would soon be Karine
Wildred.

"You look ill, Mr. Stanton," remarked Bennett. "I guess you've had a
tiresome journey. I know what a bad run that is between Chicago and
Denver."

A nasty run, indeed! But it would be much worse going back again,
leaving the house of cards, which I had come so far to see, lying in
ruins behind me. Still, I continued to beat into my brains the fact that
I rejoiced in poor old Farnham's safety.

"I believe I am a bit knocked out," I said, "though I ought to be able
to stand a trifle like that and think nothing of it. I should be glad to
see Mr. Farnham. I suppose such an old friend as I might venture to call
in on him, even though he isn't feeling as fit as I should like to think
him. If he's not likely to turn up here presently I might drive to the
house, and he'd give me breakfast, I daresay."

I saw before I had finished my second sentence that Bennett was slightly
disturbed. He flushed to the roots of his flaxen hair, and his face wore
an expression which betrayed a suppressed desire to whistle.

"You can bet he would give you breakfast, or anything else he had, Mr.
Stanton," the trusted man of business said heartily, yet with a certain
irresolution. "But the fact is, he ain't at the house this morning. He's
gone away again."

"I thought he was unwell," I interpolated, in surprise.

"That's so. He's a sick man, not hardly fit to be about, but for all
that he's off. He ought to be back again in--well, in a few days,
however."

"A few days!" I echoed.

"More or less. By George! he will be mad when he knows he's kept you
waiting. For, of course, you _will_ wait, won't you, Mr. Stanton?"

"I should certainly like to see him before I go back to the East," I
said; and I spoke no more than the truth, for, putting my cordial
feeling for Farnham out of the question, it might be that valuable
information concerning Wildred's past could be wrested from him with due
diplomacy. "Still, I hardly feel like hanging about Denver for an
indefinite length of time, doing nothing. I shouldn't mind a little
journey, as I've come so far. If he's at any of the Colorado mines,
perhaps I might run out and join him; I've been there with him before,
you may remember."

"You might indeed, sir," returned Bennett, still embarrassed, "if he was
in any such place, which he isn't. To tell you the plain truth, Mr.
Stanton, as I'm sure Mr. Farnham would wish, if he could dream it was
_you_ I was talking to,