lph loved, minted coins that could be
saved and counted and stacked away, but it was the shining treasure of
romance, wealth that, unlike dully satisfying riches, meant battle and
adventure and triumph after overwhelming odds. He did at last consent
to help Barbara house the bees in a suitable dwelling, but he talked
still of the tale he had heard and his eyes were shining with the
wonder of it.

"Did you hear him say that there was just one beaten trail across the
plains, all the way from the Mississippi to California? Think of a
road, a single road, two thousand miles long, reaching out through the
wilderness, over the deserts, through the mountains, with no towns or
houses or people, just one lonely highway--and gold at the far end!"

Ralph was late that evening, late and tired and impatient after an
unsatisfactory day. He brushed past Felix, still sitting on the step,
flung down his bundle of papers, and went over to the fire. The little
carved money box stood open on the mantel, revealing its emptiness.

"What is this?" he asked Barbara sternly, as she stood in the corner,
twisting her apron and finding, suddenly, that it was very difficult
to explain. Felix came in, the light of excitement still on his face,
eager to tell the tale.

He began to recount what they had heard, so carried away that he never
noticed the gathering thundercloud upon his brother's face. The
plains, the mountains, the shining rivers running to the sea--he
seemed to conjure up all of them as he told the story, but Ralph's
face never changed.

"So," cut in the elder brother at last when the younger stopped for
breath, "it is for a fairy tale like this that you have wasted your
time and your substance, have emptied my money box. You bought bees
with it--_bees_! To buy bees when the forest is full of them and you
can have a swarm from any neighbor for the asking. You spend _my_
money that some lying rascal may be helped upon his way!"

"It was our money," Felix reminded him gently, beginning to be
awakened from his dream by the bitter anger of the other's tone.

"Mine," repeated Ralph. A cold fury seemed to possess him, which
discussions over money could alone bring forth. "Have you forgotten
that everything here is mine, given me by our father? The bread you
eat, the roof over your head, they belong to me; do you understand?"

Barbara saw, in the firelight, that Felix's face flushed, then turned
white. No one but herself could know ju