nothing to her, she told herself.
She had seen Monohan only once since the day Fyfe choked him, and then
only to exchange the barest civilities--and to feel her heart flutter at
the message his eyes telegraphed.

When she returned from the launch trip, Fyfe was home, and Charlie
Benton with him. She crossed the heavy rugs on the living room floor
noiselessly in her overshoes, carrying Jack Junior asleep in her arms.
And so in passing the door of Fyfe's den, she heard her brother say:

"But, good Lord, you don't suppose he'll be sap-head enough to try such
fool stunts as that? He couldn't make it stick, and he brings himself
within the law first crack; and the most he could do would be to annoy
you."

"You underestimate Monohan," Fyfe returned. "He'll play safe,
personally, so far as the law goes. He's foxy. I advise you to sell if
the offer comes again. If you make any more breaks at him, he'll figure
some way to get you. It isn't your fight, you know. You unfortunately
happen to be in the road."

"Damned if I do," Benton swore. "I'm all in the clear. There's no way he
can get me, and I'll tell him what I think of him again if he gives me
half a chance. I never liked him, anyhow. Why should I sell when I'm
just getting in real good shape to take that timber out myself? Why, I
can make a hundred thousand dollars in the next five years on that block
of timber. Besides, without being a sentimental sort of beggar, I don't
lose sight of the fact that you helped pull me out of a hole when I sure
needed a pull. And I don't like his high-handed style. No, if it comes
to a showdown, I'm with you, Jack, as far as I can go. What the hell
_can_ he do?"

"Nothing--that I can see." Fyfe laughed unpleasantly. "But he'll try. He
has dollars to our cents. He could throw everything he's got on Roaring
Lake into the discard and still have forty thousand a year fixed income.
Sabe? Money does more than talk in this country. I think I'll pull that
camp off the Tyee."

"Well, maybe," Benton said. "I'm not sure--"

Stella passed on. She wanted to hear, but it went against her grain to
eavesdrop. Her pause had been purely involuntary. When she became
conscious that she was eagerly drinking in each word, she hurried by.

Her mind was one urgent question mark while she laid the sleeping
youngster in his bed and removed her heavy clothes. What sort of
hostilities did Monohan threaten? Had he let a hopeless love turn to the
acid of hate