time to report by telephone to the Department of the Interior before the
close of the official day. Several letters awaited him. One was from
Elsie, and this he read at once, finding it unexpectedly cordial:

"My father is writing you an invitation to come to us
immediately. You said you would arrive in Washington on the
17th, either on the 11 A.M. train or the one at 3 P.M. In
either case we will look for you at 6.30 to dine with us before
you get your calendar filled with engagements. I shall wait
impatiently to hear how you are getting on out there. It is all
coming to have a strange fascination for me. It is almost like
a dream."

This letter quickened his pulse in a way which should have brought shame
to him, but did not. The Senator's letter was ponderously polite. "I
hope, my dear Captain Curtis, you will be free to call at once. My
daughter and Lawson--"

At that word a chill wind blew upon the agent's hope. Lawson! "I had
forgotten the man!" he said, almost aloud. "Ah! that explains her frank
kindliness. She writes as one whose affections are engaged, and
therefore feels secure from criticism or misapprehension." That
explained also her feeling for the valley--it was the scene of her
surrender to Lawson. The tremor went out of his nerves, his heart
resumed its customary beating, steady and calm, and, setting his lips
into a straight line, he resumed the Senator's letter, which ended with
these significant words: "There are some important matters I want to
talk over in private."

A note from Lawson urged him to take his first breakfast in the city
with him. "I want to post you on the inside meaning of certain
legislation now pending. I expect to see you at the Brisbanes'."

Curtis made his toilet slowly and with great care, remitting nothing the
absence of which would indicate a letting down of military neatness and
discipline. He wore the handsome undress uniform of a captain, and his
powerful figure, still youthful in its erectness, although the lines
were less slender than he wished, was dignified and handsome--fit to be
taken as a type of mature soldier. He set forth, self-contained but
eager.

The Brisbane portico of rose granite was immensely imposing to a dweller
in tents and cantonments, such as Curtis had been for ten years, but he
allowed no sign of his nervousness to appear as he handed his overcoat
and cap to the old colored man in the vestibule.

As h