loses," she said; and not
waiting for an answer she went on to ask--moved by some association of
ideas:--

"How is Jocint doing?"

"Always unruly, the foreman tells me. I don't believe we shall be able
to keep him."

Hosmer then spoke a few words through the telephone which connected
with the agent's desk at the station, put on his great slouch hat, and
thrusting keys and hands into his pocket, joined Therese in the
door-way.

Quitting the office and making a sharp turn to the left, they came in
direct sight of the great mill. She quickly made her way past the huge
piles of sawed timber, not waiting for her companion, who loitered at
each step of the way, with observant watchfulness. Then mounting the
steep stairs that led to the upper portions of the mill, she went at
once to her favorite spot, quite on the edge of the open platform that
overhung the dam. Here she watched with fascinated delight the great
logs hauled dripping from the water, following each till it had
changed to the clean symmetry of sawed planks. The unending work made
her giddy. For no one was there a moment of rest, and she could well
understand the open revolt of the surly Jocint; for he rode the day
long on that narrow car, back and forth, back and forth, with his
heart in the pine hills and knowing that his little Creole pony was
roaming the woods in vicious idleness and his rifle gathering an
unsightly rust on the cabin wall at home.

The boy gave but ugly acknowledgment to Therese's amiable nod; for he
thought she was one upon whom partly rested the fault of this
intrusive Industry which had come to fire the souls of indolent
fathers with a greedy ambition for gain, at the sore expense of
revolting youth.

III

In the Pirogue.

"You got to set mighty still in this pirogue," said Gregoire, as with
a long oar-stroke he pulled out into mid stream.

"Yes, I know," answered Melicent complacently, arranging herself
opposite him in the long narrow boat: all sense of danger which the
situation might arouse being dulled by the attractiveness of a new
experience.

Her resemblance to Hosmer ended with height and slenderness of figure,
olive tinted skin, and eyes and hair which were of that dark brown
often miscalled black; but unlike his, her face was awake with an
eagerness to know and test the novelty and depth of unaccustomed
sensation. She had thus far lived an unstable existence, free from the
weight of responsibilities, with