pers, seemed sufficient. Some few may have had surmises, but
they said nothing openly. Bert Morrison, for example, meeting Dave in
the street, congratulated him upon the change. "I knew you would find
him out some day;" she said. "Find what out?" Dave questioned, with
feigned surprise. "Oh, nothing," was her enigmatic answer, as she
changed the subject.

Irene Hardy found herself in a position of increasing delicacy. Since
the day of their conversation in the tea-room Dave had been constant in
his attentions, but, true to his ultimatum, had uttered no word that
could in any way be construed to be more or less than Platonic. His
attitude vexed and pleased her. She was vexed that he should leave her
in a position where she must humiliate herself by taking the
initiative; she was pleased with his strength, with his daring, with
the superb self-control with which he carried out a difficult purpose.
Just how difficult was that purpose Irene was now experiencing in her
own person. She had now no doubt that she felt for Dave that
attachment without which ceremonies are without avail, and with which
ceremonies are but ceremonies. And yet she shrank from
surrender. . . . And she knew that some day she must surrender.

The situation was complicated by conditions which involved her
mother--and Conward. Mrs. Hardy had never allowed herself to become
reconciled to Dave Elden. She refused to abandon her preconceived
ideas of the vulgarity which through life must accompany one born to
the lowly status of cow puncher. The fact that Dave, neither in manner
nor mind, gave any hint of that vulgarity which she chose to associate
with his early occupation, did not in the least ameliorate her
aversion. Mrs. Hardy, without knowing it, was as much a devotee of
caste as any Oriental. And Dave was born out of the caste. Nothing
could alter that fact. His assumption of the manners of a gentleman
merely aggravated his offence.

It was also apparent that Conward's friendship for Mrs. Hardy did not
react to Dave's advantage. Conward was careful to drop no word in
Irene's hearing that could be taken as a direct reflection upon Dave,
but she was conscious of an influence, a magnetism, it almost seemed,
the whole tendency of which was to pull her away from Elden. She knew
there had been trouble between the two men, and that their formal
courtesy, when they met at her mother's house, was formal only; but
neither admitted her into