and she felt she
must go back to the simplicity she had laid aside before she could
grasp their meaning.

It was the man who first broke the silence. "I was wondering if you
would like a cigar, sir?" he said.

Deringham glanced at the Indian-wrought case, which was singularly
artistic, somewhat dubiously, but remembering that something was due to
their host, drew a cigar out and lighted it. He said nothing for a
minute, and then turned to the teamster.

"Wherever did you get cigars of that kind from? They are far better
than any I could find in Winnipeg," he said.

Miss Deringham noticed the man's eyes close a trifle, and fancied that
very little would call the steely sparkle she had seen when the
pack-ponies blocked the trail into them.

"Well," he said quietly, "a friend of mine sent them me, and I believe
they came from Cuba. We don't raise cigars of any kind in British
Columbia."

Miss Deringham saw her father's face, and felt quietly amused. He
could, she knew, assume a manner which went far to carry him smoothly
through discontented share-holders' meetings, but it seemed that the
men who dwelt in the wilderness were at least as exigent as those who
dwelt in London. Deringham, however, glanced at the speaker.

"The least said is often the soonest mended, but if you think----" he
said.

The teamster laughed. "It should come from me, but the fact is I was
worrying about that wagon and forgot," he said. "Now, if there is
anything I can tell you about this country."

"I wonder," said Alice Deringham, "whether you know Mr. Alton of
Somasco."

"Oh, yes," said the man, with a little smile.

"You have worked for him possibly?" said the girl.

Harry the teamster nodded. "Considerably harder than I ever did for
anybody else," he said.

The next question required some consideration, and he appeared to
ruminate over it. "You mean what kind of man he is?" he said. "Well,
he's not very much to look at, and there are a good many things he
don't know."

"So I should have fancied," said the girl, more to herself than the
listener, and wondered whether it was an effect of the firelight or the
curious twinkle had once more flashed into his eyes. "You do not seem
to like him?" she said.

The man looked into the fire. "The trouble is I know how mean he is,"
he said.

"Mean?" said the girl. "That is niggardly?"

"No," said Harry; "I don't think he's niggardly. It's another word for
low down in th