e as much as I'll earn altogether next year if I
throw away my stake."

She waved his argument aside. "Stupid boy! I have dresses enough to last
me for five years--if you'll let me be that poor man's wife. I can make
them over myself later and still be the best dressed woman in camp."

From above came Captain Kilmeny's shout. "We telephoned down. The
engineer has the trouble arranged."

The cable began to move.

"When shall I see you alone again, Moya?" Jack demanded.

"I don't know."

"I'm going to see you. We've got to fight this out. I'll not let Lady
Farquhar keep me from seeing you alone. It's serious business."

"Yes," she admitted. "I'll tell Lady Jim. But ... there's no use in
letting you think I'll give up. I can't."

"You've got to give up. That's all there is to it." His jaw was set like
a vise.

The party above fell upon them as they landed.

"Were you frightened, Moya?" exclaimed Joyce above the chorus of
questions.

"Just for a moment." Moya did not look at Jack. "Mr. Kilmeny told me it
would be all right."

Jack's eyes danced. "I told her we would work out of the difficulty if
she would trust me."

Moya blushed. It happened that Captain Kilmeny was looking directly at
her when his cousin spoke.

CHAPTER XXV

HOMING HEARTS

Jack Kilmeny had not been brought up in the dry sunbaked West for
nothing. The winds of the Rockies had entered into his character as well
as into his physique. He was a willful man, with a good deal of granite
in his make-up. A fighter from his youth, he did not find it easy to
yield the point upon which he differed from Moya. There was in her so
much of impulsive generosity that he had expected to overpower her
scruples. But she stood like a rock planted in the soil.

It came to him as he walked home after a long fight with her that in his
heart he did not want her to yield. She was the Moya Dwight he loved
because she would not compromise with her conviction. Yet, though he
wanted her to stand firm, he hated the thought of giving way himself. It
galled his pride that he must come to her without a penny, knowing that
she had the means to keep them both modestly. Nor could he, without a
pang, think of surrendering the twenty-eight thousand dollars he had
fought for and won. He was no visionary. The value of money he
understood perfectly. It stood for power, place, honor, the things that
were worth having. Given what he had, Jack knew he could double it in