alacrity than ever before. Nor could he tell the reason.
Five minutes more and he was back at the mill, giving what aid he could
with his uninjured arm.

Night, and he traveled with Ba'tiste to his cabin, only to fret
nervously about the place and at last to strike out once more, on foot,
for the lumber camp. He was worried, nervous; in a vague way he
realized that he had been curt, almost brusque, with a woman for whom
he felt every possible gratitude and consideration. Nor had he
inquired about her when work had ended for the day. Had the excuse of
a headache been made only to cover feelings that had been deeply
injured? Or had it meant a blind to veil real, serious illness? For
three years, Barry Houston had known Agnes Jierdon in day-to-day
association. But never had he remembered her in exactly the light that
he had seen her to-day. There had been a strangeness about her, a
sharpness that he could not understand.

He stopped just at the entrance to the mill clearing and looked toward
the cottage. It was darkened. Barry felt that without at least the
beckoning of a light to denote the wakefulness of the cook, he could
not in propriety go there, even for an inquiry regarding the condition
of the woman whom he felt that some day he would marry. Aimlessly he
wandered about, staring in the moonlight at the piled-up remains of his
mill, then at last he seated himself on a stack of lumber, to rest a
moment before the return journey to Ba'tiste's cabin. But suddenly he
tensed. A low whistle had come from the edge of the woods, a hundred
yards away, and Barry listened attentively for its repetition, but it
did not come. Fifteen minutes he waited, then rose, the better to
watch two figures that had appeared for just a moment silhouetted in
the moonlight at the bald top of a small hill. A man and a woman were
walking close together,--the woman, it seemed, with her head against
the man's shoulder; the man evidently with his arm about her.

There was no time for identities. A second more and they had faded
into the shadows. Barry rose and started toward the darkened cottage,
only to turn again into the road.

"Foolishness!" he chided himself as he plodded along. "She doesn't
know any one but Thayer--and what if she does? It's none of my
business. She's the one who has the claim on me; I have none on her!"

And with this decision he walked on. A mile--two. Then a figure came
out of the woods just ahead