white against the mountain-side, suggesting to Palmerston's idle
vision a sail becalmed upon a sage-green sea. "Dysart's ship, which will
probably never come in," he said to himself, looking at it with visible
indignation, one morning, as he sat at his tent door in that state of
fuming indolence which the male American calls taking a rest.

"Practically there is little difference between a knave and a fool," he
fretted; "it's the difference between the gun that is loaded and the one
that is not: in the long run the unloaded gun does the more mischief. A
self-absorbed fool is a knave. After all, dishonesty is only abnormal
selfishness; it's a question of degree. Hello, Dysart!" he said aloud,
as his host appeared around the tent. "How goes it?"

"Slow," said John emphatically, "slow. I'm feeling my way like a cat,
and the professor he's just about as cautious as I am. We're a good
team. He's been over the canyon six times, and every time that machine of
his'n gives him a new idea. He's getting it down to a fine point. He
wanted to go up again to-day, but I guess he can't."

"What's up?" inquired Palmerston indifferently.

"Well, his daughter wrote him she was coming this afternoon, and
somebody'll have to meet her down at Malaga when the train comes in.
I've just been oiling up the top-buggy, and I thought maybe if you"--

"Why, certainly," interrupted Palmerston, responding amiably to the
suggestion of John's manner; "if you think the young lady will not
object, I shall be delighted. What time is the train due?"

"Now, that's just what I told Emeline," said John triumphantly. "He'd
liever go than not, says I; if he wouldn't then young folks has changed
since I can remember. The train gets there about two o'clock. If you jog
along kind of comfortable you'll be home before supper. If the girl's as
smart as her father, you'll have a real nice visit."

Mrs. Dysart viewed the matter with a pessimism which was scarcely to be
distinguished from conventionality.

"I think it's a kind of an imposition, Mr. Palmerston," she said, as her
boarder was about to start, "sendin' you away down there for a total
stranger. It's a good thing you're not bashful. Some young men would be
terribly put out. I'm sure Jawn would 'a' been at your age. But my
father wouldn't have sent a strange young man after one of his
daughters--he knowed us too well. My, oh! just to think of it! I'd have
fell all in a heap."

Palmerston ventured a hop