he habitually used toward Burnaby, "has tea got to do with a man
you met on the Upper Liara last summer and a man you met this afternoon?
Why tea?"

"A lot," said Burnaby cryptically, and proceeded to apply himself to his
salad, for he had refused the courses his lateness had made him miss.
"Y'see," he said, after a moment's reflection, "it was this way--and
it's worth telling, for it's queer. I ran into this Terhune this
afternoon at a club--a big, blond Englishman who's been in the army, but
now he's out making money. Owns a tea house in London. Terhune &
Terhune--perhaps you know them?" He turned to Sir John.

"Yes, very well. I imagine this is Arthur Terhune."

"That's the man. Well, his being in tea and that sort of thing got me to
telling him about an adventure I had last summer, and, the first crack
out of the box, he said he remembered the other chap perfectly--had
known him fairly well at one time. Odd, wasn't it, when you come to
think of it? A big, blond, freshly bathed Englishman in a club, and that
other man away up there!"

"And the other man? Is he in the tea business too?" asked Mrs. Selden.
She was interested by now, leaning across the table, her dark eyes
catching light from the candles. It was something--to interest Mrs.
Selden.

"No," said Burnaby abruptly. "No. He's in no business at all, except
going to perdition. Y'see, he's a squaw-man--a big, black squaw-man,
with a nose like a Norman king's. The sort of person you imagine in
evening clothes in the Carleton lounge. He might have been anything but
what he is."

"I wonder," said Sir John, "why we do that sort of thing so much more
than other nations? Our very best, too. It's odd."

"It was odd enough the way it happened to me, anyhow," said Burnaby.
"I'd been knocking around up there all summer, just an Indian and
myself--around what they call Fort Francis and the Pelly Lakes, and
toward the end of August we came down the Liara in a canoe. We were
headed for Lower Post on the Francis, and it was all very lovely until,
one day, we ran into a rapid, a devil of a thing, and my Indian got
drowned."

"How dreadful!" murmured Lady Masters.

"It was," agreed Burnaby; "but it might have been worse--for me, that
is. It couldn't have been much worse for the poor devil of an Indian,
could it? But I had a pretty fair idea of the country, and had only
about fifty miles to walk, and a little waterproof box of grub turned up
out of the wreck, so I wa