to notice the regular flop of the Tamo'Shanter over the lighter dance of the hair, the increasing rosinessof the cheeks dimpled into almost continual laughter, to catch straysnatches of gay little remarks thrown out at random as they tore along. After a time they drew out from the shadow of the pines into theclearing at Rockerville, where the hydraulic "giants" had eaten awaythe hill-sides, and left in them ugly unhealed sores. Then more roughpine-shadowed roads, from which occasionally would open for a momentbroad vistas of endless glades, clear as parks, breathless descents, orsharp steep cuts at the bottom of which Spring Creek, or as much of itas was not turned into the Rockerville sluices, brawled or idled along. It was time for lunch, so they dismounted near a deep still pool andate. The ponies cropped the sparse grasses, or twisted on their backs, all four legs in the air. Squirrels chattered and scolded overhead. Some of the indigo-coloured jays of the lowlands shot in long levelflight between the trees. The girl and the boy helped each other, hindered each other, playing here and there near the Question, butswerving always deliciously just in time. 

After lunch, more riding through more pines. The road dipped stronglyonce, then again; and then abruptly the forest ceased, and they foundthemselves cantering over broad rolling meadows knee-high with grasses, from which meadow larks rose in all directions like grasshoppers. Soonafter they passed the canvas "schooners" of some who had started theevening before. Down the next long slope the ponies dropped cautiouslywith bunched feet and tentative steps. Spring Creek was forded for thelast time, another steep grassy hill was surmounted, and they lookedabroad into Rapid Valley and over to the prairie beyond. 

Behind them the Hills lay, dark with the everlasting greenery of theNorth--even, low, with only sun-browned Harney to raise its cliff-likefront above the rest of the range. As though by a common impulse theyreined in their horses and looked back. 

"I wonder just where the Rock is?" she mused. 

They tried to guess at its location. 

The treeless ridge on which they were now standing ran like a beltoutside the Hills. They journeyed along its summit until late in theafternoon, and then all at once found the city of Rapid lying belowthem at the mouth of a mighty cańon, like a toy village on fine velvetbrown. 

In the city they separated, Mary going to the McPhersons', Benningtonto the hotel. It was now near to sunset, so it was agreed thatBennington was to come round the following morning to get her. At thehotel Bennington spent an interesting evening viewing the pioneers withtheir variety of costume, manners, and speech. He heard many goodstories, humorous and blood-curdling, and it was very late before hefinally got to bed. 

The immediate consequence was that he was equally late to breakfast. Hehurried through that meal and stepped out into the street, with theintention of hastening to Dr. McPherson's for Mary, but this he foundto be impossible because of the overcrowded condition of the streets. The sports of the day had already begun. From curb to curb the way wasjammed with a dense mass of men, women, and children, through whom hehad to worm his way. After ten feet of this, he heard his name called, and looking up, caught sight of Mary herself, perched on a dry-goodsbox, frantically waving a handkerchief in his direction. 

"You're a nice one!" she cried in mock reproach as he struggled towardher. Her eyes were bright and her cheeks flew red signals of enjoyment. 

Bennington explained. 

"I know. Well, it didn't matter, any way. I just captured this box. Climb up. There's room. I've lost the doctor and Mrs. McPhersonalready. "

Two mounted men, decorated with huge tin marshals' badges, rode slowlyalong forcing the crowd back to the right and to the left. The firsthorse race was on. Suddenly there was an eager scramble, a cloud ofdust, a swift impression of dim ghostlike figures. It was over. Thecrowd flowed into the street again. 

The two pressed together, hand in hand, on the top of the dry-goodsbox. They laughed at each other and everything. Something beautiful wasvery near to them, for this was the Pioneer's Picnic, and bothremembered that the Pioneer's Picnic marked the limit of many things. 

"What's next? What's next?" she called excitedly to a tall youngcattleman. 

The cowboy looked up at her, and his face relaxed into a pleased smile. 

"Why, it's a drillin' match over in the next street, miss, " he answeredpolitely. "You'd better run right along over and get a good place. " Heglanced at de Laney, smiled again, and turned away, apparently tofollow his own advice. 

"Come on, we'll follow him, " cried Mary, jumping down. 

"And abandon our box?" objected Bennington. But she was already in fullpursuit of the tall cowboy. 

The ring around the large boulder--dragged by mule team from thehills--had just begun to form when they arrived, so they were enabledto secure good places near the front rank, where they kneeled on theirhandkerchiefs, and the crowd hemmed them in at the back. The drillingmatch was to determine which pair of contestants could in a giventime, with sledge and drill, cut the deepest hole in a granite boulder. To one who stood apart, the sight must have been picturesque in theextreme. The white dust, stirred by restless feet, rose lazily acrossthe heated air. The sun shone down clear and hot with a certainwide-eyed glare that is seen only in the rarefied atmosphere of theWest. Around the outer edge of the ring hovered a few anxious smallboys, agonized that they were missing part of the show. Stolidlyindifferent Indians, wrapped close in their blankets, smoked silently, awaiting the next pony race, the riders of which were skylarking abouttrying to pull each other from their horses' backs. 

When the last pair had finished, the judges measured the depths of theholes drilled, and announced the victors. 

The crowd shouted and broke for the saloons. The latter had been plyinga brisk business, so that men were about ready to embrace inbrotherhood or in battle with equal alacrity. 

Suddenly it was the dinner hour. The crowd broke. Bennington and Maryrealized they had been wandering about hand in hand. They directedtheir steps toward the McPhersons with the greatest propriety. It was aglorious picnic. 

The house was gratefully cool and dark after the summer heat out ofdoors. The little doctor sat in the darkest room and dissertatedcannily on the strange variety of subjects which a Scotchman can alwaysbring up on the most ordinary occasions. 

The doctor was not only a learned man, as was evidenced by his positionin the School of Mines and his wonderful collections, but was a scoutof long standing, a physician of merit, and an Indian authority ofacknowledged weight. Withal he was so modest that these things becameknown only by implication or hearsay, never by direct evidence. Mrs. McPherson was not Scotch at all, but plain comfortable American, redolent of wholesome cleanliness and good temper, and beaming withkindliness and round spectacles. Never was such a doctor; never wassuch a Mrs. McPherson; never was such a dinner! And they brought inafter-dinner coffee in small cups. 

"Ah, ha! Mr. De Laney, " laughed the doctor, who had been watching himwith quizzical eye. "We're pretty bad, but we aren't got quite tosavagery yet. "

Bennington hastened to disavow. 

"That's all right, " the doctor reassured him; "that's all right. Ididn't wonder at ye in this country, but Mrs. McPherson and mysel' jesttake a wee trip occasionally to keep our wits bright. Isn't it so, Mrs. Mac?"

"It is that, " said she with a doubtful inner thought as to thepropriety of offering cream. 

"And as for you, " went on the doctor dissertatively, "I suppose ye'regetting to be somewhat of a miner yourself. I mind me we did a bit ofassay work for your people the other day--the Crazy Horse, wasn't it? Agood claim I should judge, from the sample, and so I wrote Davidson. "

"When was this?" asked the Easterner, puzzled. 

"The last week. "

"I didn't know he had had any assaying done. "

"O weel, " said the doctor comfortably, "it may not have occurred to himto report yet. It was rich. "

"Mrs. McPherson, let's talk about dresses, " called Mary across thetable. "Here we've come down for a _holiday_ and they insist on talkingmining. "

And so the subject was dropped, but Bennington could not get it out ofhis mind. Why should Mizzou have had the Crazy Horse assayed withoutsaying anything about it to him? Why had he not reported the result?How did it happen that the doctor's assistants had found the ore richwhen the company's assayers East had proved it poor? Why should Mizzouhave it assayed at all, since he was no longer connected with thecompany? But, above all, supposing he had done this with the intentionof keeping it secret from Bennington, what possible benefit oradvantage could the old man derive from such an action?

He puzzled over this. It seemed to still the effervescence of his joy. He realized suddenly that he had been very careless in a great manyrespects. The work had all been trusted to Davidson, while he, often, had never even seen it. He had been entirely occupied with the girl. Heexperienced that sudden sinking feeling which always comes to a manwhom neglected duty wakes from pleasure. 

What was Davidson's object? Could it be that he hoped to "buy in" arich claim at a low figure, and to that end had sent poor samples East?The more he thought of this the more reasonable it seemed. Hisresignation was for the purpose of putting him in the position ofoutside purchaser. 

He resolved to carry through the affair diplomatically. During theafternoon he ruminated on how this was to be done. Mary could notunderstand his preoccupation. It piqued her. A slight strangenesssprang up between them which he was too _distrait_ to notice. Finally, as he tumbled into bed that night, an idea so brilliant came to himthat he sat bolt upright in sheer delight at his own astuteness. 

He would ask Dr. McPherson for a copy of the assays. If his suspicionswere correct, these assays would represent the richest samples. Hewould send them at once to Bishop with a statement of the case, in thatmanner putting the capitalist on his guard. There was somethingexquisitely humorous to him in the idea of thus turning to his own usethe information which Davidson had accumulated for his fraudulentpurposes. He went to sleep chuckling over it. 

CHAPTER XV

THE GIRL ON THE TRAIN

The next morning the young man had quite regained his good spirits. Thegirl, on the other hand, was rather quiet. 

Dr. McPherson made no objections to furnishing a copy of the assays. The records, however, were at the School of Mines. He drove down to getthem, and in the interim the two young people, at Mrs. McPherson'ssuggestion, went to see the train come in. 

The platform of the station was filled to suffocation. Assuming thatthe crowd's intention was to view the unaccustomed locomotive, it wasstrange it did not occur to them that the opposite side of the track orthe adjacent prairie would afford more elbow room. They huddledtogether on the boards of the platform as though the appearance of thespectacle depended on every last individual's keeping his feet from thenaked earth. They pushed good-naturedly here and there, expostulating, calling to one another facetiously, looking anxiously down thestraight, dwindling track for the first glimpse of the locomotive. 

Mary and Bennington found themselves caught up at once into the vortex. After a few moments of desperate clinging together, they were forcedinto the front row, where they stood on the very edge, braced backagainst the pressure, half laughing, half vexed. 

The train drew in with a grinding rush. From the step swung theconductor. Faces looked from the open windows. 

On the platform of one of the last cars stood a young girl and threemen. One of the men was elderly, with white hair and side whiskers. Theother two were young and well dressed. The girl was of our bestpatrician type--the type that may know little, think little, saylittle, and generally amount to little, and yet carry its negativequalities with so used an air of polite society as to raise them bysheer force to the dignity of positive virtues. From head to foot shewas faultlessly groomed. From eye to attitude she was languidlysuperior--the impolitic would say bored. Yet every feature of herappearance and bearing, even to the very tips of her enamelled andsensibly thick boots, implied that she was of a different class fromthe ordinary, and satisfied on "common people" that impulse whichattracts her lesser sisters to the vulgar menagerie. She belonged tothe proper street--at the proper time of day. Any one acquainted withthe species would have known at once that this private-car trip toDeadwood was to please the prosperous-looking gentleman with the sidewhiskers, and that it was made bearable only by the two smooth-shavenindividuals in the background. 

She caught sight of the pair directly in front of her, and raised herlorgnette with a languid wrist. 

Her stare was from the outside-the-menagerie standpoint. Bennington wasnot used to it. For the moment he had the Fifth Avenue feeling, andknew that he was not properly dressed. Therefore, naturally, he wasconfused. He lowered his head and blushed a little. Then he becameconscious that Mary's clear eyes were examining him in a very troubledfashion. 

Three hours and a half afterward it suddenly occurred to him that shemight have thought he had blushed and lowered his head because he wasashamed to be seen by this other girl in her company; but it was thentoo late. 

The train pulled out. The Westerners at once scattered in alldirections. Half an hour later the choking cloud dusts rose like smokefrom the different trails that led north or south or west to the heartof the Hills. 

"The picnic is over, " he suggested gently at their noon camping place. 

"Yes, thank Heaven!"

"You remember your promise?"

"What promise?"

"That you would explain your 'mystery. '"

"I've changed my mind. "

A leaf floated slowly down the wind. A raven croaked. The breeze madethe sunbeams waver. 

"Mary, the picnic is over, " he repeated again very gently. 

"Yes, yes, yes!"

"I love you, Mary. "

The raven spread his wings and flew away. 

"Do you love me?" he insisted gently. 

"I want you to come to dinner at our house to-morrow noon. "

"That is a strange answer, Mary. "

"It is all the answer you'll get to-day. "

"Why are you so cross? Is anything the matter?"

"Nothing. "

"I love you, Mary. I love you, girl. At least I can say that now. "

"Yes, you can say it--now. "

CHAPTER XVI

A NOON DINNER

Bennington did not know what to make of his invitation. At one momenthe told himself it must mean that Mary loved him, and that she wishedhim to meet her parents on that account. At the next he tormentedhimself with the conviction that she thus merely avoided the issue. Between these moods he alternated, without being able to abide ineither. He forgot all about Old Mizzou. 

Promptly at noon the following day he turned up the little right-handtrail for the first time. 

The Lawton house he found, first of all, to be scrupulously neat. Itstood on a knoll, as do most gulch cabins, in order that occasionalfreshets might pass below, and the knoll looked as though it had beenclipped with a pair of scissors. Not a crooked little juniper bush wasallowed to intrude its plebeian sprawl among the dignified pines andthe gracefully infrequent bushes. In front of the cabin itself was a"rockery" of pink quartz, on which were piled elk antlers. The buildingwas L-shaped, of two low stories, had a veranda with a railing, andpossessed various ornamental wood edgings, all of which were painted. The whole affair was mathematically squared and correspondingly neat. Some boxes and pots of flowers adorned the window ledges. 

Bennington's knock was answered by an elderly woman, who introducedherself at once as Mrs. Lawton. She commenced a voluble and slightlyembarrassed explanation of how "she" would be down in a moment or so, at the same time leading the way into the parlour. While thisexplanation was going forward, Bennington had a good chance to examinehis hostess and her surroundings. 

Mrs. Lawton was of the fat but energetic variety. She fairly shone withcleanliness and with an insistent determination to keep busy. You couldsee that all the time her tongue was uttering polite platitudesconcerning the weather, her mind was hovering like a dragon fly overthis or that flower of domestic economy. She was one of the women whocarry their housekeeping to a perfection uncomfortable both to herselfand everybody else, and then delude themselves into the martyrlikebelief that she is doing it all entirely for others. As a consequence, she exhibited much of the time an aggrieved air that comported butludicrously with her tendency to bustle. And it must be confessed thatin other ways Mrs. Lawton was ludicrous. Her dumpy little form wasdressed in the loudest of prints, the figures of which turned her intoa huge flower bed of brilliant cabbage-like blooms. Over this chaos ofcolours peered her round little face with its snapping eyes. Shediscoursed in sentences which began coherently, but frayed out sooninto nothingness under the stress of inner thought. "I don't see wherethat husban' of mine is. I reckon you'll think we're just awful rude, Mr. De Laney, and that gal, an' Maude. I declare it's jest enough totry any one's patience, it surely is. You've no idea, Mr. De Laney, what with the hens settin', and this mis'able dry spell that sends th'dust all over everything and every one 'way behin' hand oneverythin'----" Her eye was becoming vacant as she wondered aboutcertain biscuits. 

"I'm sure it must be, " agreed Bennington uncomfortably. 

"What was I a-sayin'? You must excuse me, Mr. De Laney, but you, beinga man, can have no idea of the life us poor women folks lead, slavin'our very lives away to keep things runnin', and then no thanks fer ita'ter all. I'd just like t' see Bill Lawton try it _fer jest one week_. He'd be a ravin' lunatic, an' thet I tell him often. This country'sjest awful, too. I tell him he must get out sometimes, and I 'spect hewill, when he's made his pile, poor man, an' then we'll have a chanstto go back East again. When we lived East, Mr. De Laney, we had ahouse--not like this little shack; a good house with nigh on to a dozenrooms, and I had a gal to help me and some chanst to buy things once ina while, but now that Bill Lawton's moved West, what's goin' to becomeo' me I don't know. I'm nigh wore out with it all. "

"Then you lived East once?" asked Bennington. 

"Law, yes! We lived in Illinoy once, and th' Lord only knows I wisht welived there yet, though the farmin' was a sight of work and no paysometimes. " The inner doubts as to the biscuits proved too much forher. "Heaven knows, you ain't t' git much to eat, " she cried, jumpingup, "but you ain't goin' to git anythin' a tall if I don't run rightoff and tend to them biscuit. "

She bustled out. Bennington had time then to notice the decorations ofthe "parlour. " They offered to the eye a strange mixture of the Eastand West--reminiscences of the old home in "Illinoy" and trophies ofthe new camping-out on the frontier. From the ceiling hung a heavy lampwith prismatic danglers, surrounded by a globe on which were depictedstags in the act of leaping six-barred gates. By way of complement tothis gorgeous centrepiece, the paper on the walls showed, in infinitelyrecurring duplicate, a huntress in green habit and big hat carrying ona desperate flirtation with a young man in the habiliments of thefifteenth century, while across the background a huddle of dogs pursueda mammoth deer. Mathematically beneath the lamp stood a table coveredwith a red-figured spread. On the table was a glass bell, underneathwhich were wax flowers and a poorly-stuffed robin. In one angle of theroom austerely huddled a three-cornered "whatnot" of four shelves. Twochina pugs and a statuette of a simpering pair of children under amassive umbrella adorned this article of furniture. On the wall tickedan old-fashioned square wooden clock. The floor was concealed by a ragcarpet. So much for the East. The West contributed brilliant greencopper ore, flaky white tin ore, glittering white quartz ore, shiningpyrites, and one or two businesslike specimens of oxygenated quartz, all of which occupied points of exhibit on the "whatnot. " Over thecarpet were spread a deer skin, and a rug made from the hide of atimber wolf. Bennington found all this interesting but depressing. Hewas glad when Mrs. Lawton returned and took up her voluble discourse. 

In the midst of a dissertation on the relation of corn meal to eggsthe door opened, and Mr. Lawton sidled in. 

"Oh, here y' are at last!" observed his spouse scornfully, and rattledon. Lawton nodded awkwardly, and perched himself on the edge of achair. He had assumed an ill-fitting suit of store clothes, in which heunaccustomedly writhed, and evidently, to judge from the sleekness ofhis hair, had recently plunged his head in a pail of water. He saidnothing, but whenever Mrs. Lawton was not looking he winked elaboratelyand solemnly at Bennington as though to imply that circumstances aloneprevented any more open show of cordiality. At last, catching the youngman's eye at a more than usually propitious moment, he went through thepantomime of opening a bottle, then furtively arose and disappeared. Mrs. Lawton, remembering her cakes, ran out. Bennington was left aloneagain. He had not spoken six words. 

The door slowly opened, and another member of the family sidled in. Bennington owned a helpless feeling that this was a sort of show, andthat these various actors in it were parading their entrances andtheir exits before him. Or that he himself were the object ofinspection on whom the others were satisfying their own curiosity. 

The newcomer was a child, a little girl about eight or ten years old. Bennington liked children as a usual thing. No one on earth could havebecome possessed in this one's favour. She was a creature of regularbut mean features, extreme gravity, and evidently of an inquiringdisposition. On seeing her for the first time, one sophisticated wouldhave expected a deluge of questions. Bennington did. But she merelystood and stared without winking. 

"Hullo, little girl!" Bennington greeted her uneasily. 

The creature only stared the harder. 

"My doll's name is Garnet M-a-ay, " she observed suddenly, with along-drawn nasal accent. 

After this interesting bit of information another silence fell. 

"What is your name, little girl?" Bennington asked desperately atlast. 

"Maude, " remarked the phenomenon briefly. 

This statement she delivered in that whining tone which the extremelyself-conscious infant imagines to indicate playful childishness. Sheapproached. 

"D' you want t' see my picters?" she whimpered confidingly. 

Bennington expressed his delight. 

For seven geological ages did he gaze upon cheap and horrible woodcutsof gentlemen in fashionable raiment trying to lean againstconspicuously inadequate rustic gates; equally fashionable ladies, withflat chests, and rat's nest hair; and animals whose attitudes denotedplayful sportiveness of disposition. Each of these pictures wasexplained in minute detail. Bennington's distress became apathy. Mrs. Lawton returned from the cakes presently, yet her voice seemed to breakin on the duration of centuries. 

"Now, Maude!" she exclaimed, with a proper maternal pride, "you mustn'tbe botherin' the gentleman. " She paused to receive the expecteddisclaimer. It was made, albeit a little weakly. "Maude is very goodwith her Book, " she explained. "Miss Brown, that's the school teacherthat comes over from Hill Town summers, she says Maude reads a sightbetter than lots as is two or three years older. Now how old would youthink she was, Mr. De Laney?"

Mr. De Laney tried to appraise, while the object hung her headself-consciously and twisted her feet. He had no idea of children'sages. 

"About eleven, " he guessed, with an air of wisdom. 

"Jest eight an' a half!" cried the dame, folding her handstriumphantly. She let her fond maternal gaze rest on the prodigy. Suddenly she darted forward with extraordinary agility for one so wellendowed with flesh, and seized her offspring in relentless grasp. 

"I do declare, Maude Eliza!" she exclaimed in horror-stricken tones, "you ain't washed your ears! You come with me!"

They disappeared in a blue mist of wails. 

As though this were his cue, the crafty features of Lawton appearedcautiously in the doorway, bestowed a furtive and searching inspectionon the room, and finally winked solemnly at its only occupant. A handwas inserted. The forefinger beckoned. Bennington arose wearily andwent out. 

Lawton led the way to a little oat shed standing at some distance fromthe house. Behind this he paused. From beneath his coat he drew a roundbottle and two glass tumblers. 

"No joke skippin' th' ole lady, " he chuckled in an undertone. He pouredout a liberal portion for himself, and passed the bottle along. Bennington was unwilling to hurt the old fellow's feelings after he hadtaken so much trouble on his account, but he was equally unwilling todrink the whisky. So he threw it away when Lawton was not looking. 

They walked leisurely toward the house, Lawton explaining variousimprovements in a loud tone of voice, intended more to lull his wife'ssuspicions than to edify the young man. The lady looked on themsternly, and announced dinner. At the table Bennington found Maryalready seated. 

The Easterner was placed next to Mrs. Lawton. At his other hand wasMaude Eliza. Mary sat opposite. Throughout the meal she said little, and only looked up from her plate when Bennington's attention wascalled another way. 

Her mere presence, however, seemed to open to the young man a differentpoint of view. He found Mrs. Lawton's lengthy dissertations amusing; heconsidered Mr. Lawton in the light of a unique character, and MaudeEliza, while as disagreeable as ever, came in for various excuses andexplanations on her own behalf in the young man's mind. He became moreresponsive. He told a number of very good stories, at which the otherslaughed. He detailed some experiences of his own at places in the worldfar remote, selected, it must be confessed, with some slight referenceto their dazzling effect on the company. Without actually "showingoff, " he managed to get the effect of it. The result of his efforts wasto harmonize to some extent these diverse elements. Mrs. Lawton becamemore coherent, Mr. Lawton more communicative; Maude Eliza stoppedwhining--occasionally and temporarily. Bennington had rarely been insuch high spirits. He was surprised himself, but then was not that dayof moment to him, and would he not have been a strange sort ofindividual to have seen in the world aught but brightness?

But Mary responded not at all. Rather, as Bennington arose, she fell, until at last she hardly even moved in her place. 

"Chirk up, chirk up!" cried Mrs. Lawton gaily, for her. "I know someone who ought to be happy, anyhow. " She glanced meaningly from one tothe other and laughed heartily. 

Bennington felt a momentary disgust at her tactlessness, but covered itwith some laughing sally of his own. The meal broke up in great goodhumour. Mrs. Lawton and Maude Eliza remained to clear away the dishes. Mr. Lawton remarked that he must get back to work, and shook hands infarewell most elaborately. Bennington laughingly promised them all thathe would surely come again. Then he escaped, and followed Mary up thehill, surmising truly enough that she had gone on toward the Rock. Hethought he caught a glimpse of her through the elders. He hastened hisfootsteps. At this he stumbled slightly. From his pocket fell a letterhe had received that morning. He picked it up and looked at it idly. 

It was from his mother and covered a number of closely-written pages. As he was about to thrust it back into his pocket a single sentencecaught his eye. It read: "Sally Ogletree gave a supper last week, whichwas a very pretty affair. "

He stopped short on the trail, and the world seemed to go black aroundhim. He almost fell. Then resumed his way, but step now was hesitatingand slow, and he walked with his eyes bent thoughtfully on the ground. 

CHAPTER XVII

NOBLESSE OBLIGE

The thought which caused Bennington de Lane so suddenly look grave wassuggested by the sentence in his mother's letter. For the first time herealized that these people, up to now so amusing, were possiblydestined to come into intimate relations with himself. Old Bill Lawtonwas Mary's father; while Mrs. Lawton was Mary's mother; Maude wasMary's sister. 

The next instant a great rush of love into his heart drove this feelingfrom it. What matter anything, provided she loved him and he loved her?Generous sentiment so filled him that there was room for nothing else. He even experienced dimly in the depths of his consciousness, a faintpale joy that in thus accepting what was disagreeable to his finersensibilities, he was proving more truly to his own self theboundlessness of his love. For the moment he was exalted by thisinstant revulsion against anything calculating in his passion. Andthen slowly, one by one, the objections stole back, like a flock ofnoisome sombre creatures put to flight by a sudden movement, but nowreturning to their old nesting places. The very unassuming method oftheir recurrence lent them an added influence. Almost before Benningtonknew it they had established a case, and he found himself face to facewith a very ugly problem. 

Perhaps it will be a little difficult for the average and democraticreader to realize fully the terrible proportions of this problem. Wewhose lives assume little, require little of them. Intangibleobjections to the desires of our hearts do not count for much againsttheir realization; there needs the rough attrition of reality to turnback our calm, complacent acquisition of that which we see to be forour best interest in the emotional world. Claims of ancestry meannothing. Claims of society mean not much more. Claims of wealth areconsidered as evanescent among a class of men who, by their efforts andgenius, are able to render absolute wealth itself an evanescentquality. When one of us loves, he questions the worth of the object ofhis passion. That established, nothing else is of great importance. There is a grand and noble quality in this, but it misses much. Aboutthe other state of affairs--wherein the woman's appurtenances of allkinds, as well as the woman herself, are significant--is a delicate andsubtle aura of the higher refinement--the long refinement of the spiritthrough many generations--which, to an eye accustomed to look forgradations of moral beauty, possesses a peach-blow iridescence of itsown. From one point of view, the old-fashioned forms of thought andcourtesy are stilted and useless. From another they retain still thelofty dignity of _noblesse oblige_. 

So we would have none set down Bennington de Laney as a prig or a snobbecause he did not at once decide for his heart as against hisaristocratic instincts. Not only all his early education, but the lifelessons of many generations of ancestors had taught him to set afictitious value on social position. He was a de Laney on both sides. He had never been allowed to forget it. A long line of forefathers, proud-eyed in their gilded frames, mutely gazed their sense of theobligations they had bequeathed to this last representative of theirrace. When one belongs to a great family he can not live entirely forhimself. His disgrace or failure reflects not alone on his ownreputation, but it sullies the fair fame of men long dead and buried;and this is a dreadful thing. For all these old Puritans and Cavaliers, these knights and barons, these king's councillors and scholars, haveperchance lived out the long years of their lives with all good intentand purpose and with all earnestness of execution, merely that theymight build and send down to posterity this same fair fame. It is abold man, or a wicked man, who will dare lightly to bring the effortsof so many lives to naught! In the thought of these centuries ofendeavour, the sacrifice of mere personal happiness does not seem sogreat an affair after all. The Family Name has taken to itself a soul. It is a living thing. It may be worked for, it may be nourished byaffection, it may even be worshipped. Men may give their lives to itwith as great a devotion, with as exalted a sense of renunciation, andas lofty a joy in that renunciation, as those who vow allegiance to St. Francis or St. Dominic. The tearing of the heart from the bosom oftenproves to be a mortal hurt when there is nothing to put in the gap ofits emptiness. Not so when a tradition like this may partly take itsplace. 

These, and more subtle considerations, were the noblest elements ofBennington de Laney's doubts. But perhaps they were no more potent thansome others which rushed through the breach made for them in the youngman's decision. 

He had always lived so much at home that he had come to accept the homepoint of view without question. That is to say, he never examined thevalue of his parent's ideas, because it never occurred to him to doubtthem. He had no perspective. 

In a way, then, he accepted as axioms the social tenets held by hismother, or the business methods practised by his father. He believedthat elderly men should speak precisely, and in grammatical, butcolourless English. He believed also that people should, in society, conduct themselves according to the fashion-plate pattern designed byMrs. De Laney. He believed these things, not because he was a fool, orshallow, or lacking in humour, or snobbish, but because nothing hadever happened to cause him to examine his beliefs closely, that hemight appreciate what they really were. One of these views was, thatcultured people were of a class in themselves, and could not and shouldnot mix with other classes. Mrs. De Laney entertained a horror ofvulgarity. So deep-rooted was this horror that a remote taint of it wassufficient to thrust forever outside the pale of her approbation anyunfortunate who exhibited it. She preferred stupidity to common sense, when the former was allied with good form, and the latter only withplain kindliness. This was partly instinct and partly the result ofcultivation. She would shrink, with uncontrollable disgust, from any ofthe lower classes with whom she came unavoidably in contact. A slightbreach of the conventions earned her distrust of one of her own caste. As this personal idiosyncrasy fell in line with the de Laney pride, itwas approved by the head of the family. Under encouragement it becamealmost a monomania. 

Bennington pictured to himself only too vividly the effect of theLawtons on this lady's aristocratic prejudices. He knew, only too well, that Bill Lawton's table manners would not be allowed even in herkitchen. He could imagine Mrs. Lawton's fatuous conversation in the deLaney's drawing-room, or Maude Eliza's dressed-up self-consciousness. The experience of having the three Westerners to dinner just oncewould, Bennington knew, drive his lady mother to the verge of nervousprostration--he remembered his father's one and only experience inbringing business connections home to lunch--; his imagination failedto picture the effect of her having to endure them as actual members ofthe family! As if this were not bad enough, his restless fancy carriedhim a step farther. He perceived the agonies of shame andmortification, real even though they were conventional, she would haveto endure in the face of society. That the de Laneys, social leaders, rigid in respectability, should be forced to the humiliation ofacknowledging a misalliance, should be forced to the added humiliationof confessing that this marriage was not only with a family of inferiorsocial standing, but with one actually unlettered and vulgar!Bennington knew only too well the temper of his mother--and of society. 

It would not be difficult to expand these doubts, to amplify thesereasons, and even to adduce others which occurred to the unhappy youngman as he climbed the hill. But enough has been said. Surely thereader, no matter how removed in sympathy from that line of argument, must be able now at least to sympathize, to perceive that Bennington deLaney had some reason for thought, some excuse for the tardiness of hissteps as they carried him to a meeting with the girl he loved. 

For he did love her, perhaps the more tenderly that doubts must, perforce, arise. All these considerations affected not at all histhought of her. But now, for the first time, Bennington de Laney wasweighing the relative claims of duty and happiness. His happinessdepended upon his love. That his duty to his race, his parents, hiscaste had some reality in fact, and a very solid reality in his ownestimation, the author hopes he has shown. If not, several pages havebeen written in vain. 

The conflict in his mind had carried him to the Rock. Here, as heexpected, he found Mary already arrived. He ascended to the littleplateau and dropped wearily to the moss. His face had gone very whitein the last quarter of an hour. 

"You see now why I asked you to come to-day, " she said withoutpreliminary. "Now you have seen them, and there is nothing more toconceal. "

"I know, I know, " he replied dully. "I am trying to think it out. Ican't see it yet. "

They took entirely for granted that each knew the subject of theother's thoughts. The girl seemed much the more self-possessed of thetwo. 

"We may as well understand each other, " she said quietly, withoutemotion. "You have told me a certain thing, and have asked me for acertain answer. I could not give it to you before without deceivingyou. Now the answer depends on you. I have deceived you in a way, " shewent on more earnestly, "but I did not mean to. I did not realize thedifference, truly I didn't, until I saw the girl on the train. Then Iknew the difference between her and me, and between her's and mine. Andwhen you turned away, I saw that you were her kind, and I saw, too, that you ought to know everything there was about me. Then you spoke. "

"I meant what I said, too, " he interrupted. "You must believe that, Mary, whatever comes. "

"I was sorry you did, " she went on, as though she had not heard him. Then with just a touch of impatience tingeing the even calm of hervoice, "Oh, why will men insist on saying those things!" she cried. "The way to win a girl is not thus. He should see her often, withoutspeaking of love, being everything to her, until at last she finds shecan not live without him. "

"Have I been that to you, Mary? Has it come to that with me?" he askedwistfully. 

"Heaven help me, I am afraid it has!" she cried, burying her face inher hands. 

A great gladness leaped up into his face, and died as the blaze of afire leaps up and expires. 

"That makes it easier--and harder, " he said. "It is bad enough as itis. I don't know how I can make you understand, dear. "

"I understand more than you think, " she replied, becoming calm again, and letting her hands fall into her lap. "I am going to speak quiteplainly. You love me, Ben--ah, don't I know it!" she cried, with asudden burst of passion. "I have seen it in your eyes these many days. I have heard it in your voice. I have felt it welling out from yourgreat heart. It has been sweet to me--so sweet! You can not know, noman ever could know, how that love of yours has filled my soul and myheart until there was room for nothing else in the whole wide world!"

"You love me!" he said wonderingly. 

"If I had not known that, do you think I would have endured a moment'shesitation after you had seen the objectionable features of my life? Doyou think that if I had the slightest doubts of your love, I could nowunderstand _why_ you hesitate? But I do, and I honour you for it. "

"You love me!" he repeated. 

"Yes, yes, Ben dear, I _do_ love you. I love you as I never thoughtto be permitted to love. Do you want to know what I did that second dayon the Rock--the day you first showed me what you really were? The dayyou told me of your old home and the great tree? It was all sopeaceful, and tender, and comforting, so sweet and pure, that it restedme. I felt, here is a man at last who could not misunderstand me, couldnot be abrupt, and harsh, and cruel. I said to myself, 'He is notperfect nor does he expect perfection. ' I shut my eyes, and thensomething choked me, and the tears came. I cried out loud, 'Oh, to bewhat I was, to give again what I have not! O God, give me back my heartas it once was, and let me love!' Yes, Ben dear, I said 'love. ' Andthen I was not happy any more all day. But God answered that prayer, Ben dear, and we do love one another now, and that is why we can lookat things together, and see what is best for us both. "

"You love me!" he exclaimed for the third time. 

"And now, dear, we must talk plainly and calmly. You have seen what myfamily is. "

"I don't know, Mary, that I can make you understand at all, " beganBennington helplessly. "I can't express it even to myself. Our peopleare so different. My training has been so different. All this sort ofthing means so much to us, and so little to you. "

"I know exactly, " she interrupted. "I have read, and I have lived East. I can appreciate just how it is. See if I can not read your thoughts. My family is uneducated. If it becomes your family, your own parentswill be more than grieved, and your friends will have little to do withyou. You have also duties toward your family, _as_ a family. Is thatit?"

"Yes, that _is_ it, " answered he, "but there are so many things it doesnot say. It seems to me it has come to be a horrible dilemma with me. If I do what I am afraid is my duty to my family and my people, I willbe unhappy without you forever. And if I follow my heart, then it seemsto me I will wrong myself, and will be unhappy that way. It seems achoice of just in what manner I will be miserable!" he ended with aghastly laugh. 

"And which is the most worth while?" she asked in a still voice. 

"I don't know, I don't know!" he cried miserably. "I must think. "

He looked out straight ahead of him for some time. "Whichever way Idecide, " he said after a little, "I want you to know this, Mary: I loveyou, and I always will love you, and the fact that I choose my duty, ifI do, is only that if I did not, I would not consider myself worthyeven to look at you. " A silence fell on them again. 

"I can not live West, " said he again, as though he had been arguingthis point in his mind and had just reached the conclusion of it. "Mylife is East; I never knew it until now. " He hesitated. "Wouldyou--that is, could you--I mean, would your family have to live Easttoo?"

She caught his meaning and drew herself up, with a little pride in themovement. 

"Wherever I go, whatever I do, my people must be free to go or do. Youhave your duty to your family. I have my duty to mine!"

He bowed his head quietly in assent. She looked at the struggledepicted in the lines of his face with eyes in which, strangely enough, was much pity, but no unhappiness or doubt. Could it be that she was sosure of the result?

At last he raised his head slowly and turned to her with an air ofdecision. 

"Mary----" he began. 

At that moment there became audible a sudden rattle of stones below theRock, and at the same instant a harsh voice broke in rudely upon theirconversation. 

CHAPTER XVIII

THE CLAIM JUMPERS

Bennington instinctively put his finger on his lips to enjoin silence, and peered cautiously over the edge of the dike. Perhaps he was gladthat this diversion had occurred to postpone even for a short time theannouncement of a decision it had cost him so much to make. Perhaps herecognised the voice. 

Three men were clambering a trifle laboriously over the broken rocks atthe foot of the dike, swearing a little at their unstable footing, butall apparently much in earnest in their conversation. Even asBennington looked they came to a halt, and then sank down each on aconvenient rock, talking interestedly. One was Old Mizzou, one was theman Arthur, the third was a stranger whom Bennington had never seen. 

The latter had hardly the air of the country. 

He was a dapper little man dressed in a dark gray bob-tailed cutaway, and a brown derby hat, which was pushed far back on his head. His face, however, was keen and alert and brown, all of which characteristicsindicated an active Western life at no very remote day. The words whichhad so powerfully arrested Bennington de Laney's attention weredelivered by Old Mizzou to this stranger. 

"Thar!" the old man had said, "ain't that Crazy Hoss Lode 'bout asgood-lookin' a lead as they make 'em?"

"So, so; so, so;" replied the man in the derby in a high voice. "Yourvein is a fissure vein all right enough, and you've got a good widelead. If it holds up in quality, I don't know but what you're right. "

"I shows you them assays of McPherson's, don't I?" argued Mizzou, "an'any quartz in this kentry that assays twenty-four dollars ain't no wayscheap. "

This speech was so significantly in line with Bennington's surmise thathe caught his breath and drew back cautiously out of sight, but stillin such a position that he could hear plainly every word uttered by thegroup below. The girl was watching him with bright, interested eyes. 

"Listen carefully!" he whispered, bringing his mouth close to her ear. "I think there's some sort of plot here. "

She nodded ready comprehension, and they settled themselves to hear thefollowing conversation:

"I saw the assay, " replied the stranger's voice to Mizzou's laststatement, "but who's this McPherson? How do I know the assays are allright?"

"Why, he's that thar professer at th' School of Mines, " expostulatedMizzou. 

"Oh, yes!" cried the stranger, as though suddenly enlightened. "Ifthose are his assays, they're all right. Let's see them again. "

There followed a rustling of papers. 

"Well, I've looked over your layout, " went on the stranger after amoment, "and pretty thoroughly in the last few days. I know what you'vegot here. Now what's your proposition?"

There was a pause. 

"I knows you a good while, Slayton----" began Mizzou, but wasinterrupted almost immediately by a third voice, that of Arthur. "Thepoint is this, " said the latter sharply, "Davidson here is in aposition to give you possession of this group o' claims, but he ain'tin a position to appear in th' transaction. How are you goin' topurtect him an' me so we gets something out of it?"

"Wait a minute, " put in the stranger, "I want to ask a few questionsmyself. These claims belong to the Holy Smoke Company now, don't they?"

"Well, that's the idea. "

"Are either of you the agent of that Company?"

"Not directly, perhaps. "

"Are you indirectly?"

"Seems to me you haven't got any call t' look into that, if weguarantee t' give you good title. "

"How do I know you can give me good title?"

"Ain't I tellin' you so?"

"Yes, but why should I believe you?"

"You shouldn't, unless you've got sense enough to see that we ain'tgettin' you 'way up here, an' we ain't living round these parts acouple of years on a busted proposition. "

The stranger evidently debated this. 

"How would it be if you took equal shares with me on the claims, yourshares to be paid from the earnings? That would be fair all round. Youwould get nothing unless the title was good. I would risk no more thanyou did, " he suggested. 

"Isn't I tellin' yo' I don't appear a tall in this yere transaction?"objected Mizzou. 

The stranger laughed a little. 

"I can see through a millstone, " he said. "Why don't you oldturtlebacks come out of your shells and play square? You've got someshady game on here that you're working underhand. Spin your yarn andI'll tell you what I think of it. "

"How do I know you don't leave us out a'ter we tells you, " objectedMizzou, returning to his original idea. 

"You don't!" answered the stranger impatiently, "you don't! But itseems to me if you expect to get anything out of a shady transaction, you've got to risk something. "

"That's right, " put in Arthur, "that's right! 'Nuff said! Now, Slayton, we'll agree to git you full legal control of these yere claims ifyou'll develop them at your expense, an' gin Davidson and me a thirdinterest between us fer our influence. That's our proposition, an' thatgoes. If you don't play squar', I knows how t' make ye. "

"Spin your yarn, " repeated the stranger quietly. "I'll agree to giveyou and Davidson a third interest, _provided_ I take hold of the thingat all. "

"An' Jack Slayton, " put in Mizzou threateningly, "if you don't play ussquar', I swar I'll shoot ye like a dog!"

"Oh, stow that, Davidson, " rejoined the stranger in an irritated voice;"that rot don't do any good. I know you, and you know me. I never wentback on a game yet, and you know it. "

"I does know it, Jack!" came up Davidson's voice repentantly, "but thisis a big deal, an' y' can't be too careful!"

"All right, all right, " the stranger responded "Now tell us yourscheme. How can you get hold of the property?"

"By jumping the claims, " replied Arthur calmly. There ensued a shortpause. Then:

"Don't be a fool, " exclaimed Slayton with contempt; "this is no hold-upcountry. You can't drive a man off his property with a gun. "

"I knows that. These claims can be 'jumped' quiet and legal. "

"How?"

"They ain't be'n a stroke of assessment work done on 'em since we came. Th' Company's title's gone long ago. They lost their job last January. Them claims is open to any one who cares to have 'em. "

The stranger uttered a long whistle. Old Mizzou chuckled cunningly. "Ihas charge of them claims from th' time they quits work on 'em 'tillnow. They ain't be'n a pick raised on 'em. Anybody could a-jumped 'emany time since las' January. "

"But how about the Company?" asked Slayton. "How did you fool them?"

"Oh, I sends 'em bills fer work reg'lar enough! And I didn't throwaway th' money neither!"

"Yes, that'd be easy enough. But how about the people around here? Whyhaven't they jumped the claims long ago?"

"Wall, I argues about this a-way. These yere gents sees I has charge, an' they says to themselves, 'Ole Davidson takes care of themassessment works all right, ' an' so they never thinks it's worth whilet' see whether it is done or not. "

"You trusted to their thinking you were performing your duties?"

"Thet's it. "

"Well, it was a pretty big risk!"

"Ev'rything t' gain an' nothin' t' lose, " quoted Old Mizzoucomfortably. 

"How about this new man the Company has out here--de Laney? Is he inthis deal too?"

"Oh, him!" said Davidson with vast contempt. "He don' know enough t'dodge a brick! I tells him th' assessment work is all done. He believesit, an' never looks t' see. I gets him fooled so easy it's shorefunny. "

"Hold on!" put in Slayton sharply. "I'm not so sure you aren't liablethere somewhere. Of course your failure to do the assessment work whileyou were alone here was negligence, but that is all. The Company couldfire you for failing to do your duty, but they couldn't prove any fraudagainst you. But when this de Laney came along it changed things. "

"How is that?"

"Well, you told him the assessment work had been done, in so manywords, didn't you? The Company can prove that you were using yourofficial information to deceive him for the purposes of fraud. In otherwords, you were an officer of the Company, and you deceived anotherofficer in your official capacity. I don't know but you'd be liable toa criminal action. "

"Not on your tin-type, " said Old Mizzou with confidence. 

"Have you looked it up?"

"I does better than that. At that point I shore becomes subtle. _Iresigns from th' Company!_ A'ter that I talks assessment work. I tellshim advice, jest as a friend. If he believes th' same, an' it ain't so, why thet's unfort'nit, but they can't do anythin' t' me. I'm jest anoutsider. He is responsible to th' Company, an' if he wantsinformation, he ought to go to th' books, and not to frien's who maydeceive him. "

"Davidson, you're a genius!" exclaimed the stranger heartily. 

"I tells you I becomes subtle, " acknowledged the old man with justpride. "But now you sees it ain't delikit that my name appears in th'case a tall. Folks is so suspicious these yere days, that if I has ashare, and Arthur yere has a share, they says p'rhaps we has this yerescheme in view right along. But if Slayton gets them lapsed claims byhisself, Slayton bein' a stranger, they thinks how fortinit thatSlayton is t' git onto it, and they puts pore Ole Mizzou down asbecomin' fergitful in his old age. "

The stranger laughed. 

"It's easy, " he remarked. "We get them for nothing, and you can betyour sweet life I'll push 'em through for all there is in it. Why, boys, you're rich! You won't have anything more to do the rest of yourmortal days, unless you want to. "

"I ain't seekin' no manual employment, " observed Mizzou. 

"I'm willin' to quit work, " agreed Arthur. 

"Well, you'll have a chance. Now we better hustle this thing throughlively. We've got to make our discoveries on the quiet so no one willget on to us. "

"It ain't goin' t' take us long t' tack up them notices, now 't we'veagreed. We kin do th' most on it this evenin'. Jest lay low, that'sall. "

"Ain't de Laney going to get onto us sasshaying off with a lot ofnotices?"

"If he does, " remarked Old Mizzou grimly, "I knows a dark hole whar weretires that young man for th' day! If it comes t' that, though, yougot t' tend to it, Slayton. I ain't showin' in this deal y' know. "

The stranger laughed unpleasantly. 

"You show me the hole and I'll take care of Mr. Man, " he agreed. Helaughed again. "By the way, it strikes me that fellow's going to run upagainst a good deal of tribulation before he gets through. "

"Wall, thet thar Comp'ny ain't goin' to raise his pay when they findsit out, " agreed Mizzou. "Thet Bishop, he gets tolerable anxious 'boutthem assessment works now, and writes frequent. I got a whole bunch ofhis letters up t' camp that I keeps for th' good of his health. Ain'tno wise healthy t' worry 'bout business, you know. "

"Wonder th' little idiot didn't miss his mail, " growled Arthur. 

"Oh, I coaxes him on with th' letters from his mammy and pappy. They'sharmless enough. "

The three men fell into a discussion of various specimens of quartzwhich they took from their pockets, and, after what seemed to be aninterminable time, arose and moved slowly down the hill. 

The girl looked at her companion with wide-open eyes. "Ben!" shegasped, "what have you done?"

"Made a fool of myself, " he responded curtly. 

"What are you going to do about it?"

"I don't know. "

He knit his brows deeply. She cast about for an expedient. 

"I wish I knew more about mining!" she cried. "I know there is some wayto get legal possession of a claim by patenting it, but I don't knowhow you do it. "

He did not reply. 

"There must be some way out of this, " she went on, all alert. "Theyhaven't done anything yet. Why don't you go down to camp and inquire?"

"Every man would be in the hills in less than an hour. I couldn't trustthem, " he replied brusquely. 

"Oh, I know!" she cried with relief. "You must hunt up Jim. He knowsall about those things, and you could rely on him. "

"Jim? What Jim?"

"Jim Fay. Oh, that's just it! Run, Ben; go at once; don't wait aminute!"

"I want nothing whatever to do with that man, " he said deliberately. "He has insulted me at every opportunity. He has treated me in a mannerthat was even more than insulting every time we have met. If I weredying, and he had but to turn his head toward me to save me, I wouldnot ask him to do so!"

"Oh, don't be foolish, Ben!" cried she, wringing her hands in despair. "Don't let your pride stand in your way! Do you not realize thedisgrace this will be to you--to lose all these rich claims just bycarelessness? Do you realize that it means something to me, for I havebeen the reason of that carelessness. I know it! Just this once, forgetall he has done to you. You can trust him. Don't be afraid of that. Tell him that I sent you, if you don't want to trust him on your ownaccount----" she broke off. "Where are you going?" she asked anxiously. 

"To do something, " he answered, shutting his teeth together with asnap. 

"Will you see Jim?" she begged, following him to the edge of the Rockas he swung himself down the tree. 

"No!" he said, without looking back. 

After he disappeared--in the direction of the Holy Smoke camp, as shenoticed--she descended rapidly to the ground and hurried, sobbingexcitedly, away toward Spanish Gulch. She was all alive with distress. She had never realized until the moment of his failure how much she hadloved this man. Near the village she paused, bathed her eyes in thebrook, and, assuming an air of deliberation and calmness, began makinginquiries as to the whereabouts of Jim Fay. 

CHAPTER XIX

BENNINGTON PROVES GAME

Bennington de Laney sat on the pile of rocks at the entrance to theHoly Smoke shaft. Across his knees lay the thirty-calibre rifle. Hisface was very white and set. Perhaps he was thinking of his return toNew York in disgrace, of his interview with Bishop, of his inevitablemeeting with a multitude of friends, who would read in the daily papersthe accounts of his incompetence--criminal incompetence, they wouldcall it. The shadows were beginning to lengthen across the slope of thehill. Up the gulch cow bells tinkled, up the hill birds sang, andthrough the little hollows twilight flowed like a vapour. The wildroses on the hillside were blooming--late in this high altitude. Thepines were singing their endless song. But Bennington de Laney waslooking upon none of these softer beauties of the Hills. Rather hewatched intently the lower gulch with its flood-wracked, water-twistedskeleton laid bare. Could it be that in the destruction there figuredforth he caught the symbol of his own condition? That the dreary gloomof that ruin typified the chaos of sombre thoughts that occupied hisown remorseful mind? If so, the fancy must have absorbed him. Themoments slipped by one by one, the shadows grew longer, the bird songslouder, and still the figure with the rifle sat motionless, his facewhite and still, watching the lower gulch. 

Or could it be that Bennington de Laney waited for some one, and thattherefore his gaze was so fixed? It would seem so. For when the beat ofhoofs became audible, the white face quickened into alertness, and themotionless figure stirred somewhat. 

The rider came in sight, rising and falling in a steady, unhesitatinglope. He swung rapidly to the left, and ascended the knoll. Oppositethe shaft of the Holy Smoke lode he reined in his bronco anddismounted. The rider was Jim Fay. 

Bennington de Laney did not move. He looked up at the newcomer withdull resignation. "He takes it hard, poor fellow!" thought Fay. 

"Well, what's to be done?" asked the Easterner in a strained voice. "Isuppose you know all about it, or you wouldn't be here. "

"Yes, I know all about it, " said Fay gently. "You mustn't take it sohard. Perhaps we can do something. We'll be able to save one or twoclaims, any way, if we're quick about it. "

"I've heard something about patenting claims, " went on de Laney in thesame strange, dull tones; "could that be done?"

"No. You have to do five hundred dollars' worth of work, and advertisefor sixty days. There isn't time. "

"That settles it. I don't know what we can do then. "

"Well, that depends. I've come to help do something. We've got to getan everlasting hustle on us, that's all; and I'm afraid we arebeginning a little behindhand in the race. You ought to have hunted meup at once. "

"I don't see what there is to do, " repeated Bennington thickly. 

"Don't you? The assessment work hasn't been done--that's the idea, isn't it?--and so the claims have reverted to the Government. They aretherefore open to location, as in the beginning, and that is just whatDavidson and that crowd are going to do to them. Well, they're just asmuch open to us. We'll just _jump our own claims!_"

"What!" cried the Easterner, excited. 

"Well, relocate them ourselves, if that suits you better. "

Bennington's dull eyes began to light up. 

"So get a move on you, " went on Fay; "hustle out some paper so we canmake location notices. Under the terms of a relocation, we can use theold stakes and 'discovery, ' so all we have to do is to tack up a newnotice all round. That's the trouble. That gang's got their notices allwritten, and I'm afraid they've got ahead of us. Come on!"

Bennington, who had up to this time remained seated on the pile ofstones, seemed filled with a new and great excitement. He tottered tohis feet, throwing his hands aloft. 

"Thank God! Thank God!" he cried, catching his breath convulsively. 

Fay turned to look at him curiously. "We aren't that much out of thewoods, " he remarked; "the other gang'll get in their work, don't youfret. "

"They never will, they never will!" cried the Easterner exultantly. "They can't. We'll locate 'em all!" The tears welled over his eyes andran down his cheeks. 

"What do you mean?" asked Fay, beginning to fear the excitement hadunsettled his companion's wits. 

"Because they're there!" cried Bennington, pointing to the mouth of theshaft near which he had been sitting. "Davidson, Slayton, Arthur--they're all there, and they can't get away! I didn't know whatelse to do. I had to do something!"

Fay cast an understanding glance at the young man's rifle, and sprangto the entrance of the shaft. As though in direct corroboration of hisspeech, Fay could perceive, just emerging from the shadow, the sinisterfigure of the man Arthur creeping cautiously up the ladder, evidentlyencouraged to an attempt to escape by the sound of the conversationabove. The Westerner snatched his pistol from his holster andpresented it down the shaft. 

"Kindly return!" he commanded in a soft voice. The upward motion of thedim figure ceased, and in a moment it had faded from view in thedescent. Fay waited a moment. "In five minutes, " he announced in loudertones, "I'm going to let loose this six-shooter down that shaft. Ishould advise you gentlemen to retire to the tunnel. " He peered downagain intently. A sudden clatter and thud behind him startled him. Helooked around. Bennington had fallen at full length across the stones, and his rifle, falling, had clashed against the broken ore. 

Fay, with a slight shrug of contempt at such womanish weakness, ran tohis assistance. He straightened the Easterner out and placed his foldedcoat under his head. "He'll come around in a minute, " he muttered. Heglanced toward the gulch and then back to the shaft. "Can't leave thatlay-out, " he went on. He bent over the prostrate figure and began toloosen the band of his shirt. Something about the boy's clothingattracted his attention, so, drawing his knife, he deftly and gentlyripped away the coat and shirt. Then he arose softly to his feet andbared his head. 

"I apologize to you, " said he, addressing the recumbent form; "you aregame. "

In the fleshy part of the naked shoulder was a small round hole, clotted and smeared with blood. 

Jim Fay stooped and examined the wound closely. The bullet had enterednear the point of the shoulder, but a little below, so that it hadmerely cut a secant through the curve of the muscle. If it had struck aquarter of an inch to the left it would have gouged a furrow; a quarterof an inch beyond that would have caused it to miss entirely. Fay sawthat the hurt itself was slight, and that the Easterner had faintedmore because of loss of blood than from the shock. This determined tohis satisfaction, he moved quickly to the mouth of the shaft. "Waybelow!" he cried in a sharp voice, and discharged his revolver twicedown the opening. Then he stole noiselessly away, and ran at speed tothe kitchen of the shack, whence he immediately returned with a pail ofwater and a number of towels. He set these down, and again peered downthe shaft. "Way below!" he repeated, and dropped down a sizable chunkof ore. Apparently satisfied that the prisoners were well warned, hegave his whole attention to his patient. 

He washed the wound carefully. Then he made a compress of one of thetowels, and bound it with the other two. Looking up, he discoveredBennington watching him intently. 

"It's all right!" he assured the latter in answer to the question inhis eyes. "Nothing but a scratch. Lie still a minute till I get thisfastened, and you can sit up and watch the rat hole while I get yousome clothes. "

In another moment or so the young man was propped up against an emptyore "bucket, " his shoulder bound, and his hand slung comfortably in asling from his neck. 

"There you are, " said Jim cheerily. "Now you take my six-shooter andwatch that aggregation till I get back. They won't come out any, butyou may as well be sure. "

He handed Bennington his revolver, and moved off in the direction ofthe cabin, whistling cheerfully. The young man looked after himthoughtfully. Nothing could have been more considerate than theWesterner's manner, nothing could have been kinder than his promptaction--Bennington saw that his pony, now cropping the brush near athand, was black with sweat--nothing could have been morestraightforward than his assistance in the matter of the claims. Andyet Bennington de Laney was not satisfied. He felt he owed the suddenchange of front to a word spoken in his behalf by the girl. This was astrange influence she possessed, thus to alter a man's attitudeentirely by the mere voicing of a wish. 

The Westerner returned carrying a loose shirt and a coat, which he drewentire over the injured shoulder, which left one sleeve empty. 

"I guess that fixes you, " said he with satisfaction. 

"Look here, " put in Bennington suddenly, "you've been mighty good to mein all this. If you hadn't come along as you did, these fellows wouldhave nabbed me sooner or later, and probably I'd have lost the claimsany way. I feel I owe you a lot. But I want you to know before you goany further that that don't square us. You've had it in for me eversince I came out here, and you've made it mighty unpleasant for me. Ican't forget that all at once. I want to tell you plainly that, although I am grateful enough, I know just why you have done all this. It is because _she_ asked you to. And knowing that, I can't accept whatyou do for me as from a friend, for I don't feel friendly toward you inthe least. " His face flushed painfully. "I'm not trying to insult youor be boorish, " he said; "I just want you to understand how I feelabout it. And now that you know, I suppose you'd better let the mattergo, although I'm much obliged to you for fixing me up. "

He glanced at his shoulder. 

Fay listened to this speech quietly and with patience. "What do youintend to do?" he asked, when the other had quite finished. 

"I don't know yet. If you'll say nothing down below--and I'm sure youwill not--I'll contrive some way of keeping this procession down thehole, and of feeding them, and then I'll relocate the claims myself. "

"With one arm?"

"Yes, with one arm!" cried Bennington fiercely; "with no arms at all, if need be!" he broke off suddenly, with the New Yorker's ingrainedinstinct of repression. "I beg your pardon. I mean I'll do as well as Ican, of course. "

"How about the woman--Arthur's wife? She'll give you trouble. "

"She has locked herself in her cabin already. I will assist her tocontinue the imprisonment. "

Fay laughed outright. "And you expect, with one arm and wounded, tofeed four people, keep them in confinement, and at the same time torelocate eighteen claims lying scattered all over the hills! Well, you're optimistic, to say the least. "

"I'll do the best I can, " repeated Bennington doggedly. 

"And you won't ask help of a friend ready to give it?"

"Not as a friend. "

"Well, " Fay chuckled, apparently not displeased, "you're an obstinateyoung man, or rather a pig-headed young man, but I don't know as thatcounts against you. I'll help you out, anyway--if not as a friend, thenas an enemy. You see, I have my marching orders from someone else, andyou haven't anything to do with it. "

Bennington bowed coldly, but his immense relief flickered into his facein spite of himself. "What should we do first?" he asked formally. 

"Sit here and wait for the kids, " responded Jim. 

"Who are the kids?"

"Friends of mine--trustworthy. "

Jim rearranged Bennington's coverings and lit a pipe. "Tell us aboutit, " said he. 

"There isn't much to tell. I knew I had to do something, so I just heldthem up and made them get down the shaft. I didn't know what I wasgoing to do next, but I was glad to have them out of the way to gettime to think. "

"Who plugged you?" inquired Fay, motioning with the mouthpiece of hispipe toward the wounded shoulder. 

"That was Arthur. He had a little gun in his coat pocket and he shotfrom inside the pocket. I'd made them drop all the guns they had, Ithought. "

"Did you take a crack at him then?" asked Fay, interested. 

"Oh, no. I just covered him and made him shell out. As a matter of factI don't believe any one of them knew I was hit. "

Fay smoked on in silence, glancing from time to time with satisfactionat the youth opposite. During the passage of these events the day hadnot far advanced. The shadow of Harney had not yet reached out to theedge of the hills. 

"Hullo! The kids!" said Fay suddenly. 

Two pedestrians emerged from the lower gulch and bent their stepstoward the camp. As they came nearer, Bennington, with a gasp ofsurprise, recognised the Leslies. 

The sprightly youths were dressed just alike, in knickerbockers andNorfolk jackets of dark brown plaid, and small college caps tomatch--an outfit which Bennington had always believed would attract toovivid attention in this country. As they came nearer he saw that thejackets were fitted with pockets of great size. In the pockets weresketch books and bulging articles. They caught sight of the two figureson the ore heap simultaneously. 

"Behold our attentive host!" cried Jeems. "He is now in the act ofreceiving us with all honour!"

Bennington's face fairly shone with pleasure at the encounter. "Hullofellows! Hullo there!" he cried out delightedly again and again, androse slowly to his feet. This disclosed the fact of his injury, and thebrothers ran forward, with real sympathy and concern expressed on theirlively countenances. There ensued a rapid fire of questions andanswers. The Leslies proved to be already familiar with the details ofthe attempt to jump the claims, and understood at once Fay's briefaccount of the present situation, over which they rejoiced in thewell-known Leslie fashion. They exploded in genuine admiration ofBennington's adventure, and praised that young man enthusiastically. Bennington could feel, even before this, that he stood on a differentfooting than formerly with these self-reliant young men. They treatedhim as familiarly as ever, but with a new respect. The truth is, theirastuteness in reading character, which is as essentially an attributeof the artistic temperament in black and white as in words and phrases, had shown them already that their old acquaintance had grown from boyto man since last they had met. They knew this even before they learnedof its manifestation. So astounding was the change that they gave itcredit, perhaps, for being more thorough than it was. After thesituation had been made plain, Bennington reverted to theunexpectedness of their appearance. 

"But you haven't told me yet how you happen to be here, " he suggested. "I'd as soon have expected to see Ethel Henry coming up the gulch!"

"Didn't you get our letters?" cried Bert in astonishment. 

"No, I haven't received any letters. Did you write?"

"Did we write! Well, I should think so! We wrote three times, tellingyou we were coming and when to expect us. Jeems and I wondered why youdidn't meet us. That explains it. Seems funny you didn't get any ofthose letters!"

"No, I don't believe it is so funny after all, " responded Bennington, who had been thinking it over. "I remember now that Davidson told theothers he had been intercepting my letters from the Company, and Isuppose he got yours too. "

"That's it, of course. I'll have to interview that Davidson later. Well, we used to train around here off and on, as I told you once, andthis year Jeems and I thought we'd do our summer sketching here, andsort of revive old times. So we packed up and came. "

"I'm mighty glad you came, anyway, " replied Bennington fervently. 

"So'm I. We're just in time to help foil the villain. As foilers Jeemsand I are an artistic success. We have studied foiling under the bestmasters in the Bowery and Sixth Avenue theatres. "

"Where's Bill?" asked Jim suddenly. 

"Will be around in the morning. You're to report progress at once. Didn't dare to come up until after the row. Dreadful anxious though. Would have come if Jeems and I hadn't forbidden it. "

Bennington wondered vaguely who Bill might be, but he was beginning tofeel a little tired from the excitement and his wound, so he saidnothing. 

"The next thing is grub, " remarked Fay, rising and gathering his pony'sreins. "I'll mosey up to the shack and see about supper. You fellowscan sit around and talk until I get organized. "

He turned to move away, leading his horse. 

"Hold on a minute, Jim, " called Bert. "You might lend me your bronc, and I'll lope down and set Bill's mind easy. It won't take long. "

"Good scheme!" approved Jim heartily. "That's thoughtful of you, Bertie!"

He dropped the reins where he stood, and the pony, with the usualwell-trained Western docility, hung his head and halted. Bert arose andlooked down the shaft. 

"Supper will be served shortly, gentlemen, " he observed suavely. Heturned toward the pony. 

"Bert, " called Bennington in a different voice, "did you say you weregoing down the gulch?"

"Yes. "

"Do you want to do something for me?"

"Why, surely. What is it?"

"Would you just as soon stop at the Lawtons' and tell Miss Lawton forme that it's all right! You'll find the Lawton house----"

"Yes, I know where the Lawton house is, " interrupted Bert, "but MissLawton, you said?"

"Don't you remember, Bert, " put in James, "there is a kid there--Maude, or something of that sort?"

"No, no, not Maude, " persisted Bennington, still more bashfully. "Imean Miss Lawton, the young lady. "

He felt that both the youths were looking keenly at him with dawningwonder and delight. "Hold on, Bert, " interposed James, as the other wasabout to exclaim, "do you mean, Ben, the one you've been giving such arush for the last two months?"

"Miss Lawton and I are very good friends, " replied Bennington withdignity, wondering whence James had his information. 

Bert drew in his breath sharply, and opened his mouth to speak. 

"Hold on, Bert, " interposed James again. "There are possibilities inthis. Don't destroy artistic development by undue haste. What did youcall the young lady, Ben?"

"Miss Lawton, of course!"

"Daughter of Bill Lawton?"

"Why, yes. "

"Oh, my eye!" ejaculated James. 

"And you have eyes in your head!" he cried after a moment. "You haveears in your head! Blamed if you haven't everything in your head butbrains! She's a good one! I didn't appreciate the subtlety of thatwoman before. Ben, you everlasting idiot, do you mean to tell me thatyou've seen that girl every day for the last two months, and don't knowyet that she's too good to belong to Bill Lawton?"

Bert began to laugh hysterically. 

"What do you mean!" cried Bennington. 

"What I say. _She_ isn't Bill Lawton's daughter. Her name isn't Lawtonat all. O glory! He don't even know her name!" James in his turn wentinto a fit of laughing. In uncontrollable excitement Bennington seizedhim with his sound hand. 

"What is it? Tell me! What is her name, then?"

"O Lord! Don't squeeze so! I'll tell you! Letup!"

James dashed the back of his hand across his eyes. 

"What is her name?" repeated Bennington fiercely. 

"Wilhelmina Fay. We call her Bill for short. "

"And Jim Fay?"

"Is her brother. "

"And the Lawtons?"

"They board there. "

Across Bennington's mind flashed vaguely a suspicion that turned himfaint with mortification. 

"Who is this Jim Fay?" he asked. 

"He's Jim Fay--James Leicester Fay, of Boston. "

"Not----"

"Yes, exactly. The Boston Fays. "

Bert swung himself into the saddle. "Better not say anything to Billabout the young 'un's shoulder, " called after him the ever-thoughtfulJames. 

CHAPTER XX

MASKS OFF

Now that it was all explained, it seemed to Bennington de Laney to beridiculously simple. He wondered how he could have been so blind. Forthe moment, however, all other emotions were swallowed up in intensemortification over the density he had displayed, and the ridiculouslight in which he must have appeared to all the actors in the comedy. His companion perceived this, and kindly hastened to relieve it. 

"You're wondering how it all happened, " said he, "but you don't want toask about it. I'm going to tell you the story of your life. You see, Bert and I knew the Fays very well in Boston, and we knew also thatthey were out here in the Hills. That's what tickled us so when yousaid you were coming out to this very place. You know yourself, Ben, that you were pretty green when you were in New York--you must know it, because you have got over it so nicely since--and it struck us, afteryou talked so much about the 'Wild West, ' that it would be a shame ifyou didn't get some of it. So we wrote Jim that you were coming, and tosee to it that you had a time. "

Jim chuckled a little. "From his letters, I guess you had it. He wroteabout that horse he sprung on you, and the time they lynched you, andall the rest of it, and we thought we had done pretty well, especiallysince Jim wrote he thought you weren't half bad, and had come throughin good shape. He wrote, too, that you had run against Bill, and thatBill was fooling you up in some way--way unspecified. He seemed to be alittle afraid that Bill was trifling with your young affections--how isit Ben, anyway?--but he said that Bill was very haughty on the subject, and as he'd never been able to do anything with her before, he didn'tbelieve he'd have much success if he should try now. I suggested thatBill might get in a little deep herself, " went on James, watching hislistener's face keenly, "but Bert seemed inclined to the opinion thatany one as experienced as Bill was perfectly able to take care ofherself anywhere. She's a mighty fine girl, Ben, old man, " suddenlyconcluded this startling youth, holding out his hand, "and I wish youevery success in the world in getting her!"

"Thank you, Jeems, " replied Bennington simply, without attempting todeny the state of affairs. "I'm sure I'm glad of your good wishes, butI'm afraid I haven't any show now. " He sighed deeply. 

"I'll give an opinion on that after I see Bill again, " observed theartist sagely. 

"It always struck me as being queer that two of the most refined peopleabout here should happen to be living in the same house, " commentedBennington, only just aware that it had so struck him. 

"Did it, indeed?" said Leslie drolly. "You're just bursting withsagacity now, aren't you? And your Sherlock-Holmes intellect isseething with conjecture. The lover's soul is far above the sordidearthly considerations which interest us ordinary mortals, but I'll beta hat you are wondering how it comes that a Boston girl is out herewithout any more restraint on her actions than a careless brother whodoesn't bother himself, and why she's out here at all, and a few thingslike that. 'Fess up. "

"Well, " acknowledged Bennington a trifle reluctantly, "of course it isa little out of the ordinary, but then it's all right, somehow, I'llswear. "

"All right! Of course it's all right! They haven't any father ormother, you know, and they are independent of action, as you've nodoubt noticed. Bill kept house for Jim for some time--and they used tokeep a great house, I tell you, " said James, smacking his lips inrecollection. "Bert and I used to visit there a good deal. That's whythey call me Jeems--to distinguish me from Jim. Then Jim got tired ofdoing nothing--they possess everlasting rocks--you know their lamenteddad was a sort of amateur Croesus--and he decided to monkey with mines. Bert and I were here one summer, so Bill and Jim just pulled up stakesand came along too. They have been here ever since. They're both truesports and like the life, and all that; and, besides, Jim has kept busymonkeying with mining speculation. They're the salt of the earth, thatpair, if they _do_ worry poor old Boston to death with their ways ofdoing things. That's one reason I like 'em so much. Society has fitsover their doings, but it can't get along without them. "

"The Fays are a pretty good family, aren't they?" inquired Bennington. He was irresistibly impelled to ask this question. 

"Best going. Mayflower, William the Conqueror, and all that rot. Youmust know of the Boston Fays. "

"I do. That is, I've heard of them; but I didn't know whether they werethe same. "

Jeems perceived that the topic interested the young fellow, so hedescanted at length concerning the Fays, their belongings, and theirdoings. Time passed rapidly. Bennington was surprised to see Jim comingdown to them through the afterglow of sunset announcing vociferouslythat the meal was at last prepared. 

"I've fed the old lady, " he announced, "and unlocked her. She doesn'tknow what's up anyway. She just sits there like a graven image, scaredto death. She doesn't know a relocation from a telegraph pole. I toldher to get a move on her and fix us up some bunks, and I guess she'sat it now. "

They consulted as to the best means of guarding the prisoners. It wasfinally agreed that Leslie should stand sentinel until the others hadfinished supper. 

"I want to watch the effect of this light on the hills, " he announcedpositively, "and I'm not hungry, and Jim ought to cool off beforecoming out into the air, and Ben's shoulder ought to be taken care of. Get along with ye!"

Bennington accompanied Jim to the meal very cheerfully. The facts as tothe latter's persecutions remained the same, but in some way they didnot hold the same proportions as heretofore. The mere item that Jim Faywas Mary's brother, instead of her lover, made all the difference inthe world. He chattered in a lively fashion concerning the method ofwork to be adopted. Suddenly he pulled himself up short. 

"I think I must beg your pardon, " he said. "I heard about it all fromJim Leslie. I have been very green, and you were quite right. If youstill want to do so, let's go into this together as friends. "

"No pardon coming to me, " responded Fay heartily. "I've been a littletough on you occasionally, that I'll admit, and if I've done too much, I'm sure I beg _your_ pardon. I saw you had the right stuff in you thatday when you stuck to the horse until you rode him, and I've alwaysliked you first-rate since then. And I wouldn't worry about this lastmatter. You were green to the country, and were put down here withoutdefinite instructions. You trusted Davidson, of course, and got fooledin it; but then you just followed Bishop's lead in that. He'd beentrusting Davidson before you got here, and if he hadn't trusted himright along, you can bet you'd have had your directions from A to Z. Hewas as much to blame as you were, and you'll find that he knows it. "

"I'm afraid you can't make me feel any better about that, " objectedBennington, shaking his head despondently. 

"Well, you'll feel better after a time, and anyway there's no actualharm done. "

At this moment Bert Leslie entered. 

"Bill's tickled to death, " he announced. "She says she's coming upfirst thing in the morning. She wanted to come right off and cooksupper, but I wouldn't let her. She couldn't very well stay here allnight, and it's pretty late now. What you got here? Pork? Coffee?Murphies?"

He sat down and began to eat hungrily. Jim arose to relieve thesentinel at the mouth of the shaft, at the same time advising de Laneyto go to bed as soon as possible. 

"You're tired, " he said, "and need rest. Wet that compress well withPond's Extract, and we'll dress it again in the morning. "

In the kitchen he found the strange sombre woman sitting bolt uprightin silence, her arms folded rigidly across her flat bosom. She lookedstraight in front of her, and rocked slowly to and fro on her chair. 

"You mustn't worry, Mrs. Arthur, " consoled Fay kindly, pausing for amoment. "There isn't going to be any trouble. It's just a little matterof mining law. We'll have to keep your husband locked up for a fewdays, but he won't be harmed. "

The woman made no reply. Fay looked at her sharply again, and passedout. 

"Jeems, " he directed that individual at the mouth of the shaft, "go getyour grub. Send the kid to bed right off, and then you and Bert comedown here and we'll fix up these prairie dogs of ours down the hole. "

Jeems and his brother therefore helped the wounded hero to bed, andleft him to a much-needed slumber; after which they returned to thespot of light in the darkness which marked the glow of Fay's pipe. Thatcapable individual issued directions. First of all they lowered, bymeans of a light cord, food and water to their prisoners. The lattermaintained a sullen silence, and it was only by the lightening of theburden at the end of the line that those above knew their provisionshad been appropriated. Then followed blankets. The Leslies werestrongly in favour of as uncomfortable a confinement as possible, andso disapproved of blankets, but Fay insisted. After that the brothersmanned the windlass and let Jim down in a bowline about twenty feet, while he detached and removed two lengths of the shaft ladder. Thisleft no means of ascent, as the walls of the shaft were smoothlytimbered; but, to make matters sure, they covered the mouth with inchthick boards on which they piled large chunks of ore. 

"You don't suppose they'll smother?" suggested Bert. 

"Not much! There's only three of them, and often men drilling will staydown ten or twelve hours at a time without using up the air. "

"Sweet dreams, gentlemen!" called the irrepressible Jeems in farewell. 

"There's one other thing, " said Jim, "and then we can crawl in. "

He approached the cabin in which Arthur and his wife were accustomed tosleep, and listened until he had satisfied himself that Mrs. Arthur wasinside. Then he softly locked the door, the key of which he hadappropriated immediately after supper, and propped shut the heavywooden shutter of the window. 

"No dramatic escapes in ours, thank you!" he muttered. He drew back andsurveyed his work with satisfaction. "Come on, boys, let's turn in. To-morrow we slave. "

CHAPTER XXI

THE LAND OF VISIONS

Although he had retired so early, and in so exhausted a condition, Bennington de Laney could not sleep. He had taken a slight fever, andthe wound in his shoulder was stiff and painful. For hours on end helay flat on his back, staring at the dim illuminations of the windowsand listening to the faint out-of-door noises or the sharper borings ofinsects in the logs of the structure. His mind was not active. He layin a semi-torpor, whose most vivid consciousness was that of mentaldiscomfort and the interminability of time. 

The events of the day rose up before him, but he seemed to loathe themmerely because they had been of so active a character, and now he couldnot bear to have his brain teased even with their impalpable shadow. 

Strangely enough, this altitude seemed to create a certain deadpolarity between him and them. They lay sullenly outside his brain, repelled by this dead polarity, and he looked at them languidly, against the dim illumination of the window, with a dull joy that theycould not come near him and enter the realm of his thoughts. All thiswas the fever. 

In a little time these events became endowed with more palpable bodieswhich moved. The square of semilucent window faded into somethingindescribable, and that into something indescribable, and that intosomething else, still indescribable. 

They moved swiftly, and things happened. He found himself suddenly in along gallery, half in the dusk, half in the lamplight, pacing slowlyback and forth, waiting for something, he knew not what. To him came abustling motherly old woman with a maid's cap on, who said, "Sure, Master Ben, the moon is shining, and, let me tell ye, at the end of thehall is a balcony of iron, and Miss Mary will be glad you know thatsame. " And at that he seemed to himself to be hunting for a coin withwhich to tip her. He discovered it turned to lead between his fingers, whereupon the old woman laughed shrilly and disappeared, and he foundhimself alone on the prairie at midnight. 

His mind seemed to be filled with great thoughts which would make himfamous. Over and over again he said to himself: "The rain pours and thepeople down below chuckle as they move about each under his littleumbrella of self-conceit. They look up to the mountain, saying, 'Thefool! Why looks he so high? He is lost in the mists up there, and hemight be safe and dry with us. ' But the mountain has over him the archof the universe, and sleeps calmly in the sun of truth. Little recks heof the clouds below, and knows not at all the little self-satisfiedfools who pity him, " and he thought this was the sum of all wisdom, andthat with it would come immortality. 

Then a bell began to boom, a deep-toned bell, whose tolling wasinexpressibly solemn, and poured into his heart a sadness too deep forsorrow. As though there dwelt an enchantment in the very sound itself, the dark prairies shifted like a scene, and in their stead he saw, in acold gray twilight, a high doorway built of a cold gray stone, rough-hewed and heavy. Through its arch passed then a file ofgray-cowled monks, their faces concealed. Each carried a torch, whoseflickering, wavering light cast weird cowled figures on the gray stone, and in their midst was borne a bier, covered with white. And as thedeep bell boomed on through all the vision, like a subtle thrillingpresence, Bennington seemed to himself to stand, finger on lip, theeternal custodian of the Secret of it all--the secret that each ofthese cowled figures was a Man--a divine soul and a body, with ears, and eyes, and a brain; that he had thoughts, and his life that is andis to come was of these thoughts; that there beat hearts beneath thatgray, and that their voices must not be heeded; that in the morningthese wearied eyes awaited but the eve, and that the evening brought nohope for a new day; that these silent, awesome beings lived within theheavy stones alone with monotony, until the bell tolled, as now, andthey were carried through the arched doorway into the night; and, aboveall, that to each there were sixty minutes in the hour, and twenty-fourhours in the day, and years and years of these days. This was theSecret, and he was its custodian. None of the others knew of it; butits awfulness made him sad and stern. He checked the days, he numberedthe hours, he counted the minutes rigorously lest one escape. One didescape, and he turned back to catch it, and pursued it far away fromthe stone doorway and the dull twilight, and even the sound of thebell, off into a land where there were many hills and valleys, amongwhich the fugitive Minute hid elusively. And he pursued the Minute, calling upon it to come to him, and the name by which he called it wasMary. Then he saw that the square of the window had become yellow withthe sun, and that through it he could hear plainly the voices of theLeslies talking in high tones. 

His brain was very clear, more so than usual, and he not only receivedmany impressions, and ordered them with ease and despatch, but his verysenses seemed more than ordinarily acute. He could distinguish even byday, when the night stillness had withdrawn its favouring conditions, the borings of the sawdust insects in the logs of the cabin. Only hewas very tired. His hands seemed a long distance away, as though itwould require an extraordinary effort of the will to lift them. So helay quiet and listened. 

The conversation, of which he was the eavesdropper, was carried on byfits and starts. First a sentence would be delivered by one of theLeslies; then would ensue a pause as though for a reply, inaudible toany but the interlocutors themselves; then another sentence; and so on, like a man at a telephone. After a moment's puzzling over it, Bennington understood that Jim Leslie was talking to one of theprisoners down the shaft. 

"You have the true sporting spirit, sir, " cried the voice of Jeems. "Ihonour you for it. But so philosophical a resignation, while itinclines our souls to know more of you personally, nevertheless rendersyou much less interesting in such a juncture as the present. I wouldlike to hear from Mr. Davidson. "

Pause. 

"That was a performance, Mr. Davidson, which I can not entirelycommend. It is fluent, to be sure, but it lacks variety. A true artistwould have interspersed those finer shades and gradations of meaningwhich go to express the numerous and clashing emotions which mustnecessarily agitate your venerable bosom. You surely mean more than_damn_. _Damn_ is expressive and forceful, because capable of beingenunciated at one explosive effort of the breath, but it is monotonouswhen too freely employed. To be sure, you might with some justice replythat you had qualified said adjective strongly--but the qualificationwas trite though blasphemous. And you limited it very nicely--but thelimitation to myself is unjust, as it overlooks my brother's equitableclaims to notice. "

Pause. 

"I _beg_ pardon! Kindly repeat!"

Pause. 

"Delicious! Mr. Davidson, you have redeemed yourself. Bertie, did youhear Mr. Davidson's last remark?"

"No!" replied another voice. "Couldn't be bothered. What was it?"

"Mr. Davidson, with a polished sarcasm that amounted to genius, advisedme in his picturesque vernacular 't' set thet jaw of mine goin', andthen go away an' leave it!'"

Pause. 

"I beg you, Mr. Slayton, do not think of such a thing. I would not havehim repressed for anything in the world. As you value our futureacquaintanceship, do not end our interview. Thank you! I appreciateyour compliment, and in return will repeat that, though in a prettysharp game, you are a true sport. Our friend Arthur is strangelysilent. I have never met Mr. Arthur. I have heard that either his faceor his hat looks like a fried egg, but I forget for the moment whichwas so characterized. "

Pause. 

"Fie, fie! Mr. Arthur. Addison, in his most intoxicated moments, wouldnever have used such language. "

And then the man in the cabin, lying on the bed, began to laugh in alow tone. His laugh was not pleasant to hear. He was realizing howfunny things were to other people--things that had not been funny tohim at all. For the first time he caught a focus on his father, withhis pompous pride and his stilted diction; on his mother's socialcreed. He cared as much for them as ever and his respect was as great, but now he realized that outsiders could never understand them as hedid, and that always to others they must appear ridiculous. So helaughed. And, too, he perceived that the world would see somethinggrimly humorous in his insistence on the girl's parentage, when all thetime, in the home to which he was to bring her, dwelt these unlovable, snobbish old parents of his own. So he laughed. And he thought of howhe had been fooled, and played with, and duped, and cheated, and allbut disgraced by the very people on whom he had looked down from afancied superiority. And so he laughed. And as he laughed his handsswelled up to the size of pillows, and he thought that he was dressedin a loose garment spotted all over with great spots, and that he wasstanding on a stage before these grave, silent hillmen. The light camein through a golden-yellow square just behind them. In the front rowsat Mary, looking at him with wide-open, trusting eyes. And he wasrevolving these hands like pillows around each other, trying to makethe sombre men and the wistful girl laugh with him, while over andover certain words slipped in between his cachinnations, like straybird-notes through a rattle of drums. 

"I have no fresh motley for my lady's amusement, " he was saying to her, "no new philosophies to spread out for my lady's inspection, no brightpictures to display for my lady's pleasure, and so I, like a poorpoverty-stricken minstrel whose harp has been broken, yet dare beg atthe castle gate for a crumb of my lady's bounty. " At which he wouldhave wept, but could only laugh louder and louder. 

Then dimly he knew again he was in his own room, and he felt thatseveral people were moving back and forth quickly. He tried to rise, but could not, and he knew that he was slipping back to the hall andthe solemn crowd of men. He did not want to go. He grasped convulsivelyat the blanket with his sound hand, and shrieked aloud. 

"I am sick! I am sick! I am sick!" he cried louder and louder. 

Some one laid a cool hand on his forehead, and he lay quiet and smiledcontentedly. The room and the people became wraithlike. He saw themstill, but he saw through them to a reality of soft meadows and summerskies, from which Mary leaned, resting her hand on his brow. Voicesspoke, but muffled, as though by many veils. They talked of variousthings. 

"It's the mountain fever, " he heard one say. "It's a wonder he escapedit so long. "

Then the cool hand was withdrawn from his brow, and inexorably he washurried back into the land of visions. 

CHAPTER XXII

FLOWER O' THE WORLD

Bennington de Laney found himself lying comfortably in bed, listeningwith closed eyes to a number of sounds. Of these there most impressedhim two. They were a certain rhythmical muffled beat, punctuated atintervals by a slight rustling of paper; and a series of metallicclicks, softened somewhat by distance. After a time it occurred to himto open his eyes. At once he noticed two things more--that he had someway acquired fresh white sheets for his bed, and that on a little tablenear the foot of his bunk stood a vase of flowers. These two newimpressions satisfied him for some time. He brooded over them slowly, for his brain was weak. Then he allowed his gaze to wander to thewindow. From above its upper sash depended two long white curtains ofsome lacelike material, freshly starched and with deep edges, ruffledslightly in a pleasing fashion. They stirred slowly in the warm airfrom the window. Bennington watched them lazily, breathing withpleasure the balmy smell of pine, and listening to the sounds. Theclinking noises came through the open window. He knew now that theymeant the impact of sledge on drill. Some one was drilling somewhere. His glance roved on, and rested without surprise on a girl in a rockingchair swaying softly to and fro, and reading a book, the turning ofwhose leaves had caused the rustling of paper which he had noticedfirst. 

For a long time he lay silent and contented. Her fine brown hair hadbeen drawn back smoothly away from her forehead into a loose knot. Shewas dressed in a simple gown of white--soft, and resting on the curvesof her slender figure as lightly as down on the surface of the warmmeadows. From beneath the full skirt peeped a little slippered foot, which tapped the floor rhythmically as the chair rocked to and fro. Finally she glanced up and discovered him locking at her. She arose andcame to the bedside, her finger on her lips. 

"You mustn't talk, " she said sweetly, a great joy in her eyes. "I'm soglad you're better. "

She left the room, and returned in a little time with a bowl of chickenbroth, which she fed him with a spoon. It tasted very good to him, andhe felt the stronger for it, but as yet his voice seemed a longdistance away. When she turned to leave the room, however, he murmuredinarticulately and attempted to stir. She came back to the bed at once. 

"I'll be back in a minute, " she said gently, but seeing some look ofpleading in his eyes, she put the empty bowl and spoon on the littletable and sat down on the floor near the bed. He smiled, and then, closing his eyes, fell asleep--outside the borders of the land ofvisions, and with the music of a woman's voice haunting the lastmoments of his consciousness. 

After the fever had once broken, his return to strength was rapid. Although accompanied by delirium, and though running its full course ofweeks, the "mountain fever" is not as intense as typhoid. Theexhaustion of the vital forces is not as great, and recuperation iseasier. In two days Bennington was sitting up in bed, possessed of anappetite that threatened to depopulate entirely the little log chickencoop. He found that the tenancy of the camp had materially changed. Mrs. Lawton and Miss Fay had moved in, bag and baggage--but without theinquisitive Maude, Bennington was glad to observe. 

Mrs. Lawton, in the presence of an emergency, turned out to be helpfulin every way. She knew all about mountain fevers for one thing, and asthe country was not yet blessed with a doctor, this was not anunimportant item. Then, too, she was a most capable housekeeper--shecooked, marketed, swept, dusted, and tyrannized over the mere men in amanner to be envied even by a New England dame. Fay and the Leslies hadalso taken up their quarters in the camp. Old Mizzou and the Arthurshad gone. The old "bunk house" now accommodated a good-sized gang ofminers, who had been engaged by Fay to do the necessary assessmentwork. Altogether the camp was very populous and lively. 

After a little Bennington learned of everything that had happenedduring the three weeks of his sickness. It all came out in a series ofcharming conversations, when, in the evening twilight, they gathered inthe room where the sick man lay. Mary--as Bennington still liked toname her--occupied the rocking chair, and the three young mendistributed themselves as best suited them. It was most homelike andresting. Bennington had never before experienced the delight of seeinga young girl about a house, and he enjoyed to the utmost the deftlittle touches by which is imparted that airily feminine appearance toa room; or, more subtly, the mere spirit of daintiness which breathesalways from a woman of the right sort. He felt there was added a newerand calmer element of joy to his love. 

During the first period of his illness, then, Jim Fay and the Lesliebrothers had worked energetically relocating the claims, while Mrs. Lawton and Miss Fay had taken charge of the house. By the end of thefirst day the job was finished. The question then came up as to thedisposition of the prisoners. 

"We didn't want the nuisance of a prosecution, " said Fay, "because thatwould mean that these mossbacks could drag us off to Rapid City anyold time as witnesses, and keep us there indefinitely. Neither did wewant to let them off scot-free. They'd made us altogether too muchtrouble for that! Bert here suggested a very simple way out. I wentdown to Spanish Gulch and told the boys the whole story from start tofinish. Well, it isn't hard to handle a Western crowd if you go at itright. The boys always thought you had good stuff in you since you rodethe horse and smashed Leary's face that night. It would have been easyto have cooked up all kinds of trouble for our precious gang, but Imanaged to get the boys in a frivolous mood, so they merely came up andhad fun. "

"I should say they did!" Bert interjected. "They dragged the crowd outof the shaft--and they were a tough-looking proposition, I can tellyou!--and stood them up in a row. They shaved half of Davidson's headand half his beard, on opposite sides. They left tufts of hair all overArthur. They made a six-pointed star on the top of Slayton's crown. Then they put the men's clothes on wrong side before, and tied themfacing the rear on three scrubby little burros. Then the whole outfitwas started toward Deadwood. The boys took them as far as Blue Lead, where they delivered them over to the gang there, with instructions topass them along. They probably got to Deadwood. I don't know what'sbecome of them since. "

"I think it was cruel!" put in Miss Fay decidedly. 

"Perhaps. But it was better than hanging them. "

"What became of Mrs. Arthur?" asked the invalid. 

"I shipped her to Deadwood with a little money. Poor creature! It wouldbe a good thing for her if her husband never did show up. She'd getalong better without him. "

The claims located and the sharpers got rid of, Fay proceeded at onceto put the assessment work under way. In this, his long Westernexperience, and his intimate acquaintance with the men, stood him insuch good stead that he was enabled to contract the work at a cheaperrate than Bishop's estimate. 

"I wrote to Bishop, " he said, "and told him all about it. In hisanswer, which I'll show you, he took all the blame to himself, just asI anticipated he would, and he's so tickled to death over the showingmade by the assays that he's coming out here himself to see aboutdevelopment. So I'm afraid you're going to lose your job. "

"I'm not sorry to go home. But I'm sorry to leave the Hills. " He lookedwistfully through the twilight toward Mary's slender figure, outlinedagainst the window. The three men caught the glance, and began at onceto talk in low tones to each other. In a moment they went out. Somehow, on returning from the land of visions, Ben found that the world hadmoved, and that one of the results of the movement was that many thingswere taken for granted by the little community of four who surroundedhim. It was as though the tangle had unravelled quietly while he slept. She leaned toward him shyly, and whispered something to his ear. Hesmiled contentedly. 

They talked then long and comfortably in the dusk--about how theLeslies had written the letter, how much trouble she had taken toconceal her real identity, and all the rest. 

"I sent Bill Lawton up to warn your camp the first day I met you, " saidshe. 

"Why, I remember!" he cried. "He was there when I got back. "

And they talked on of their many experiences, in the fashion of lovers, and how they had come to care for each other, and when. 

"I made up my mind it was so foolish a joke, " she confessed, "that Idetermined to tell you all about it. You remember I had something totell you at the Pioneer's Picnic? That was it. But then you rememberthe girl in the train, and how, when she looked at us, you turnedaway?"

"I remember that well enough, " replied Bennington. "But what has thatto do with it?"

"It was a perfectly natural thing to do, dearest. I see that plainlyenough now. But it hurt me a little that you should be ashamed of me asa Western girl, and I made up my mind to test you. "

"Why, I wasn't thinking of that at all, " cried Bennington. "I was justashamed of my clothes. I never thought of you!"

She reached out and patted his hand. "I'm glad to hear that, Ben dear, after all. It did hurt. And I was so foolish. I thought if you wereashamed of me, you would never stand the thought of the Lawtons. So Idid not tell you the truth then, but resolved to test you in that way. "

"Foolish little girl!" said he tenderly. "But it came out all right, didn't it?"

"Yes, " she sighed, with a happy gesture of the hands. They fell silent. 

"I want you to tell me something, dear, " said Bennington after a while. "You needn't unless you want to, but I've thought about it a greatdeal. "

"I will tell you, Ben, anything in the world. We ought to be frank witheach other now, don't you think so?"

"I don't know as I ought to say anything about it, after all, " hehesitated, evidently embarrassed. "But, Mary, you know you have hinteda little at it yourself. You remember you said something once aboutlosing faith, and being made hard, and----"

She took both his hands in hers and drew them closely to her breast. Although he could not see her eyes against the dusk, he knew that shewas looking at him steadily. 

"Listen quietly, Ben dear, and I will tell you. Before I came out hereI thought I loved a man, and he--well, he did not treat me well. I hadtrusted him and every one else implicitly until the very momentwhen----I felt it very much, and I came West with Jim to get away fromthe old scenes. Now I know that it was only fascination, but it wasvery real then. You do not like that, Ben, do you? The memory is notpleasant to me, and yet, " she said, with a wistful little break of thevoice, "if it hadn't been for that I would not have been the woman Iam, and I could not love you, dearest, as I do. It is never in the sameway twice, but each time something better and higher is added to it. Oh, my darling, I _do_ love you, I do love you so much, and you must bealways my generous, poetic _boy_, as you are now. "

She strained his hands to her as though afraid he would slip from herclasp. "All that is ideal so soon hardens. I can not bear to think ofyour changing. "

Bennington leaned forward and their lips met. "We will forgive him, " hemurmured. 

And what that remark had to do with it only our gentler readers will beable to say. 

Ah, the delicious throbbing silence after the first kiss!

"What was your decision that afternoon on the Rock, Ben? You never toldme. " She asked presently, in a lighter tone, "Would you have taken mein spite of my family?"

He laughed with faint mischief. 

"Before I tell you, I want to ask _you_ something, " he said in histurn. "Supposing I had decided that, even though I loved you, I mustgive you up because of my duty to my family--suppose that, I say--whatwould _you_ have done? Would your love for me have been so strong thatyou would have finally confessed to me the fact that the Lawtons werenot your parents? Or would you have thrown me over entirely because youthought I did not love you enough to take you for yourself?"

She considered the matter seriously for some little time. 

"Ben, I don't know, " she confessed at last frankly. "I can't tell. "

"No more can I, sweetheart. I hadn't decided. "

She puckered her brows in the darkness with genuine distress. Womenworry more than men over past intangibilities. He smiled comfortably tohimself, for in his grasp he held, unresisting, the dearest little handin the world. Outside, the ever-charming, ever-mysterious night of theHills was stealing here and there in sighs and silences. From thedarkness came the high sweet tenor of Bert Leslie's voice in the wordsof a song:

 "A Sailor to the Sea, a Hunter to the Pines, And Sea and Pines alike to joy the Rover, The Wood-smells to the nostrils of the Lover of the Trail, And Hearts to Hearts the whole World over!"

Through and through the words of the song, like a fine silver wirethrough richer cloth of gold, twined the long-drawn, tremulous notesof the white-throated sparrow, the nightingale of the North. 

"The dear old Hills, " he murmured tenderly. "We must come back to themoften, sweetheart. "

"I wish, I _wish_ I knew!" she cried, holding his hand tighter. 

"Knew what?" he asked, surprised. 

"What you'd have done, and what I'd have done!"

"Well, " he replied, with a happy sigh, "I know what I'm _going_ to do, and that's quite enough for me. "

THE END