ink I had ever harbored them. If she had done
things I could not understand--and she had--I knew there must be a good
reason for them. For the rest, in spite of Marcia and her silly
mysteries, and even though she belonged to Dudley, she was my dream
girl, and I meant to stand by her.

"That was the first time I spoke to you," I said, as if there had been
no pause. "After that, I picked up a seal for you, and I told you your
hair was untidy before Marcia could. I think those are all the
enormously kind things I've ever done for you. But, if you want
kindness, you know where to come!"

"Without telling you things--and when you don't trust me!"

"Telling things never made a man trust any one," said I. "And besides,"
it was so dark now, as we crawled along the side of the long rocky hill
that followed the swamp, that I had to look hard to see her face, "I
never said I didn't trust you. And there isn't anything you could tell
me that I want to know!"

"Oh," Paulette cried as sharply as if I had struck her, "do you mean
you're taking me on trust--in spite of everything?"

"In spite of nothing." I laughed. I was not going to have her think I
knew about Collins, much more all the stuff Marcia had said. But she
turned her head and looked at me with a curious intentness.

"I'll try," she began in a smothered sort of voice, "I mean I'm not all
you've been thinking I was, Mr. Stretton! Only," passionately, and it
was the last thing I had expected her to say, "I wish we were at Billy
Jones's with all this gold!"

I did not, whether she had astonished me or not. I could have driven all
night with her beside me, and her arm touching mine when the wagon
bumped over the rocks.

"We're halfway," I returned rather cheerlessly. "Why? You're not afraid
we'll be held up, are you? No human being ever uses this road."

"I wasn't thinking of human beings," she returned simply. "I was
thinking of wolves."

"Wolves?" I honestly gasped it. Then I laughed straight out. "I can't
feel particularly agitated about wolves. I know we had some at La
Chance, but we probably left them there, nosing round the bunk-house
rubbish heap. And anyhow, a wolf or two wouldn't trouble us. They're
cowardly things, unless they're in packs." I felt exactly as if I were
comforting Red Riding Hood or some one in a fairy tale, for the Lord
knows it had never occurred to me to be afraid of wolves. "What on earth
put wolves in your head?"

"I--don't know! They