but the evening was no more than pleasantly cool, and
Ida sat down on an old stone seat.

Scarthwaite faced toward the west, and she looked out across a deep,
green valley toward the sweep of upland and heather moor that cut
black and solemn against a paling saffron glow. It was very still,
though now and then a bleating of sheep rang sharply out of the wisps
of mist that streaked the lower meadows. Perhaps it was the stillness
or the scent of the firs that climbed the hollow of the ghyll behind
the house that reminded Ida of the man who had strolled with her
through the shadow of the giant redwoods of the Pacific Slope. In any
case, she was thinking of him when Arabella Kinnaird stopped for a
moment at her side and glanced toward Weston, who stood not far away.

"You heard that man's name. Did you notice a resemblance to anybody we
have met?" she inquired.

"Yes," said Ida. "Of course, it may be accidental."

Her companion laughed.

"I don't think it is. In view of what I once told you on the subject,
it's a matter I mean to investigate."

She moved away; but it was Ida who first was afforded an opportunity
of deciding the question, for a few minutes later Ainslie strolled
toward her. When he sat down beside her, she indicated the waste, of
climbing pasture, which ran up, interspersed with gorse bushes and
clumps of heather, to the dusky moor.

"Not a sign of cultivation," she said. "I suppose that grass is never
broken up? How much foundation is there for Mr. Weston's views?"

Ainslie laughed.

"I'm afraid I'm hardly competent to decide, but there are people who
agree with him. Still, I think it's reasonably certain that a good
deal of the higher land that now carries a few head of sheep would
grow oats and other things. It's largely a question of economics.
Somebody would have to spend a good deal of money and labor on it
first, and the result, which wouldn't be very apparent for two or
three years, would be a little uncertain then. It depends on how much
the man who undertook it wanted back to make the thing worth while."

"They are content with food, and sometimes very indifferent shelter,
in western Canada."

"There," said Ainslie, "you have the thing in a nutshell. You have, no
doubt, formed some idea of Weston's wants, which are rather numerous.
In fact, some of us seem to consider it the correct thing to cultivate
them. The more wants you have the greater man you are."

Ida smiled a little as she