aw the small gathering of people still
hanging about the veranda, upon which the auctioneer still stood with
his clerk, busy over the sales. He noticed others passing hither and
thither, as they prepared to depart with their purchases. But none of
these things which he looked upon affected him in any mawkish,
sentimental manner. It was all over. That little hill, with its wooded
background and vast frontage of prairie, from which he had loved to
watch the sun get up after its nightly sojourn, would know him no more.
His indifference was unassumed. His was not the nature to regret past
follies.

He smiled softly as he turned his attention to the future which lay
before him, and his smile was not in keeping with the expression of a
broken man.

In these last days of waning prosperity Bunning-Ford had noticeably
changed. With loss of property he had lost much of that curious veneer
of indolence, utter disregard of consequences, which had always been
his. Not, that he had suddenly developed a violent activity or
boisterous enthusiasm. Simply his interest in things and persons seemed
to have received a fillip. There seemed to be an air of latent activity
about him; a setness of purpose which must have been patent to any one
sufficiently interested to observe the young rancher closely. But Foss
River was too sleepy--indifferent--to worry itself about anybody, except
those in its ranks who were riding the high horse of success. Those who
fell out by the wayside were far too numerous to have more than a
passing thought devoted to them. So this subtle change in the man was
allowed to pass without comment by any except, perhaps, the
money-lender, Lablache, and the shrewd, kindly wife of the
doctor--people not much given to gossip.

It was only since the discovery of Lablache's perfidy that "Lord" Bill
had understood what living meant. His discovery in Smith's saloon had
roused in him a very human manhood. Since that time he had been seized
with a mental activity, a craving for action he had never, in all his
lazy life, before experienced. This sudden change had been aggravated by
Lablache's subsequent conduct, and the flame had been fanned by the
right that Jacky had given him to protect her. The sensation was one of
absorbing excitement, and the loss of property sat lightly upon him in
consequence. Money he had not--property he had not. But he had now what
he had never possessed before--he had an object.

A lasting, implaca