ge if he could not find a boat ready to leave
port for some far-off, safe place. He could do that any day. He had
money enough in his pocket to carry him out of the country if he were
willing to forego the luxuries that come dear in travel--and he
thought he could, with all this practice!

He played with the idea. He pictured himself taking the down train,
and the next day shipping out of San Francisco on a sailing vessel
bound for Japan or Panama or Seattle--it did not greatly matter which.
He would have to make sure first that the boat was not equipped with
wireless, so he supposed he must choose a small sailing vessel, or
perhaps a tramp steamer. At other times he pictured himself landing in
Salt Lake and hiking out from there to find work on some ranch. Who
would ever identify him there as Jack Corey?

He dreamed those things over his cigarettes, smoked parsimoniously
through a cheap holder until the stub was no longer than one of
Marion's fingernails that Jack loved to look at because they were
always so daintily manicured. He dreamed, but he could not bring
himself to the point of making one of his dreams come true. He could
not, because of Marion. She had helped him to plan this retreat, she
had helped him carry some of the lighter supplies up to the cave, she
had stood by him like the game little pal she was. He could dream, but
he could not show himself ungrateful to Marion by leaving the place.
Truth to tell, when he could be with her he did not want to leave. But
the times when he could be with her were so dishearteningly few that
they could not hold his courage steady. She upbraided him for going so
far down the mountain to meet her--what would she have said if she
knew that once, when the moon was full, he had gone down to the very
walls of the cabin where she slept, and had stood there like a
lonesome ghost, just for the comfort her nearness gave him? Jack did
not tell her that!

Jack did not tell her anything at all of his misery. He felt that it
would not be "square" to worry Marion, who was doing so much for him
and doing it with such whole-souled gladness, to serve a fellow being
in distress. Jack did not flatter himself that she would not have done
exactly as much for any other likable fellow. It was an adventure that
helped to fill her empty days. He understood that perfectly, and as
far as was humanly possible he let her think the adventure a pleasant
one for him. He could not always control his