ly justified the title, and in due course the party
arrived at the ranch of Roaring Bull, where the poor invalid was
confined to his room for a considerable time thereafter, and became
known at the ranch as Mr Shank.

One evening Charlie Brooke entered the kitchen of the ranch in search of
his friend Dick Darvall, who had a strange fondness for Buttercup, and
frequently held converse with her in the regions of the back-kitchen.

"I dun know whar he is, massa Book," answered the sable beauty when
appealed to, "he's mostly somewhar around when he's not nowhar else."

"I shouldn't wonder if he was," returned Charlie with a hopeful smile.
"I suppose Miss Mary's not around anywhere, is she?"

"I shouldn't wonder if she wasn't; but she ain't here, massa," said the
black maid earnestly.

"You are a truthful girl, Butter--stick to that, and you'll get on in
life."

With this piece of advice Charlie left the kitchen abruptly, and thereby
missed the eruption of teeth and gums that immediately followed his
remark.

Making his way to the chamber of his sick friend, Charlie sat down at
the open window beside him.

"How d'you feel this evening, my boy?" he asked.

"A little better, but--oh dear me!--I begin to despair of getting well
enough to go home, and it's impossible to avoid being worried, for,
unless father is sought for and found soon he, will probably sink
altogether. You have no idea, Charlie, what a fearful temptation drink
becomes to those who have once given way to it and passed a certain
point."

"I don't know it personally--though I take no credit for that--but I
have some idea of it, I think, from what I have seen and heard. But I
came to relieve your mind on the subject, Shank. I wanted to speak with
Dick Darvall first to see if he would fall in with my plan, but as I
can't find him just now I thought it best to come straight to you about
it. Hallo! There is Dick."

"Where?" said Shank, bending forward so as to see the place on which his
friend's eyes were fixed.

"There, don't you see? Look across that bit of green sward, about fifty
yards into the bush, close to that lopped pine where a thick shrub
overhangs a fallen tree--"

"I see--I see!" exclaimed Shank, a gleeful expression banishing for a
time the look of suffering and anxiety that had become habitual to him.
"Why, the fellow is seated beside Mary Jackson!"

"Ay, and holding a very earnest conversation with her, to judge from his
atti