he money for them. The
hand that took the money, a pudgy hand all angry red from beating sun,
had blisters in the palm. Gower's face, like his hands, was brick red.
Already shreds of skin were peeling from his nose and cheeks. August sun
on the Gulf. MacRae knew its bite and sting. So had his father known. He
wondered if Gower ever thought about that now.

But there was in Gower's expression no hint of any disturbing thought.
He uttered a brief "thanks" and pocketed his money. He sat down and took
his oars in hand, albeit a trifle gingerly. And he said to old Doug
Sproul, almost jovially:

"Well, Doug, I got as many as you did, this trip."

"Didja?" Sproul snarled. "Kain't buy 'em cheap enough, no more, huh?
Gotta ketch 'em yourself, huh?"

"Hard-boiled old crab, aren't you, Doug?" Gower rumbled in his deep
voice. But he laughed. And he rowed away to the beach before his house.
MacRae watched. Betty came down to meet him. Together they hauled the
heavy rowboat out on skids, above the tide mark.

Nearly every day after that he saw Gower trolling around the Rock,
sometimes alone, sometimes with Betty sitting forward, occasionally
relieving him at the oars. No matter what the weather, if a rowboat
could work a line Gower was one of them. Rains came, and he faced them
in yellow oilskins. He sweltered under that fiery sun. If his life had
been soft and easy, softness and ease did not seem to be wholly
necessary to his existence, not even to his peace of mind. For he had
that. MacRae often wondered at it, knowing the man's history. Gower
joked his way to acceptance among the rowboat men, all but old Doug
Sproul, who had forgotten what it was to speak pleasantly to any one.

He caught salmon for salmon with these old men who had fished all their
lives. He sold his fish to the _Blanco_ or the _Bluebird_, whichever was
on the spot. The run held steady at the Cove end of Squitty, a
phenomenal abundance of salmon at that particular spot, and the _Blanco_
was there day after day.

And MacRae could not help pondering over Gower and his ways. He was
puzzled, not alone about Gower, but about himself. He had dreamed of a
fierce satisfaction in beating this man down, in making him know poverty
and work and privation,--rubbing his nose in the dirt, he had said to
himself.

He had managed it. Gower had joined the ranks of broken men. He was
finished as a figure in industry, a financial power. MacRae knew that,
beyond a doubt. Go