t you understand you
can't get back to-night, if you go to Caraquet. And--Good heavens--you
ought _not_ to go, if you want the truth of it! There's nothing to
see--and you'll get half frozen--and you mayn't get back for days, if it
snows!"

Paulette Brown looked at him as if he were not there. Then she laughed.
"I didn't say I was going to Caraquet! If you want to know all about my
taking a chance for a drive behind a pair of good horses, Miss Wilbraham
wants Billy Jones's wife to come over for a week and work for her. I'm
going to stay all night with Mrs. Jones and bring her back in the
morning. She'll never leave Billy unless she's fetched. So I really
think you needn't worry, Mr. Macartney," she paused, and I thought I saw
him wince. "I'm not going to be a nuisance either to you or Mr.
Stretton," and before he had a chance to answer she started up the
horses. I had just time to take a flying jump and land in the wagon
beside her as she drove off.

Macartney exclaimed sharply, and I didn't wonder. If he had not jumped
clear the near wheels must have struck him. I lost the angry, startled
sentence he snapped out. But it could have been nothing in particular,
for my dream girl only turned in her seat and smiled at him.

I had no smile as I took the reins from her. I had wanted a chance to be
alone with her, and I had it: but I knew better than to think she was
going to Billy Jones's for the sake of a drive with me. The only real
thought I had was that behind me, in the back of the wagon, were the
boxes of gold she had marked inexplicably with her blue seal, and that I
had heard her say the night before that she "would have to get that
gold!"

How she meant to do it was beyond me; and it was folly to think she ever
_could_ do it, with six feet of a man's strength beside her. But
nevertheless, when you loved a girl for no other earthly reason than
that she was your dream of a girl come true, and even though she
belonged to another man, it was no thought with which to start on a
lonely drive with her. I set my teeth on it and never opened them for a
solid mile over the hummocky road through the endless spruce bush,
behind which the sun had already sunk. I could feel my dream girl's
shoulder where she sat beside me, muffled in a sable-lined coat of
Dudley's: and the sweet warmth of her, the faint scent of her
gold-bronze hair, made me afraid to speak, even if I had known what I
wanted to say.

But suddenly she spoke