glad to make the trip for the sake
of the boy, and the sight of his face will do me good."

"You've been working too hard. Take it easy now and don't worry,"
counseled Danvers. "I shall be up again in a few weeks, and in the
meantime write to me, Arthur."

He stood a moment as Judge Latimer waited for Eva. He felt, somehow,
that his friend needed him. But his train would soon be due, and with a
hearty hand-clasp he said good-night and hurried away for the Fort
Benton express.

[Illustration]

Chapter V

Despair

The days that followed the convention were like a dream to Danvers when
he remembered them afterwards. He had scarcely picked up the old life at
Fort Benton--looked over his cattle and gone over his neglected
correspondence, when a telegram from the old doctor recalled him to
Helena.

Arthur Latimer's tragedy had come, and Danvers, unfamiliar with death,
knew no words of consolation for the father bereft of his firstborn. A
numbness mercifully comes during those first hours, which makes it
possible to move about and go through strange, meaningless ceremonies
with a calm that surprises those who have not known the searing touch of
the death angel.

A few days later he and the doctor were back at Fort Benton again, and
life moved on as before. Only there was always the memory of Latimer's
drawn face that no laddie's voice would lighten, no little hand caress.

The doctor hoped that the political campaign would occupy his thoughts
for the present, but when the election went against Latimer he shook his
head.

"Read this letter," he said to Danvers one evening. "It came to-day, and
I should have sent for you if I hadn't felt so certain you would drop
in. You're the one to go."

It was a letter from Winifred, and Danvers felt a peculiar sensation of
satisfaction in seeing her handwriting, as if it gave him an added bond
to their friendship.

But he forgot Winifred in his anxiety over the message her letter
conveyed.

_"I wish that you or Mr. Danvers could come to Helena," she wrote.
"Judge Latimer is so changed since little Arthur's death that we
sometimes fear for his reason. Since the election has gone against
him there is no direct interest to take his attention and he has
sunk into a deep melancholy. You could rouse him as no one else
could. Please come--one or both of you."_

Danvers read no further, but looked up to catch the doctor's eye. He
nodded. "A