"But you did!" Tears of pure vexation started; she faced him, eye to
eye, thoroughly incensed.

"What sort of man are you?" she said under her breath. "Your friend Mr.
Kerns is wrong. You are not worth saving from yourself."

"Kerns!" he repeated, angry and amazed. "What the deuce has Kerns to do
with this affair?"

She stared, then, realizing her indiscretion, bit her lip, and spurred
forward. But he put his horse to a gallop, and they pounded along in
silence. In a little while she drew bridle and looked around coldly,
grave with displeasure.

"Mr. Kerns came to us before you did. He said you would probably come,
and he begged us to strain every effort in your behalf, because, he
said, your happiness absolutely depended upon our finding for you the
woman you were seeking. . . . And I tried--very hard--and now she's
found. You admit that--and _now_ you say--"

"I say that one of these balmy summer days I'll assassinate Tommy
Kerns!" broke in Gatewood. "What on earth possessed that prince of
butters-in to go to Mr. Keen?"

"To save you from yourself!" retorted the girl in a low, exasperated
voice. "He did not say what threatened you; he is a good friend for a
man to have. But we soon found out what you were--a man well born, well
bred, full of brilliant possibility, who was slowly becoming an idle,
cynical, self-centered egoist--a man who, lacking the lash of need or
the spur of ambition, was degenerating through the sheer uselessness and