ation and
the St. Lawrence trip.

Hilda saw, in her side glances, the gloomy expression that had settled
upon his face; and she recovered her spirits first.

"It's all right," she whispered; "I don't care."

Max came up then, from a talk with James out on the stairway, and for a
few moments there was no chance to reply. But after Bannon had caught
Max's signals to step out of hearing of the others, and before he had
risen, there was a moment when Pete's attention was drawn by one of the
waiters, and he said:--

"Can you go with me--Monday?"

She looked frightened, and the blood rose in her cheeks so that she had to
bend low over her pile of napkins.

"Will you?" He was pushing back his chair.

She did not look up, but her head nodded once with a little jerk.

"And you'll stay for the dinner, won't you--now?"

She nodded once more, and Bannon went to join Max.

Max made two false starts before he could get his words out in the proper
order.

"Say," he finally said; "I thought maybe you wouldn't care if I told
James. He thinks you're all right, you know. And he says, if you don't
care, he'd like to say a little something about it when he makes his
speech. Not much, you know--nothing you wouldn't like--he says it would
tickle the boys right down to their corns."

Bannon looked around toward Hilda, and slowly shook his head.

"Max," he replied, "if anybody says a word about it at this dinner I'll
break his head."

That should have been enough, but when James' turn came to speak, after
nearly two hours of eating and singing and laughing and riotous good
cheer, he began in a way that brought Bannon's eyes quickly upon him.

"Boys," he said, "we've worked hard together on this job, and one way and
another we've come to understand what sort of a man our boss is. Ain't
that right?"

A roar went up from hundreds of throats, and Hilda, sitting next to
Bannon, blushed.

"We've thought we understood him pretty well, but I've just found out that
we didn't know so much as we thought we did. He's been a pretty square
friend to all of us, and I'm going to tell you something that'll give you
a chance to show you're square friends of his, too."

He paused, and then was about to go on, leaning forward with both hands on
the table, and looking straight down on the long rows of bearded faces,
when he heard a slight noise behind him. A sudden laugh broke out, and
before he could turn his head, a strong hand fell on each