ht
he knew--and he wondered at the strange tenacity of this emotion which
Mills could not shake off. A deep-rooted passion for some particular
woman, an emotion which could not be crushed, was no mystery to
Hollister. He only wondered that it should be so vital a force in the
life of a man.

Mills came down from the hill camp to settle his account with
Hollister in the morning. He carried his blankets and his clothes in a
bulky pack on his sturdy shoulders. When he had his money, he rose to
go, to catch the coastwise steamer which touched the Inlet's head that
afternoon. Hollister helped him sling the pack, opened the door for
him,--and they met Myra Bland setting foot on the porch step.

They looked at each other, those two. Hollister knew that for a second
neither was conscious of him. Their eyes met in a lingering fixity,
each with a question that did not find utterance.

"I'm going out," Mills said at last. A curious huskiness seemed to
thicken his tongue. "This time for good, I hope. So-long."

"Good-by, Charlie," Myra said.

She put out her hand. But either Mills did not see it or he shrank
from contact, for he passed her and strode away, bent a little forward
under his pack. Myra turned to watch him. When she faced about again
there was a mistiness in her eyes, a curious, pathetic expression of
pity on her face. She went on into the house with scarcely a glance at
Hollister.

In another week spring had ousted winter from his seasonal supremacy.
The snow on the lower levels vanished under a burst of warm rain. The
rain ceased and the clouds parted to let through a sun fast growing to
full strength. Buds swelled and burst on willow and alder. The soil,
warmed by the sun, sent up the first shoots of fern and grasses, a
myriad fragile green tufts that would presently burst into flowers.
The Toba rose day by day, pouring down a swollen flood of snow-water
to the sea.

And life went on as it always did. Hollister's crew, working on a
bonus for work performed, kept the bolts of cedar gliding down the
chute. The mill on the river below swallowed up the blocks and spewed
them out in bound bundles of roof covering. Lawanne kept close to his
cabin, deep in the throes of creation, manifesting strange vagaries of
moroseness or exhilaration which in his normal state he cynically
ascribed to the artistic temperament. Bland haunted the creeks where
the trout lurked, tramped the woods gun in hand, a dog at his heels,
ob