that claimed him. His only claim to distinction was the sanity and
strength that looked out of his steady grey eyes, the firmness and
decision of his clean-shaven lips, and his broad, sturdy body with its
muscles of iron.

"You'll be tired, too," he went on kindly. "You'd best get to bed when
you've had a warm. I'll fix the chores."

He moved from his position at the table, and, passing out into the
lean-to kitchen, returned a moment later with a small saucepan which he
placed on the shining top of the stove.

"Mrs. Ross seems to figure it was all sorts of a swell party," he went
on. "She guesses the boys must have worried themselves to death fixing
Abe's saloon so it didn't look like--Abe's saloon."

The man's smile was gently humorous. For once he had not the courage to
pursue the downright course which his nature prompted. Little Coqueline
was foremost in his thoughts. Then there was the memory of all the
happiness his home meant to him, and he feared that which undue
precipitancy might bring about.

The girl looked up from the stove. Her eyes abandoned their intense
regard with seeming reluctance.

"It was all--wonderful. Just wonderful," she said in the tone of one
roused from a beautiful dream.

"Abe's saloon?"

Steve's incautious satire suddenly precipitated the crisis he feared.
The girl's eyes flashed a hot look of resentment. He was laughing at
her. She was in no mood to be made sport of, or to have her words made
sport of. She sat up with a start and leant forward in her chair in an
attitude that gave force to her sharp enquiry.

"And why not?" she demanded, her violet eyes darkening under the frown
of swift anger which drew her pretty brows together. "Why not Abe's
saloon, or--or any other place?" She set her coffee cup on the floor
with a clatter, and her hands clasped the arms of her chair as though
she were about to spring to her feet. "Yes," she continued, with
increasing heat, "why not Abe's saloon? It's not the place. It's not the
folk, even. Those things don't matter. It's the thing itself. The whole
thing. The glimpse of life when you're condemned to existence on this
fierce outworld. It's the meaning of it. A dance. It doesn't sound much.
Maybe it doesn't mean a thing to you but something to laugh at, or to
sneer at. It's different to me, and to other folks, who--who aren't
crazy for the long trail and the terrible country we're buried in. The
decorations. The flags. Yes, the cheap Turke