had not recognized him as her
host, and could continue the conversation unreservedly. "Have you
seen the ladies' boudoir?" he asked. "You know, the room fitted with
knick-knacks and pretty things--some of 'em bought from old collections
in Europe, by fellows who knew what they were but perhaps," he added,
looking into her eyes for the first time, "didn't know exactly what
ladies cared for."

"I merely glanced in there when I first came, for there was such a queer
lot of women--I'm told he isn't very particular in that way--that I
didn't stay."

"And you didn't think THEY might be just as valuable and good as some of
the furniture, if they could have been pulled around and put into shape,
or set in a corner, eh?"

The young girl smiled; she thought her fellow-guest rather amusing, none
the less so, perhaps, for catching up her own ideas, but nevertheless
she slightly shrugged her shoulders with that hopeless skepticism which
women reserve for their own sex. "Some of them looked as if they had
been pulled around, as you say, and hadn't been improved by it."

"There's no one there now," said Rushbrook, with practical directness;
"come and take a look at it." She complied without hesitation, walking
by his side, tall, easy, and self-possessed, apparently accepting
without self-consciousness his half paternal, half comrade-like
informality. The boudoir was a large room, repeating on a bigger scale
the incongruousness and ill fitting splendor of the others. When she
had of her own accord recognized and pointed out the more admirable
articles, he said, gravely looking at his watch, "We've just about seven
minutes yet; if you'd like to pull and haul these things around, I'll
help you."

The young girl smiled. "I'm quite content with what I've done in my own
room, where I have no one's taste to consult but my own. I hardly know
how Mr. Rushbrook, or his lady friends, might like my operating here."
Then recognizing with feminine tact the snub that might seem implied in
her refusal, she said quickly, "Tell me something about our host--but
first look! isn't that pretty?"

She had stopped before the window that looked upon the dim blue abyss of
the canyon, and was leaning out to gaze upon it. Rushbrook joined her.

"There isn't much to be changed down THERE, is there?" he said, half
interrogatively.

"No, not unless Mr. Rushbrook took it into his head to roof it in, and
somebody was ready with a contract to do it. But what