e down to the small feet in
bead-ornamented moccasins. A woman's eyes, her hair, her hands, her
bearing--these things had never obtruded upon his notice before. Yet he
saw now that a shaft of sunlight on her hair made it shimmer like ripe
wheat straw, that her breast was full and rounded, her lips red and
sweetly curved. But it was not alone that swift revelation of seductive
beauty, or warm human desirableness, that stirred him so deeply, that
afflicted him with those queer uncomfortable sensations. He found
himself struggling with a sense of guilt, of shame. The world, the
flesh, and the devil seemed leagued against his peace of mind.

He was filled with an incredulous wonder as to what manner of thing this
was which had blown through the inner recesses of his being like a gusty
wind through an open door. He had grown to manhood with nothing but a
cold, passionless tolerance in his attitude toward women. Technically he
was aware of sex, advised as to its pitfalls and temptations; actually
he could grasp nothing of the sort. A very small child is incapable of
associating pain with a hot iron until the hot iron has burned him. Even
then he can scarcely correlate cause and effect. Neither could Thompson.
No woman had ever before stirred his pulse to an added beat.

But this--this subtle, mysterious emanation from a smiling girl at his
elbow singed him like a flame. If he had been asleep he was now in a
moment breathlessly, confusedly awake.

The commotion was all inward, mental. Outwardly he kept his composure,
and the only sign of that turmoil was a tinge of color that rose in his
face. And as if there was some mysterious mode of communication
established between them a faint blush deepened the delicate tint of
Sophie Carr's cheeks. Thompson rose. So did Tommy Ashe with some haste
when he perceived her there.

"No, no," she protested. "Keep your chairs, please."

"Mr. Thompson," Carr's keen old eyes flickered between the two men and
the girl. "My daughter. Mr. Thompson is the latest leader of the
forlorn hope at Lone Moose, Sophie."

Mr. Thompson murmured some conventional phrase. He was mightily
disturbed without knowing why he was so disturbed, and rather fearful of
showing this incomprehensible state. The girl's manner put him a little
at his ease. She gave him her hand, soft warm fingers that he had a mad
impulse to press. He wondered why he felt like that. He wondered why
even the tones of her voice gave him