uldn't begin it now. We can explain
everything, you know; and, besides, I have money with which to pay for
what we take."

"But your money isn't Canadian money," was the ready objection voiced by
the tender conscience.

Prime's laugh did not ring quite true. "That is where you are mistaken,"
he retorted. "It is good English gold, in sovereigns."

If the young woman were surprised to learn that a man who had expected
to motor out of Canada in a day or two at the most had supplied himself
with a stock of English sovereigns, she did not question the fact. But
for fear she might, Prime went on hastily:

"I always like to be prepared for all kinds of emergencies when I leave
home, and this time I wasn't sure just where I was going to bring up,
you know--after Grider had changed his mind as to our starting-point."

The evasion served its purpose, and the young woman assented to an
immediate examination of the canoe-load. Prime helped her down the steep
bank, and they began to rummage, spreading their findings out on the
little beach. As Prime had intimated, there was a liberal stock of
provisions--jerked deer-meat, smoke-cured bacon, flour, meal, salt,
baking-powder, tea, and sugar, but no coffee, a few tins of vegetables,
a small sack of potatoes, and, last but not least, a canvas-covered mass
of something which they decided was pemmican.

Rummaging further, the precious tobacco came to light--two huge twists
of it hidden in the centre of one of the two remaining blanket-rolls.
Prime stopped right where he was, crumbled a bit of the dried leaf in
his hands, and made a cigarette, his companion looking on with a little
lip-curl which might have been of derision or merely of amusement.

"Is it good?" she asked, when he had inhaled the first deep breath.

"It's vile!" he returned. "At the same time, it is so much better than
nothing that I could do a Highland fling for pure joy. Take my advice,
Miss Millington, and never become a slave to the tobacco habit."

"'Miss Millington,'" she repeated, half musingly. "Doesn't that strike
you as being a trifle absurd at this distance from a drawing-room?"

[Illustration: "Is it good?" she asked, when he had inhaled the first
deep breath.]

"It surely does," he admitted frankly; "and so, for that matter, does
'Mr. Prime.'"

She looked up at him with a charming little grimace.

"I'll concede the 'Lucetta' if you will concede the 'Donald.'"

"It's a go," he laughed. "It is th