red, and the natives would
have been ready to ride you on a rail. Then when we saved your bacon and
you knew they were two thieves, you even returned them the little extra
money they had sent you to pay the men. I won't say anything about the
heroic way you made your aunt's loss good. It was heroic, but it wasn't
sense.

"Now, after all this eye-opening experience, and you on your uppers, so
to speak, I offered to start you in a lawful business, you won't have
it, simply because it smacks of gambling! Winn, you are one of the best
fellows in the world, and I like you, but you are a fool--net!"

"Well, I'll keep on being one," answered Winn warmly (for no man enjoys
plain truth), "before I'll open a bucket shop and knowingly rob people."

"Yes, and walk while the rest ride," asserted Jack, tersely, "you know
the old deacon's advice to his son just starting out in life,--'Make
money, my son, honestly if you can, but make it!'"

"All very good," replied Winn, "but old. I doubt whether you can change
my fool ideas, if you talk till doomsday; but you may mellow them. And
that reminds me of another fool thing I've done. I bought the sole
right, title, and deed of the Rockhaven Granite Company's quarry a few
weeks ago."

"The wisest buy you ever made, my boy," answered Jack, quickly; "and now
if you will hustle around and get some men to put money into a new
company, you will be in luck once more." Then, as another idea came to
this quick-witted man of the world, he added, "What's the matter with
Jess Hutton and all the money we made for him?"

But Winn was silent, while a tide of memory swept over his feelings. And
in it was Mona, with her tender love, and Jess, with the heart and hand
he offered at parting, and all the good people on the island whom Winn
knew to be his friends. And as all the possibilities Rockhaven contained
came back to him, now it suddenly dawned upon him that Jack Nickerson
had named him rightly.

"I see I've put you to sleep," continued Jack, after the long pause
while he watched Winn, "and now I'll wake you up. I saw Ethel Sherman in
a box at the theatre last night, with our mutual friend, Simmons. He
must have reached his second childhood!"

Then Winn did wake up.

And more than that, a few unconsidered trifles connected with this same
vivacious Ethel assumed index shape. He recalled that she had for the
past six weeks specified the evenings she would be at home to him, for
a week ahead. He