without telling another person first."

He threw down his cigar and stood up. I rose also.

"I see," he said, with sarcasm. "I knew there was something beside
public spirit. You think, by hanging off and playing me against this
other sucker, you can get a higher price. Well, if that's the game, I'll
keep him busy."

He took out his watch, glanced at it, and thrust it back into his
pocket.

"I've wasted time enough over this fool thing," he declared. "Now that I
know what the game is we'll talk to the point. It's highway robbery, but
I might have expected to be robbed. I'll give you six hundred for that
land."

I did not answer. I was holding my temper by main strength and I could
not trust myself to speak.

"Well?" he sneered. "That shakes your public spirit some, hey? What do
you say?"

"No," I answered, and started for the door.

"What!" he could hardly believe his ears. "By the Lord Harry! the fellow
is crazy. Six hundred and fifty then, you infernal robber."

"No."

"NO! Say, what in thunder do you mean?"

"I mean that you may go to the devil," I retorted, and reached for the
door knob.

But before my fingers touched it there was the sound of laughter and
voices in the hall. The knob was turned from without. I stepped back and
to one side involuntarily, as the door opened and into the library
came, not the butler, but a young lady, a girl in an automobile coat and
bonnet. And, following her, a young man.

"Father," said the young lady, "Johnson says you've bought that horrid
road. I'm so glad! When did you do it?"

"Congratulations, Mr. Colton," said the young man. "We just passed a
cart full of something--seaweed, I believe it was--as we came along with
the car. Oscar had to slow down to squeeze by, and we certainly were
swept by ocean breezes. By Jove! I can smell them yet. I--"

The young lady interrupted him.

"Hush, Victor," she said. "I beg your pardon, Father. I thought you were
alone. Victor, we're intruding."

The open door had partially screened me from the newcomers. But Colton,
red and wrathful, had not ceased to glare in my direction and she,
following his gaze, saw me. She did not recognize me, I think--probably
I had not made sufficient impression upon her mind even for casual
remembrance--but I recognized her. She was the girl with the dark eyes,
whose look of contemptuous indifference had so withered my self-esteem.
And her companion was the young chap who, from the tonneau o