r and excused
himself early.

"What does this mean?" demanded Forsyth, angrily, as soon as Dave had
gone. "Do you think I'll take second place to that--that coal heaver?"

She straightened, and her bright eyes were charged with a blaze which
would have astonished Dave, who had known her only in her milder moods.
But she tried to speak without passion.

"That is not to his discredit," she said.

"Straight from the corrals into good society," Forsyth sneered.

Then she made no pretense of composure. "If you have nothing more to
urge against Mr. Elden, perhaps you will go."

Forsyth took his hat. At the door he paused and turned, but she was
already ostensibly interested in a magazine. He went out into the
night.

The week was a busy one with Dave, and he had no opportunity to visit
the Duncans. Friday Edith called him on the telephone. She asked an
inconsequential question about something which had appeared in the
paper, and from that the talk drifted on until it turned on the point
of their expedition of the previous Sunday. Dave never could account
quite clearly how it happened, but when he hung up the receiver he knew
he had asked her to ride with him again on Sunday, and she had
accepted. He had ridden with her before, of course, but he had never
_asked_ her before. He had been a sort of honoured employee, whose
business it was to comply with her wishes. But this time she would
ride at his request. He felt that a subtle change had come over their
relationship.

He was at the Duncan house earlier than usual Sunday afternoon, but not
too early for Edith. She was dressed for the occasion; she seemed more
fetching than he had ever seen her. There was the blush of health--or
was it altogether the blush of health?--on her cheeks, and a light in
her eyes such as he had seen more than once on those last rides with
Reenie Hardy. And across her saddle she threw a brown sweater.

She led the way over the path followed the Sunday before until again
they sat by the rushing water. Dave had again been filled with a sense
of Reenie Hardy, and his conversation was disjointed and uninteresting.
She tried unsuccessfully to draw him out with questions about himself;
then took the more astute tack of speaking of her own past life. It
had begun in an eastern city, ever so many years ago.

Chivalry could not allow that to pass. "Oh, not so very many," said
Dave.

"How many?" she teased. "Guess."

He looked