im curiously.

"You don't know Helen very well. She is very ambitious, and she has
great respect for wealth. She thinks money can do most anything in this
old world. There's no telling what Helen will do when it comes to
marrying. I can't imagine her marrying a poor man."

"I would rather see her married to Touchiniteel than to Van Shaw!" said
Bauer with a savage outburst that accelerated his speech and changed his
entire countenance.

Walter looked at Felix again, with the same curious regard.

"You seem to be a good deal disturbed over the matter, old man. What
difference does it make to you whether Helen marries Van Shaw or
Touchiniteel?"

Bauer turned his face toward Walter with a look Walter never forgot.
They were walking near one of the old ruins of an abandoned village.
Pieces of broken pottery and grinders were littered over the ground.
Felix motioned to Walter to go farther up into the mound where these
ruins were scattered.

"We can catch up with the teams. The folks will think we are looking for
specimens," he said. Walter anticipated Bauer's story as he sat down by
him and in the midst of an ancient cliff dwellers century old debris of
a home, heard his chum's simple story. After it was told in Bauer's slow
but in this case intense manner, Walter said:

"I'm awfully sorry, old man; but I don't believe you stand a ghost of a
chance with Helen."

"I don't suppose I do," assented Bauer humbly. "But you can see now why
I feel as I do and what it means to me to see a fellow like Van Shaw
with her. It is not only torture to me. I think some one ought to tell
her."

"Tell her what?"

"About Van Shaw. Such men have no business to make love to pure girls
like Helen."

Walter remonstrated.

"It's absurd, Felix. He isn't making love to her. Nonsense."

"He is!" said Bauer with a passionate burst that astonished Walter. "You
do not know him as well as I do. I am acquainted with Van Shaw's history
through the Raines-Bracken affair. You were not at Burrton when that
happened. Nothing but the fear of losing some of old Van Shaw's legacies
to the school prevented young Van Shaw's expulsion at the time. I can't
go into the affair, Walter, but it gave me a loathing for Van Shaw that
I never can overcome. It isn't because I feel holier than thou or
anything like that; God knows I am in need of his great forgiveness; but
it seems as wrong for us to leave your sister unacquainted with the real
character of Van