the carving while we have the chance. Let's get our
conscience clear and know we're playing the game."

I was dreadfully afraid he was going to laugh at me, it sounded so
much like pulpiteering. But I was in earnest, passionately in earnest,
and my lord and master seemed to realize it.

"Have you thought about the kiddies?" he asked me, for the second
time.

"I'm always thinking about the kiddies," I told him, a trifle puzzled by
the wince which so simple a statement could bring to his face. His
wondering eye, staring through the open French doors of the living-room,
rested on my baby grand.

"How about _that_?" he demanded, with a grim head-nod toward the
piano.

"That may help to amuse Lady Alicia," I just as grimly retorted.

He stared about that comfortable home which we had builded up out of
our toil, stared about at it as I've seen emigrants stare back at the
receding shores of the land they loved. Then he sat studying my face.

"How long is it since you've seen the inside of the Harris shack?" he
suddenly asked me.

"Last Friday when I took the bacon and oatmeal over to Soapy and
Francois and Whinstane Sandy," I told him.

"And what did you think of that shack?"

"It impressed me as being sadly in need of soap and water," I calmly
admitted. "It's like any other shack where two or three men have been
batching--no better and no worse than the wickiup I came to here on my
honeymoon."

Dinky-Dunk looked about at me quickly, as though in search of some
touch of malice in that statement. He seemed bewildered, in fact, to
find that I was able to smile at him.

"But that, Chaddie, was nearly four long years ago," he reminded me,
with a morose and meditative clouding of the brow. And I knew exactly
what he was thinking about.

"I'll know better how to go about it this time," I announced with my
stubbornest Doctor Pangless grin.

"But there are two things you haven't taken into consideration,"
Dinky-Dunk reminded me.

"What are they?" I demanded.

"One is the matter of ready money."

"I've that six hundred dollars from my Chilean nitrate shares," I
proudly announced. "And Uncle Carlton said that if the Company ever
gets reorganized it ought to be a paying concern."

Dinky-Dunk, however, didn't seem greatly impressed with either the
parade of my secret nest-egg or the promise of my solitary plunge into
finance. "What's the other?" I asked as he still sat frowning over his
empty pipe.

"The other