thicket
bisected by a few paths and drives, with the sea lapping all about three
sides of its seven-mile boundary. From Gower's northward windows the
Capilano canyon opened between two mountains across the Inlet. Southward
other windows gave on English Bay and beach sands where one could count
a thousand swimmers on a summer afternoon.

The place was only three blocks from Abbott's. The house itself was not
unlike Abbott's, built substantially of gray stone and set in ample
grounds. But it was a good deal larger, and both within and without it
was much more elaborate, as befitted the dwelling of a successful man
whose wife was socially a leader instead of a climber,--like so many of
Vancouver's newly rich. There was order and system and a smooth,
unobtrusive service in that home. Mrs. Horace A. Gower rather prided
herself on the noiseless, super-efficient operation of her domestic
machinery. Any little affair was sure to go off without a hitch, to be
quite charming, you know. Mrs. Gower had a firmly established prestige
along certain lines. Her business in life was living up to that
prestige, not only that it might be retained but judiciously expanded.

Upon a certain March morning, however, Mrs. Gower seemed to be a trifle
shaken out of her usual complacency. She sat at a rather late breakfast,
facing her husband, flanked on either hand by her son and daughter.
There was an injured droop to Mrs. Gower's mouth, a slightly indignant
air about her. The conversation had reached a point where Mrs. Gower
felt impelled to remove her pince-nez and polish them carefully with a
bit of cloth. This was an infallible sign of distress.

"I cannot see the least necessity for it, Norman," she resumed in a
slightly agitated, not to say petulant tone. "It's simply ridiculous for
a young man of your position to be working at common labor with such
terribly common people. It's degrading."

Norman was employing himself upon a strip of bacon.

"That's a mere matter of opinion," he replied at length. "Somebody has
to work. I have to do something for myself sometime, and it suits me to
begin now, in this particular manner which annoys you so much. I don't
mind work. And those copper claims are a rattling good prospect.
Everybody says so. We'll make a barrel of money out of them yet. Why
shouldn't I peel off my coat and go at it?"

"By the way," Gower asked bluntly, "what occasioned this flying trip to
England?"

Norman pushed back hi