my hands, do what I tell you, and take
what I may think fit to offer you?"

"No," answered Weston. "I'm sorry--but I can't do that."

"Then, if the Grenfell goes under, you'd rather go back to the bush
and chop trees for the ranchers or shovel on the railroads?"

Weston sat very still a moment, with his face awry. Then he looked up
resolutely.

"Yes," he said. "I think that, by and by, Miss Stirling would be glad
I did it. She would not have her husband her father's pensioner. After
all," he added, "one meets with sudden changes of fortune in the
west."

Then Stirling suddenly stretched out his hand and laid it on his
companion's shoulder.

"I've been twice warned by short-sighted women that my daughter might
make an injudicious marriage, and on each occasion I pointed out that
when she chose her husband she would choose just right," he said. "Now
it seems that she has done it, and I'm satisfied."

He let his hand fall, and, while Weston gazed at him in bewilderment,
smiled reassuringly.

"Go back to the mine when you like," he added. "You admitted that you
would take advice from me, and all I suggest now is that you hold fast
to every share you hold, and make no arrangements of any kind until
after next settling day. In the meanwhile, if you'll go along to the
first room in the corridor it's quite likely that you'll find Ida
there. I've no doubt that she'll be anxious to hear what I've said to
you."

Weston could never remember what answer he made, but he went out with
his heart beating furiously and a light in his eyes; and when he
entered the other room Ida stretched out her hands to him when she saw
his face.

"Then it isn't disaster?" she said. "You will stay with me?"

Weston drew her toward him.

"Dear, I must still go away to-morrow, but we have, at least, this
evening."

It was all too short for them, but Weston left in a state of
exultation, with fresh courage in his heart, and it was in an
optimistic frame of mind that he started west the next day. For
several weeks he toiled strenuously under the blinking fish-oil lamps
in the shadowy adit, but there was now, as his companions noticed, a
change in his mood. The grimness which had characterized him had
vanished. In place of toiling in savage silence he laughed cheerfully
when there was any cause for it, and showed some consideration for his
personal safety. He handled the sticks of giant-powder with due
circumspection, and no longer expose