ged eagerly into the contest.

So the afternoon started most auspiciously and all would doubtless have
gone well and peacefully, had not Captain Hardin most unfortunately
selected an exceptionally good-looking young soldier for his service,--a
tall, slender, dark-skinned youth, with merry melting eyes. Eveley never
attempted to deny that she could not resist merry melting eyes. So she
left the young officers and Kitty and Nolan and the lemonade in the
rose-bowered pergola on the edge of the canyon which sloped down abruptly
on the east side, and herself went up to superintend the building of her
stairway.

The handsome one required an inordinate amount of superintending. The
other soldier detailed by Lieutenant Ames, an ordinary young man with a
sensible face and eyes that saw only hammer and nails, got along very
well by himself. But the handsome youth, called Buddy Gillian, required
supervision on every point. He first consulted Eveley about the design of
the two steps entrusted to him for construction. He could think of as
many as two dozen different styles of rustic steps, and he explained and
illustrated them all to Eveley in great detail, drawing plans in the
gravel path. It took the two of them nearly an hour to make a selection,
and then it seemed the style they had chosen was the most difficult of
the entire assortment, and was practically impossible for any one to
construct alone. So Eveley perforce assisted, holding the rustic boughs
while he hammered, carrying the saw, and carefully picking out the proper
size of nails as he required them.

"Didn't you have more sense than to bring a good-looker?" Nolan asked
Captain Hardin in a fretful voice. "Don't you know that Eveley can't
resist good looks?"

"I told him he had no business to bring Gillian," put in the lieutenant.
"Look at Muggs, whom I brought. Nobody notices that Muggs needs any help.
See there now, he has finished and is ready to go. Can't you do something
to stop this, Miss Lampton?" he pleaded, turning to Kitty.

"As long as she leaves my Arnold alone, I shall mind my own business,"
said Kitty decidedly. "If I cut in on her affair with your Buddy, she
will try her hand on Arnold to get even. Captain Hardin got you into
this, it is up to him to get you out."

And Kitty heartlessly left the pergola and went up to the rustic steps to
hold the hammer for Arnold.

Then Captain Hardin, after rapidly drinking three glasses of iced
lemonade to drow