My mother died when I needed her most. Later when
I was very lonely--or hurt--I drank."

"And brooded!" finished Mic-co quietly.

"Yes," said Carl. "Always." He spoke a little bitterly of the wild
inheritance of passions and arrogant intolerance with which Nature had
saddled him.

"All of which," reminded Mic-co soberly, "you inflamed by intemperate
drinking. Is it an inherited appetite?"

"It is not an appetite at all," said Carl.

"You like it?"

"If you mean that to abandon it is to suffer--no. I enjoyed it---yes."

The wind that blew through the open windows and doors of the lodge
stirred the moonlit water lilies in the pool. To Carl they were pale
and unreal like the wraith of the days behind him. Like a reflected
censer in the heart of the bloom shone the evening star. The peace of
it all lay in Mic-co's fine, dark, tranquil face as he talked, subtly
moulding another's mind in the pattern of his own. He did not preach.
Mic-co smoked and talked philosophy.

Carl had known but little respect for the opinions of others. He was
to learn it now. He was to find his headstrong will matched by one
stronger for all it was gentler; his impudent philosophy punctured by a
wisdom as great as it was compassionate; his own magnetic power to
influence as he willed, a negligible factor in the presence of a man
whose magnetism was greater.

Mic-co had said quietly by the pool one night that he had been a
doctor--that he loved the peace and quiet of his island home--that
years back the Seminoles had saved his life. He had since devoted his
own life to their service. They were a pitiful, hunted remnant of a
great race who were kindred to the Aztec.

He seemed to think his explanation quite enough. Wherefore Carl as
quietly accepted what he offered. There was much that he himself was
pledged to withhold. Thus their friendship grew into something fine
and deep that was stronger medicine for Carl than any preaching.

"My mother and I were _friends_!" said Carl one night. "When I was a
lad of ten or so, as a concession to convention she married the man
whose name I bear, a kindly chap who understood. He died. After that
we were very close, my mother and I. We rode much together and talked.
I think she feared for me. There was peace in my life then--like this.
That is why I speak of it. I needed a friend, some one like her with
brains and grit and balance that I could respect--some one who would
underst