"Please leave my seat, sir," she told Clay.

The Arizonan rose at once. He knew that she knew. "I was intendin' to
help you off with yore grips," he said.

She flamed into passionate resentment of his interference. "I'll
attend to them. I can look out for myself, sir."

With that she turned her back on him.




CHAPTER III

THE BIG TOWN

When Clay stepped from the express into the Pennsylvania Station he
wondered for a moment if there was a circus or a frontier-day show in
town. The shouts of the porters, the rush of men and women toward the
gates, the whirl and eddy of a vast life all about him, took him back
to the few hours he had spent in Chicago.

As he emerged at the Thirty-Fourth Street entrance New York burst upon
him with what seemed almost a threat. He could hear the roar of it
like a river rushing down a cañon. Clay had faced a cattle stampede.
He had ridden out a blizzard hunched up with the drifting herd. He had
lived rough all his young and joyous life. But for a moment he felt a
chill drench at his heart that was almost dread. He did not know a