or it? She did not know. The thing was as
unexplainable as it was inescapable. All the training of her life had
shaped her to other ends. Lady Farquhar would explain it as a glamour
cast by a foolish girl's fancy. But Moya knew the tide of feeling which
raced through her was born not of fancy but of the true romance.

CHAPTER XXIV

TWO IN A BUCKET

Jack heard the story of his rescue from India. He surprised her alone in
the breakfast room by hobbling in one morning after the rest had gone.

She popped a question directly at him. "Did the doctor say you could get
up?"

"Didn't ask him," he answered with a laugh, and dropped into a seat
across the table.

Shaven and dressed in a clean freshly pressed suit, he looked a
different man from the haggard grimy vagabond Captain Kilmeny had
brought back with him three days earlier. The eyes were still rather
sunken and the face a bit drawn, but otherwise he was his very competent
and debonair self. His "Good mornin', India," was as cheery and matter
of fact as if those five days of horror had never existed.

"Don't believe it will hurt you." Her bright eyes were warm in their
approval of him. "You look a lot fitter than you did even yesterday.
It's awfully jolly to see you around again, Cousin Jack."

"I'm enjoying it myself," he conceded. "Anything of importance in that
covered dish over there?"

"Tell me all about it," she ordered, handing him the bacon. Then, with a
shudder, she added: "Must have been rather awful down there."

"Bad enough," he admitted lightly.

"Tell me." She leaned forward, chin in hand.

"What's the use? Those fellows put me down. Your brother took me up.
That's all."

"It isn't all. Ned says it is perfectly marvelous the way you dug that
tunnel and escaped from being crushed, and then dug it again after it
had caved."

"Couldn't lie down and quit, could I? A man in the hole I was can't pick
and choose." He smiled lazily at her and took a muffin from a plate
handed him by the waiter. "My turn to ask questions. I want the full
story of how you guessed I was in the west shaft of the Golden Nugget."

"Haven't you heard? It was Moya guessed it--from the tapping on the
pipe, you know."

"So I've been told. Now let's have the particulars." His eyes went
arrow-straight into hers and rested there.

India told him. She knew that Ned would make a safer husband for Moya
than this forceful adventurer. It was quite likely to be on the card