down and twiddle his thumbs. You exercise?"

"Walk a lot."

"Climb any?"

"Don't know that game."

"It's great sport. I'll break you in some day, if you say. You'll like it.
The mountains around here are not dangerous. We can go up and down in a
day."

"I'll go you. But, say, last night Nora chucked a bunch of daisies out of
the window, and as I was nosing around in the vineyard, I came across it.
You know how a chap will absently pick a bunch of flowers apart. What do
you think I found?"

"A note?"

"This." Harrigan exhibited the emerald. "Who sent it? Where the dickens
did it come from?"

Courtlandt took the stone and examined it carefully. "That's not a bad
stone. Uncut but polished; oriental."

"Oriental, eh? What would you say it was worth?"

"Oh, somewhere between six and seven hundred."

"Suffering shamrocks! A little green pebble like this?"

"Cut and flawless, at that size, it would be worth pounds instead of
dollars."

"Well, what do you think of that? Nora told me to keep it, so I guess I
will."

"Why, yes. If a man sends a thing like this anonymously, he can't possibly
complain. Have it made into a stick pin." Courtlandt returned the stone
which Harrigan pocketed.

"Sometimes I wish Nora'd marry and settle down."

"She is young. You wouldn't have quit the game at her age!"

"I should say not! But that's different. A man's business is to fight for
his grub, whether in an office or in the ring. That's a part of the game.
But a woman ought to have a home, live in it three-fourths of the year,
and bring up good citizens. That's what we are all here for. Molly used to
stay at home, but now it's the social bug, gadding from morning until
night. Ah, here's Carlos with the tea."

Herr Rosen instantly usurped the chair next to Nora, who began to pour the
tea. He had come up from the village prepared for a disagreeable
half-hour. Instead of being greeted with icy glances from stormy eyes, he
encountered such smiles as this adorable creature had never before
bestowed upon him. He was in the clouds. That night at Cadenabbia had
apparently knocked the bottom out of his dream. Women were riddles which
only they themselves could solve for others. For this one woman he was
perfectly ready to throw everything aside. A man lived but once; and he
was a fool who would hold to tinsel in preference to such happiness as he
thought he saw opening out before him. Nora saw, but she did not care.
That in orde