Instead, Jack Fyfe sat with his feet on the oven door, a cigar
in one corner of his mouth. The kettle steamed. Her porridge pot bubbled
ready for the meal.

"Good morning," he greeted. "Mind my preempting your job?"

"Not at all," she answered. "You can have it for keeps if you want."

"No, thanks," he smiled. "I'm sour on my own cooking. Had to eat too
much of it in times gone by. I wouldn't be stoking up here either, only
I got frozen out. Charlie's spare bed hasn't enough blankets for me
these cold nights."

He drew his chair aside to be out of the way as she hurried about her
breakfast preparations. All the time she was conscious that his eyes
were on her, and also that in them lurked an expression of keen
interest. His freckled mask of a face gave no clue to his thoughts; it
never did, so far as she had ever observed. Fyfe had a gambler's
immobility of countenance. He chucked the butt of his cigar in the stove
and sat with hands clasped over one knee for some time after Katy John
appeared and began setting the dining room table with a great clatter
of dishes.

He arose to his feet then. Stella stood beside the stove, frying bacon.
A logger opened the door and walked in. He had been one to fare ill in
the night's hilarity, for a discolored patch encircled one eye, and his
lips were split and badly swollen. He carried a tin basin.

"Kin I get some hot water?" he asked.

Stella silently indicated the reservoir at one end of the range. The man
ladled his basin full. The fumes of whisky, the unpleasant odor of his
breath offended her, and she drew back. Fyfe looked at her as the man
went out.

"What?" he asked.

She had muttered something, an impatient exclamation of disgust. The
man's appearance disagreeably reminded her of the scene she had observed
through the bunkhouse window. It stung her to think that her brother was
fast putting himself on a par with them--without their valid excuse of
type and training.

"Oh, nothing," she said wearily, and turned to the sputtering bacon.

Fyfe put his foot up on the stove front and drummed a tattoo on his
mackinaw clad knee.

"Aren't you getting pretty sick of this sort of work, these more or less
uncomfortable surroundings, and the sort of people you have to come in
contact with?" he asked pointedly.

"I am," she returned as bluntly, "but I think that's rather an
impertinent question, Mr. Fyfe."

He passed imperturbably over this reproof, and his glance turn