so,--he made no overtures. On the night of Pratt's tipsy salutation he had
abruptly decided that a mining camp was no place for a nice girl, with no
acknowledged masculine protector. In Miss Newell's circumstances a girl
must be left entirely alone, or exposed to the gossip of the camp. He
knew very well which she would choose, and so he kept away,--though at
considerable loss to himself, he felt. It made him cross to watch her
pretty figure going up the trail every morning and to reflect that so much
sweetness and refinement should not be having its ameliorating influence on
his own barren and somewhat defiant existence.


II.

The autumn rains set in early, and the winter was unusually severe. Arnold
had a purpose which kept him hard at work and very happy in those days.

During the long December nights he was shut up in his office, plodding
over his maps and papers, or smoking in dreamy comfort by the fire. He was
seldom interrupted, for he had earned the character of a social ingrate and
hardened recluse in the camp. He had earned it quite unconsciously, and
was as little troubled by the fact as by its consequences. On the evening
of New Year's Day he crossed the street to the Dyers' and asked for Miss
Newell. She presently greeted him in the parlor, where she looked, Arnold
thought, more than ever out of place, among the bead baskets, and splint
frames inclosing photographs of deceased members of the Dyer family, and
the pallid walls, weak-legged chairs, and crude imaginings in worsted work.
Her apparent unconsciousness of these abominations was another source of
irritation. It is always irritating to a man to see a charming woman in an
unhappy and false position, where he is powerless to help her. Arnold had
not expected that it would be a very exhilarating occasion,--he remembered