ere respects in which his companion was
not altogether satisfied with him. She had, as she admitted, restored
him to bodily health, but, after all, that was only going so far, and
she felt it was possible that she might accomplish a little more,
though there was no very evident reason why she should wish to do so.
Still, she was conscious of the wish.

"I was wondering," she said, "how long you would be content to stay."

Nasmyth gazed at her in evident astonishment. "Stay!" he exclaimed.
"Oh, you can call it twenty years, if one must be precise."

"Ah!" replied Laura, "in one sense, that is an admission I'm not
exactly pleased that you should make."

The man raised himself slowly, and his face became intent as he strove
to grasp her meaning. He was not in the least astonished that she
should speak to him as she did, for there are few distinctions drawn
between the hired man and those who employ him on the Pacific slope,
and he had discovered already that the girl was at least his equal in
intelligence and education. In fact, he had now and then a suspicion
that her views of life were broader than his. In the meanwhile it was
in one respect gratifying to feel that she could be displeased at
anything he might think or do.

"I'm not quite sure I see the drift of that," he said.

"You would be content to continue a ranch-hand indefinitely?"

"Why not?" Nasmyth asked, with a smile.

Laura once more looked at him with an almost disconcerting steadiness,
and she had, as he was already aware, very fine eyes. She, however,
noticed the suggestive delicacy of his face, which had, as it
happened, more than once somewhat displeased her, and a certain
languidness of expression, with which she had also grown almost
impatient. This man, she had decided, was too readily acquiescent.

"That," she continued, "is rather a big question, isn't it?"

"Ah!" said Nasmyth reflectively. "Now I begin to understand. Well, I
don't mind admitting that I once had ambitions and the means of
gratifying them, as well as an optimistic belief in myself. That,
however, was rudely shattered when the means were withdrawn, and a man
very soon learns of how little account he is in Western Canada. Why
shouldn't I be content to live as the ranch-hands do, especially when
it's tolerably evident that I can't do anything else?"

"You are forgetting that most of them were born to it. That counts for
a good deal. Have you noticed how far some of the other