ch he had been hurled
two things alone stood out to him now as he tried to review them; two
things gathered the light which abandoned all other considerations to
darkness. The first thing, the clearest thing, the most important
thing in all of the new world which was being built up about him was
that he loved Argyl Crawford.

Loved her, not as Greek Conniston would have loved yesterday, could
have loved then, but with the love which was a part of the Greek
Conniston who was being born to-night. Loved her, not with the shallow
affection which would have been the tribute of a Greek Conniston of
yesterday, but with that deeper, eternal urge of soul to soul which is
true love. Loved her gravely, almost sternly, as a strong man loves.

Upon only two days had it been given him to speak with her. He thought
of that, but he knew that made no iota of difference. For he knew her
better than he knew any woman with whom he had danced or driven or
attended theaters and dinners. In that first glimpse from the Pullman
window he had seen the purposeful character of her. To-day he had seen
it again. To-day he knew that he knew Argyl Crawford, that she had
been herself to him, unaffected, honest, womanly. Her nature was
simple, straightforward, open, unassuming. Its beauty struck one as
the beauty of a Grecian temple, its lines pure and noble, the whole
edifice the more wonderful in that it depended upon itself alone and
needed no adornment.

She had shaken hands with him last night when he left her at the
house, not perfunctorily, but firmly, as the strong-handed cowboys
shook hands, and had said to him, simply:

"I wish you luck, Greek Conniston, in the fight you are about to
make."

He remembered the hand-clasp. She seemed unable to do anything, no
matter how small, without putting her whole self into it, her
frankness, her sincerity, her eagerness. And Conniston of to-night,
scowling at the match which he had swept across his thigh to light his
pipe and now let die down to his fingers, muttered, not without cause,
that he had his nerve with him even to think about her.

The other thing which was clear to him was that he must "lick"
Brayley. If he did nothing else in all of his futile life, if he quit
work or were fired the next minute, he must "lick" Brayley. It did not
strike him as amusing, as even strange, that these two things and
these alone should be the only things of which he was sure. He merely
accepted them as inevi