e stairs to pack his
belongings.

CHAPTER VIII

INTO THE NIGHT

Harris and Allan drove straight to the engine, never looking back to
see what became of the hired man. On the way the farmer explained to
his son what had taken place; that words had passed between them, but
no blows had been struck, until Allan appeared on the scene.

"Well, if that's the way of it, I'm sorry I hit him," said the young
man, frankly, "and when I see him I'll tell him so. I plugged him a
good one, didn't I?--though, to be honest, he was hardly on his feet.
But he sure landed me a stem-winder on the chin," he continued,
ruefully rubbing that member, "so I guess we're about even."

"He might 've broke your neck," said Harris. "You're too hot-headed,
both of you...I can't make out what got into Jim, that he wouldn't
answer a civil question. Jim was a good man, too." Perhaps the
disturbing suggestion entered Harris's mind that the question had
been none too civil, and he was really beginning to feel that after
all Jim might be the aggrieved party. But he crushed down such mental
sedition promptly. "It don't matter how good a man he was," he
declared, "as long as I pay the piper I'm goin' to call the tune."

"It puts us up against it for a water-man, though," said Allan,
thoughtfully.

"So it does," admitted Harris, who up to that moment had not
reflected that his hasty action in dismissing Travers would result in
much more delay than anything else that had occurred. "Well, we'll
have to get somebody else. We'll manage till noon, and then you
better ride over to Grant's or Mormon's. They'll be able to lend a
man or one of the boys for a day or two." It was significant that
although Harris was planning a considerable venture with Riles, when
he wanted a favour his thought instinctively turned to his other
neighbours, Grant and Morrison.

At noon Jim's chair was vacant, and the family sat down to dinner
amid a depressing silence. No mention was made of the morning's
incident until the meal was well advanced, when Harris, feeling that
he ought in some way to introduce the subject, said: "Is Jim gone?"

"Yes, he's gone," blazed Beulah. "You didn't expect he'd wait to kiss
you good-bye, did you?"

"One in the family is enough for that treatment," put in Allan, whose
swollen chin and stiff neck still biassed him against Travers.

"He didn't, either. And if he did it's none of your business, you
big--"; she looked her brother st