ity came there was no uncertainty in
its tenor.

"Of course I love Nancy Follet! I have loved her ever since I first
set eyes upon her sweet little face,--and it has come before me always
in any stress of mind or heart as though to tell me she was always to
have part in my life. And yet I have been so dull I did not
understand. She preempted my heart from the first and that is why I
did not love beautiful Nita Trowbridge,--why I have never been able to
look at any girl with a spark of interest since." How he loved to
linger over the revelation which had come to him! It was like having
emerged from a desert into a land flowing with milk and honey. Little
Nancy! She had been so gentle, so confiding, so eager to help him with
things,--she would be his dear helper in the work of his life,--and
the work would thereby be glorified beyond measure! Under the spell of
his tender musing the forty miles again sped by unheeded and he was
back once more at the schoolroom door.

It was well that his tasks for the year were well-nigh over, for he at
once became consumed with the desire to see Nancy in the maturity of
her girlhood. He promptly decided that he would go as soon as school
closed and win her promise before he went on that prospecting tour. In
the meantime his mind continued to hover over the hours they had
spent together as boy and girl. He went to mill once more walking
beside a little fairy figure on old Dobbin's back,--he caught the
fragrance of shy flowers which nestled in cool woodland depths, and
memory let softly down the bars into a holy of holies as the little
girl said again in her sweet innocence, "Steve, let's build us a house
in this wood and live here always." He mounted the rugged steeps of
Greely's Ridge, her strong protector, while she reached down once more
a timid little hand to hold his tightly,--and suddenly he was startled
with remembrance of the character of that ridge. It must have held
minerals! Coal, yes, coal,--he was sure of it! There was the piece of
land he had been wanting to find!

And so with buoyant, twofold hope he started as soon as school was out
towards the Follet home, having deposited in the bank a sum which he
felt would be sufficient to purchase the Greely Ridge, should he find
it as valuable as he suspected and no one had preceded him in its
discovery.

XIII

OLD TIES RENEWED

It was mid-afternoon of a late June day when Steve stopped at Mr.
Follet's store. He won