"Why, Uncle Somerville--how vindictive!" cried Virginia. "Who is he,
and what has he done?"

"He is Misteh John Winton, as you informed me just now; one of the
brainiest constructing engineers in this entiah country, and the
hardest man in this or any otheh country to down in a right-of-way
fight--that's who he is. And it's not what he's done, my deah
Virginia, it's what he is going to do. If I can't get him killed up
out of ouh way,"--but here Mr. Darrah saw the growing terror in two
pairs of eyes, and realizing that he was committing himself before an
unsympathetic audience, beat a hasty retreat to his stronghold at the
other end of the Rosemary.

"Well!" said the flaxen-haired Bessie, catching her breath. But
Virginia laughed.

"I'm glad I'm not Mr. Winton," she said.




IV

THE CRYSTALLINE ALTITUDES


Morning in the highest highlands of the Rockies, a morning clear,
cold, and tense, with a bell-like quality in the frosty air to make
the cracking of a snow-laden spruce-bough resound like a pistol-shot.