Conniston saying: "It's funny, old
top, devilish funny--but it'll be funnier still when some other man
comes along and carries her off!"

And he, John Keith, would have to grin and bear it because he was her
brother!

Mary Josephine was tapping at his door.

"Derwent Conniston," she called frigidly, "there's a female person on
the telephone asking for you. What shall I say?"

"Er--why--tell her you're my sister, Mary Josephine, and if it's Miss
Kirkstone, be nice to her and say I'm not able to come to the 'phone,
and that you're looking forward to meeting her, and that we'll be up to
see her some time today."

"Oh, indeed!"

"You see," said Keith, his mouth close to the door, "you see, this Miss
Kirkstone--"

But Mary Josephine was gone.

Keith grinned. His illimitable optimism was returning. Sufficient for
the day that she was there, that she loved him, that she belonged to
him, that just now he was the arbiter of her destiny! Far off in the
mountains he dreamed of, alone, just they two, what might not happen?
Some day--

With the cold chisel and the hammer he went to the chest. His task was
one that numbed his hands before the last of the three locks was
broken. He dragged the chest more into the light and opened it. He was
disappointed. At first glance he could not understand why Conniston had
locked it at all. It was almost empty, so nearly empty that he could
see the bottom of it, and the first object that met his eyes was an
insult to his expectations--an old sock with a huge hole in the toe of
it. Under the sock was an old fur cap not of the kind worn north of
Montreal. There was a chain with a dog-collar attached to it, a
hip-pocket pistol and a huge forty-five, and not less than a hundred
cartridges of indiscriminate calibers scattered loosely about. At one
end, bundled in carelessly, was a pair of riding-breeches, and under
the breeches a pair of white shoes with rubber soles. There was neither
sentiment nor reason to the collection in the chest. It was junk. Even
the big forty-five had a broken hammer, and the pistol, Keith thought,
might have stunned a fly at close range. He pawed the things over with
the cold chisel, and the last thing he came upon--buried under what
looked like a cast-off sport shirt--was a pasteboard shoe box. He
raised the cover. The box was full of papers.

Here was promise. He transported the box to Brady's table and sat down.
He examined the larger papers first. There we