t light now poured in, blending its
pale effulgence with the blue radiance from the grate. He was a man to
be admired. His frame a trifle stouter than when we last saw him, but
still supple and firm; the set of the shoulders, the taper of the body
to the waist, the keen but passive face, the poise of the whole figure
was that of one who, tasting of the goodness of life, had not
gormandized thereon. He was called a success, yet in the honesty of
his own soul he feared the coin did not ring true. Conward had
insisted more and more upon "weighing the coal." And Dave had
concerned himself less and less with the measure. That was what
worried him. He felt that the crude but honest conception of the
square deal which was the one valuable heritage of his childhood was
slipping away from him. He had little in common with Conward outside
of their business relationship. He suspected the man vaguely, but had
never found tangible ground for his suspicion. Dave did not drink, and
those confidences peculiar to a state of semi-intoxication were denied
him. He was afraid to drink, not with the fear of the craven, but with
the fear of a man who knows his enemy's advantage. He had suffered in
his own home, and he feared the enemy, and would make no truce.
Neither was he seduced by the vices which the possession of wealth made
easy to his hand. He counted more as a dream--a sort of supernalism
out of the past--that last night and that last compact with Irene
Hardy, but it had been anchorage for his soul on more than one
dangerous sea, and he would not give it up. Some time, he supposed, he
should take a wife, but until then that covenant, sealed by the
moonlight to the approving murmur of the spruce trees, should stand as
his one title of character against which no _caveat_ might be
registered.

He was turning this very matter over in his mind, and wondering what
the end would be, when a knock came at the door.

"Come," he said, switching on the light. . . "Oh, it's you, Bert. I
am honoured. Sit down."

The girl threw her coat over a chair and sank into another. Without
speaking she extended her shapely feet to the fire, but when its
soothing warmth had comforted her limbs she looked up and said,

"Adam sure put it over on us, didn't he?"

"Still nursing that grievance over your sex," laughed Dave. "I thought
you would outgrow it."

"I don't blame him," continued the girl, ignoring his interruption. "I
am just