be the differ a hundred years from now!"

He did not use this phrase, however, towards one experience--the advent
of Miss Molly Mackinder, the heiress, and the challenge that reverberated
through the West after her arrival. Philosophy deserted him then; he
fell back on the primary emotions of mankind.

A month after Miss Mackinder's arrival at La Touche a dramatic
performance was given at the old fort, in which the officers of the
Mounted Police took part, together with many civilians who fancied
themselves. By that time the district had realised that Terry O'Ryan
had surrendered to what they called "the laying on of hands" by Molly
Mackinder. It was not certain, however, that the surrender was complete,
because O'Ryan had been wounded before, and yet had not been taken
captive altogether. His complete surrender seemed now more certain to
the public because the lady had a fortune of two hundred thousand
dollars, and that amount of money would be useful to an ambitious man in
the growing West. It would, as Gow Johnson said, "Let him sit back and
view the landscape o'er, before he puts his ploughshare in the mud."

There was an outdoor scene in the play produced by the impetuous
amateurs, and dialogue had been interpolated by three "imps of fame" at
the suggestion of Constantine Jopp, one of the three, who bore malice
towards O'Ryan, though this his colleagues did not know distinctly. The
scene was a camp-fire--a starlit night, a colloquy between the three,
upon which the hero of the drama, played by Terry O'Ryan, should break,
after having, unknown to them, but in sight of the audience, overheard
their kind of intentions towards himself.

The night came. When the curtain rose for the third act there was