er in Denver. We just came here for the Frontier
Days," said Connie primly.

"There is another Frontier Week at Sterling," he said eagerly. "A fine
one, better than this. It isn't far over there. You would get more
material at Sterling, I think. Can't you go on up?"

"I have been away from Chicago four weeks now," said Connie. "In
exactly two weeks I must be at my desk again."

"Chicago is not a healthy town," he said, in a voice that would have
done credit to his father, the medical man. "Very unhealthy. It is
not literary either. Out west is the place for literature. All the
great writers come west. Western stories are the big sellers. There's
Ralph Connor, and Rex Beach, and Jack London and--and--"

"But I am not a great writer," Connie interrupted modestly. "I am just
a common little filler-in in the ranks of a publishing house. I'm only
a beginner."

"That is because you stick to Chicago," he said eloquently. "You come
out here, out in the open, where things are wide and free, and you can
see a thousand miles at one stretch. You come out here, and you'll be
as great as any of 'em,--greater!"

The loud clamor of the dinner bell interrupted his impassioned outburst
and he relapsed into stricken silence.

"Well, we must go to dinner before the supply runs out," said David,
rising slowly. "Come along, Julia. We are glad to have met you, Mr.
Ingram." He held out his thin, blue-veined hand. "We'll see you
again."

Prince looked hopelessly at Connie's back, for her face was already
turned toward the dining-room. How cold and infinitely distant that
tall, straight, tailored back appeared.

"Ask him to eat with us," Connie hissed, out of one corner of her lip,
in David's direction.

David hesitated, looking at her doubtfully. Connie nudged him with
emphasis.

Well, what could David do? He might wash his hands of the whole
irregular business, and he did. Connie was a writer, she must have
material, but in his opinion Connie was too young to be literary. She
should have been older, or uglier, or married. Literature is not safe
for the young and charming. Connie nudged him again. Plainly if he
did not do as she said, she was going to do it herself.

David turned to the brown-faced, sad-eyed son of the mountain ranges,
and said:

"Come along and have dinner with us, won't you?"

Carol pursed up her lips warningly, but Prince Ingram, in his
eagerness, nearly picked David up bodily i