ch; my tobacco's out."

He filled his pipe and turned to Jim. "Hope I didn't interrupt. I
forget what we were talking about. It looks as if you didn't like a
waiter's job."

Jim laughed and went to the telegraph, which began to click. He read
the message and calling the next station waited for a time, and then
turned to his guests.

"Line's broken and I've got to leave you. You can use the bunks; my
partner must sit up and watch the instrument when he comes back. You
can tell him I've gone to look for the break."

"Do you know where the break is?" the younger man asked.

"I don't know," said Jim, putting on his fur cap and old skin coat.
"It mayn't be far off and it may be some distance. All I know is it's
between here and the next shack."

"We found it hard to face the wind and there's more now."

Jim smiled. "One gets used to storms up here and the line must be
mended. Some important messages from Ottawa are coming along."

He picked up some tools and when he opened the door the others heard
the scream of the gale. The flames blew out from the snapping logs and
an icy draught swept the room and roared in the chimney. Then the door
shut, the fire burned steadily, and all was quiet in the shack.

"Our host excites one's curiosity," said the younger man.

"You mean he excited yours. You're an imaginative fellow, Dick."

Richard Halliday had remarked that since they reached the shack
Mordaunt had not called him Dick and vaguely wondered why. Lance
Mordaunt generally had an object. Dick doubted if he had been as
sleepy as he pretended when he asked for his tobacco pouch.

"Oh, well," he said, "if we were in England, you wouldn't expect to
find a fellow like this using his leisure to study old-fashioned
French."

"We are not in England," Mordaunt rejoined. "When you judge Canadians
by English standards you're likely to get misled. The country's, so to
speak, in a transition stage; they haven't developed schools of
specialists yet, and an intelligent man can often make good at an
unaccustomed job. This fellow, for example, was a waiter."

He picked up the romance and put it on a shelf. Mordaunt was generally
neat and Dick noted that he replaced the book in the spot from which it
had been taken and put the rest against it.

"Anyhow, it's curious he knew about Langrigg," Dick insisted.

"I don't think so," said Mordaunt, carelessly. "A number of our
farmers' sons have emigrated. He stated