ing on the floor as I did. Well,
what has he to say for himself?"

"He's in an awful state of mind. He was trying to cook some supper when
I got there. He'd succeeded in milking. When he saw me, he gasped. 'Is
Charley sick?' and dropped the kettle of water he was lifting."

"I told him just what you had seen and what an exhausted state Charley's
nerves seemed to be in. He just stood and took it looking like a sick
cat. When I had finished he asked what you had said and I told him and
he sort of groaned, 'You women should have let Roger beat me to death.
Why did you interfere?' Poor Dick!"

Elsa drew a long breath and was silent for a moment before she began
again. "He's in a most awful frame of mind. He's like a man who knows he
has fits of insanity and feels perfectly helpless to prevent them. He
cried and cried while he told me how he had fought drink. I never knew
any one could suffer so. He's much more to be pitied than Charley."

"Huh! Women!" grunted Roger. "Why, he's just the usual thing in drunks,
you little ninny. What's he going to do?"

"Well, I want Charley to give him one more chance."

"I thought so! Well, he doesn't get it."

"But, Roger, you can't prevent it. And he's not going into Archer's
Springs again. He's going to let us do his errands. That's where the
trouble has been."

"Except when he drinks cologne."

"What makes you so hard, Roger?"

"I saw Charley lying where Dick had knocked her down. And I felt little
Felicia almost in convulsions from fear. Let him keep out of my sight
until I can forget that."

"Of course, all I can do is to advise, anyhow," said Elsa. "Dick is
coming down in the morning and take his medicine. He insists on it. He's
a fine man, Roger, in many ways."

"You've not seen him drunk," returned Roger. "Commend me to a woman
every time for sentimentality."

"There are other weaknesses men have than drunkenness that their
sentimentality helps women to endure, aren't there, Roger?" asked Elsa
quietly. Roger dropped Elsa's arm and left her without a word.

He was at work in the engine house, the next morning when Dick came
slowly down the trail and was led by Elsa into the living tent. Then she
went off to the cook tent with Felicia. Roger, working with strained
concentration on his engine, heard on the one side the low murmur of
Dick's and Charley's voices and on the other Felicia's occasional happy
laugh above Elsa's little songs. After perhaps an hour, Dick came