at last a promise of "midsummer
pomps." Pine woods and streams breathed freshness, and when in his walk
along the railway line--since there is no other road through the Kicking
Horse Pass--he reached a point whence the great Yoho valley became
visible to the right, he checked the rapid movement which had brought
him a kind of physical comfort, and set himself--in face of that
far-stretching and splendid solitude--to wrestle with calamity.

First of all there was the Englishman--Delaine--and the letter that must
be written him. But there, also, no evasions, no suppliancy. Delaine
must be told that the story was true, and would no doubt think himself
entitled to act upon it. The protest on behalf of Lady Merton implied
already in his manner that afternoon was humiliating enough. The smart
of it was still tingling through Anderson's being. He had till now felt
a kind of instinctive contempt for Delaine as a fine gentleman with a
useless education, inclined to patronise "colonists." The two men had
jarred from the beginning, and at Banff, Anderson had both divined in
him the possible suitor of Lady Merton, and had also become aware that
Delaine resented his own intrusion upon the party, and the rapid
intimacy which had grown up between him and the brother and sister.
Well, let him use his chance! if it so pleased him. No promise whatever
should be asked of him; there should be no suggestion even of a line of
action. The bare fact which he had become possessed of should be
admitted, and he should be left to deal with it. Upon his next step
would depend Anderson's; that was all.

But Lady Merton?

Anderson stared across the near valley, up the darkness beyond, where
lay the forests of the Yoho, and to those ethereal summits whence a man
might behold on one side the smoke-wreaths of the great railway, and on
the other side the still virgin peaks of the northern Rockies, untamed,
untrodden. But his eyes were holden; he saw neither snow, nor forests,
and the roar of the stream dashing at his feet was unheard.

Three weeks, was it, since he had first seen that delicately oval face,
and those clear eyes? The strong man--accustomed to hold himself in
check, to guard his own strength as the instrument, firm and
indispensable, of an iron will--recoiled from the truth he was at last
compelled to recognise. In this daily companionship with a sensitive and
charming woman, endowed beneath her light reserve with all the sweetness
of u