he driver took them straight towards a large and attractive hotel, and
it seemed to Harley that half the population of the town was out to see
the triumphant entry of the candidate. With all the attention of the
crowd centred upon one man, Harley was able to slip quietly through the
dense ranks and enter the hotel, where he fell at once into the hands of
Sylvia Morgan. She came forward to meet him, impulsively holding out
her hands, the light of welcome sparkling in her eyes.

"We did not know what had become of you," she exclaimed. "We feared that
you had got lost in the quicksands of the river." And then, with a
sudden flush, she added, somewhat lamely, "We are all so glad that Uncle
James has got back safely."

Harley had read undeniable relief and welcome in her eyes, and it gave
him a peculiar thrill, a thrill at first of absolute and unthinking joy,
followed at once by a little catch. Before him rose the square and
massive vision of "King" Plummer, and he had an undefined sense of doing
wrong.

"We've brought him back safely," he said, after slight hesitation. "We
spent the night very comfortably in a farm-house on the prairie."

She noticed his hesitation, and her eyes became eager.

"I do believe that you have had an adventure," she exclaimed. "I know
that you have; I know by your look. You must tell it to me at once."

"We have had an adventure," admitted Harley, "and there is no reason why
I shouldn't tell you of it, as in a few hours a long account of it
written by me will be going eastward."

"I am waiting."

Harley began at once with his narrative, and they became absorbed in it,
he in the telling and she in the hearing. While he talked and she
listened "King" Plummer approached. Now the "King" in these later few
days had begun to study the ways of women, in so far as his limited
experience enabled him to do so, a task to which he had never turned his
attention before in his life. But the words of Mrs. Grayson rankled;
they kept him unhappy, they disturbed his self-satisfaction, and made
him apprehensive for the future. He had been in the crowd that welcomed
Jimmy Grayson, he had shaken the candidate's hand effusively, and now,
when he entered the hotel, he found Sylvia Morgan welcoming John Harley.

"King" Plummer did not like what he saw; it gave him his second shock,
and he paused to examine the two with a yellow eye, and a mind reluctant
to admit certain facts, among them the most obvious one,