come second nature.

So with the charm of the wild land fresh upon her, she took kindly to
Cariboo Meadows. The immediate, disagreeable past bade fair to become
as remote in reality as the distance made it seem. Surely no ghosts
would walk here to make people look askance at her.

Her first afternoon she spent loafing on the porch of the Briggs
domicile, within which Mrs. Briggs, a fat, good-natured person of
forty, toiled at her cooking for the "boarders," and kept a brood of
five tumultuous youngsters in order--the combined tasks leaving her
scant time to entertain her newly arrived guest. From the vantage
ground of the porch Hazel got her first glimpse of the turns life
occasionally takes when there is no policeman just around the corner.

Cariboo Meadows, as a town, was simply a double row of buildings facing
each other across a wagon road. Two stores, a blacksmith shop, a feed
stable, certain other nondescript buildings, and a few dwellings,
mostly of logs, was all. Probably not more than a total of fifty souls
made permanent residence there. But the teams of ranchers stood in the
street, and a few saddled cow ponies whose listlessness was mostly
assumed. Before one of the general stores a prospector fussed with a
string of pack horses. Directly opposite Briggs' boarding-house stood
a building labeled "Regent Hotel." Hazel could envisage it all with a
half turn of her head.

From this hotel there presently issued a young man dressed in the
ordinary costume of the country--wide hat, flannel shirt, overalls,
boots. He sat down on a box close by the hotel entrance. In a few
minutes another came forth. He walked past the first a few steps,
stopped, and said something. Hazel could not hear the words. The
first man was filling a pipe. Apparently he made no reply; at least,
he did not trouble to look up. But she saw his shoulders lift in a
shrug. Then he who had passed turned square about and spoke again,
this time lifting his voice a trifle. The young fellow sitting on the
box instantly became galvanized into action. He flung out an oath that
carried across the street and made Hazel's ears burn. At the same time
he leaped from his seat straight at the other man. Hazel saw it quite
distinctly, saw him who jumped dodge a vicious blow and close with the
other; and saw, moreover, something which amazed her. For the young
fellow swayed with his adversary a second or two, then lifted him
bodily off hi