en very much in earnest.

"I suppose I've got to tell you," he said, soberly. "I don't know what has
come over me--you seem to have me under a spell. I've never spoken about
it before. I don't know why I should now. But you've got to know, I
presume."

"Yes."

"On your head rest the blame," he said, his grin still cynical; "and upon
mine the consequences. It isn't a pretty story to tell; it's only virtue
is its brevity. I was fired out of college for fighting. The fellows I
licked deserved what they got--and I deserved what I got for breaking
rules. I've always broken rules. I may have broken laws--most of us have.
My father is wealthy. The last time I saw him he said I was incorrigible
and a dunce. I admit the former, but I'm going to make him take the other
back. I told him so. He replied that he was from Missouri. He gave me an
opportunity to make good by cutting off my allowance. There was a girl.
When my allowance was cut off she made me feel cold as an Eskimo. Told me
straight that she had never liked me in the way she'd led me to believe
she did, and that she was engaged to a _real_ man. She made the mistake of
telling me his name, and it happened to be one of the fellows I'd had
trouble with at college. The girl lost her temper and told me things he'd
said about me. I left New York that night, but before I hopped on the
train I stopped in to see my rival and gave him the bulliest trimming that
I had ever given anybody. I came out here and took up a quarter-section of
land. I bought more--after a while. I own five thousand acres, and about a
thousand acres of it is the best coal land in the United States. I
wouldn't sell it for love or money, for when your father gets his railroad
running, I'm going to cash in on ten of the leanest and hardest and
lonesomest years that any man ever put in. I'm going back some day. But I
won't stay. I've lived in this country so long that it's got into my heart
and soul. It's a golden paradise."

She did not share his enthusiasm--her thoughts were selfishly personal,
though they included him.

"And the girl!" she said. "When you go back, would you--"

"Never!" he scoffed, vehemently. "That would convince me that I am the
dunce my father said I was!"

The girl turned her head and smiled. And a little later, when they were
riding on again, she murmured softly:

"Ten years of lonesomeness and bitterness to save his pride! I wonder if
Hester Keyes knows what she has missed?"