"It was a decent thing for you to do--stopping over a train with me,
Grantham," said the host, when the five squares intervening had been half
measured. "I have had all kinds of a time out here in this God-forsaken
desert, but never until to-day anything approaching a chummy hour with a
man I know and care for."

Kent had not spoken since they had felt their way out of the dark lower
hall of the Farquhar Building. Up to this point the talk had been
pointedly reminiscent; of the men of their university year, of mutual
friends in the far-away "God's country" to the eastward, of the Gastonian
epic, of all things save only two--the exile's cast for fortune in the
untamed West, and one other.

"That brings us a little nearer to the things that be--and to your
prospects, David," said the guest. "How are you fixed here?"

Kent shrugged.

"Gaston is dead, as you see; too dead to bury."

"Why don't you get out of it, then?"

"I shall some day, perhaps. Up to date there has been no place to go to,
and no good way to arrive. Like some thousands of others, I've made an ass
of myself here, Loring."

"By coming, you mean? Oh, I don't know about that. You have had some hard
knocks, I take it, but if you are the same David Kent I used to know, they
have made a bigger man of you."