it dawned upon her, with a bitterness born of her former
experience with Granville, that she had lost something of the standing
that certain circles had accorded her as the wife of a successful
mining man. It made her ponder. Was Bill so far wrong, after all, in
his estimate of them? It was a disheartening conclusion. She had come
of a family that stood well in Granville; she had grown up there; if
life-time friends blew hot and cold like that, was the game worth
playing?

In so far as she could she gave the lie to some of the petty gossip.
Whereas at first she had looked dubiously on spending Bill's money to
maintain the standard of living they had set up, she now welcomed that
deposit of five thousand dollars as a means to demonstrate that even in
his absence he stood behind her financially--which she began to
perceive counted more than anything else. So long as she could dress
in the best, while she could ride where others walked, so long as she
betrayed no limitation of resources, the doors stood wide. Not what
you are, but what you've got--she remembered Bill saying that was their
holiest creed.

It repelled her. And sometimes she was tempted to sit down and pour it
all out in a letter to him. But she could not quite bring herself to
the point. Always behind Bill loomed the vast and dreary Northland,
and she shrank from that.

On top of this, she began to suffer a queer upset of her physical
condition. All her life she had been splendidly healthy; her body a
perfect-working machine, afflicted with no weaknesses. Now odd
spasmodic pains recurred without rhyme or reason in her head, her back,
her limbs, striking her with sudden poignancy, disappearing as suddenly.

She was stretched on the lounge one afternoon wrestling nervously with
a particularly acute attack, when Vesta Lorimer was ushered in.

"You're almost a stranger," Hazel remarked, after the first greetings.
"Your outing must have been pleasant, to hold you so long."

"It would have held me longer," Vesta returned, "if I didn't have to be
in touch with my market. I could live quite happily on my island eight
months in the year. But one can't get people to come several hundred
miles to a sitting. And I feel inclined to acquire a living income
while my vogue lasts."

"You're rather a wilderness lover, aren't you?" Hazel commented. "I
don't think you'd love it as dearly if you were buried alive in it."

"That would all depend on the ci