hat was
why he retained his seat on several directorates, and had built
Bonavista on the bluff above the Straits of Georgia, instead of the
ranch-house in the Bush he still hankered for.

Bonavista had cost him much money, but Mrs. Acton had seen that it was
wisely expended, and the long wooden house, with its colonnades of
slender pillars, daintily sawn scroll-work, shingled roof, and wide
verandas, justified her taste. Acton reserved one simply furnished
room in it for himself, and made no objections when she filled the
rest of it with miscellaneous guests. Wisbech had brought him a letter
from a person of consequence, and he had offered the Englishman and
his nephew the freedom of his house. He would not have done this to
everybody, though they are a hospitable people in the West, but he had
recognized in the unostentatious Wisbech one or two of the
characteristics that were somewhat marked in himself, and his wife, as
it happened, extended her favour to Nasmyth as soon as she saw him.
She had been quick to recognize something she found congenial in his
voice and manner, though none of the points she noticed would in all
probability have appealed to her husband. Acton leaned upon the
veranda balustrade, with a particularly rank cigar in his hand, a
gaunt, big-boned man in badly-fitting clothes. It was characteristic
of him that he had not spoken to Nasmyth since he stepped out from one
of the windows five minutes earlier.

"It's kind of pretty," he said, indicating the prospect with a little
wave of his hand.

Nasmyth admitted that it was pretty indeed, and his concurrence was
justified. Sombre pinewoods and rocky heights walled in the wooden
dwelling, but in front of it the ground fell sharply away, and beyond
the shadow of the tall crags a blaze of moonlight stretched eastwards
athwart the sparkling sea.

"Well," said Acton, "it's 'most as good a place for a house as I could
find anywhere the cars could take me into town, and that's partly why
we raised it here."

Then he glanced down at the little white steamer lying in the inlet
below. "That's one of my own particular toys. You're coming up the
coast with us next week for the salmon-trolling?"

Nasmyth said that he did not know what his uncle's intentions were,
but he was almost afraid they had trespassed on their host's kindness
already. Acton laughed.

"We have folks here for a month quite often--folks that I can't talk
to and who don't seem to think