nd he sat rigid, lest the bumping of the rattling vehicle should
waken her. The position for him was trying, but he never wavered.
Cramped and weary as he was, he strove by every means in his power to
leave her undisturbed.

And as he passed the river three ghostly figures ambled down to the
bank, and, after drinking their horses, likewise passed over. But
while Scipio kept to the trail, they vanished amidst the woods. Their
task was over, and they sought the shortest route to their homes.

And so Scipio came to his claim. And such was his state of mind, so
was he taken up with the happiness which the presence of his wife
beside him gave him, and such was his delight in looking forward to
the days to come, that he saw nothing of that which lay about him.

The air to him was sweet with all the perfumes his thankful heart
inspired in his thoughts. His road was a path of roses. The reek of
oil was beyond his simple ken. Nor did he heed the slush, slush of his
mule's feet, as the old beast floundered through the lake of oil
spread out on all sides about him. The gurgling, the sadly bubbling
gusher, even, might have been one of the fairy sounds of night, for
all thought he gave to it.

No; blind to all things practical as he always was, how was it
possible that Scipio, leaving Suffering Creek a poor, struggling
prospector, should realize by these outward signs that he had returned
to it, possibly, a millionaire?

CHAPTER XXXV

HOME

Scipio stood in the doorway of his hut with a hopelessly dazed look in
his pale eyes and a perplexed frown upon his brow. He had just
returned from Minky's store, whither he had been to fetch his twins
home. He had brought them with him, leading them, one in each hand.
And at sight of their mother they had torn themselves free from their
father's detaining hands and rushed at her.

Jessie, strangely subdued, but with a wonderful light of happiness in
her eyes, was in the midst of "turning out" the bedroom. She had spent
the whole morning cleaning and garnishing with a vigor, with a
heartwhole enjoyment, such as never in all her married life had she
displayed before. And now, as the children rushed at her, their piping
voices shrieking their joyous greeting, she hugged them to her bosom
as though she would squeeze their precious lives out of them. She
laughed and cried at the same time in a way that only women in the
throes of unspeakable joy can. Her words, too, were incoherent,