at first, and the work'll come hard on you, but
you'll be jest as happy as if you was in your right mind, onct you git
used to it," he assured Wallie.

"The work doesn't bother me, but I imagine it will be lonesome."

"You ought to git some kind of an animal and tame it," Pinkey suggested.
"I mind one winter when I 'bached' I tamed and halter-broke two
chipmunks so I could lead 'em anywhur. You wouldn't believe what company
they was for me."

Wallie agreed that it was an idea, but he was privately of the opinion
that there would be a limit to the pleasure which the company of
chipmunks, however accomplished, could afford him.

"If only I had a congenial neighbour," he sighed, "it would make a great
difference."

"There's Canby--you might call on him," Pinkey suggested, grinning. "Or
if you ketch yourself pickin' at the bed-clothes you can saddle up and
scamper over and see me. 'Tain't fur--forty miles across the mounting.
Jest below that notch--you can't miss it."

Wallie had looked at the notch often since then. He was staring at it
the evening Canby rode down on him--staring and thinking so hard of
Helene Spenceley that Canby had checked his horse and was looking at him
before he saw him.

It would be impossible to say which was the more astonished.

Instead of the fearsome person Canby had anticipated, he saw one so
different and at the same time so extraordinary that he could not
immediately collect himself.

Wallie's trunks had followed him, together with a supply of provisions,
and now, his day's work done, he was sitting in front of his tent on a
patent camp-chair garbed in whatsoever had come handiest.

Canby's eyes rested upon a mild-looking young man in a purple silk
lounging robe, hob-nailed mountain boots, and a yachting cap with a
black patent-leather visor. He was smoking a cigarette with a gold tip
and a monogram, held in a hand that was white and carefully manicured.

In his surprise, Canby said: "Good evening," almost amiably.

Wallie, in turn, saw a visitor who looked as if he might just have
returned from a canter through Central Park. His appearance was so
homelike and familiar that Wallie went forward with a radiant smile of
welcome. Before he knew it Canby found himself shaking hands vigorously
with the person he had come to quarrel with.

Wallie was sure that it was Canby but it flashed through his mind that
perhaps he was not so black as he was painted and Pinkey was given to
exa