nded
by convincing her that something was very much wrong indeed. And she
grieved in silence, not daring to question him further.

The self-revealing touch came to him in a curious way only a few days
before their wedding day. He was in camp on a final inspection of his
mine, and was walking the streets at night, silent, self-absorbed and
gloomy. He had grown morbid and unwholesome in his thought, and the
wreck of his happiness seemed already complete. He spent a great deal
of time in long and lonely walks.

The street swarmed with rough, noisy miners. A band of evangelists,
with drums and tambourines, occupied the central corner. A low,
continuous hum of talk could be heard at the base of all other noises.

Being in no mood for companionship Clement stood aside from it all,
thinking how far above all this life his beautiful bride was.

There had been in the camp for some weeks a certain sensational
evangelist--a man of some power, but of unhappy disposition
apparently. At any rate he had been in much trouble with the city
authorities. He had been called a "hypocrite and fake" in the public
press, and had been prosecuted for disturbance of the peace. But he
seemed to thrive on such treatment.

Clement had paid very little attention to the man and his troubles,
but as he looked down the street at the crowd around the speakers on
the corner it occurred to him to wonder if they were the fighting
evangelists.

He was about to move that way when he observed near him in the dark
middle of the street a man and a woman.

"This will do as well as anywhere," the man said, putting down a small
box. He wore a broad cowboy hat, and a long coat which hung unbuttoned
down his powerful figure. The woman was tall and slender, and neatly
dressed in gray. Clement understood that these were the persecuted
ones.

The man mounted the box, and in a powerful but not very musical voice
began to sing a hymn full of cowboy slang. His singing had a quality
not usual in street singers, and a crowd quickly gathered about him.
His song was long and not without a rude poetry. He began his address
at last by issuing a defiance to his enemies. This would mean little
in an Eastern village, perhaps, but in a mining camp, even a
degenerate mining camp, it might mean a great deal--life or death, in
fact.

"Now, gentlemen, I want to say something as a preface in order to know
just where we stand. Some citizens of the town have vilified me in
pri