and live as a lone
trapper in the woods, moving from place to place, always having a home
to come back to if he wished. What he had always to fight against was
an inclination towards luxury and labour-saving convenience. He had
bought a patent camp cooking-stove in New York. It was capable of
cooking anything, from a sirloin to a savoury. But when he unpacked it
he saw how incongruous such a thing was with the domestic economy of a
shanty in the forest.

"What does a plain trapper want with fancy fixings like this, anyway?"
he asked himself. "If he's hankerin' after delicacies an' dainty
cookery, he'd best quit right back to London. My food's goin' ter be
frizzled over an open wood fire, and that dinky, high-class kitchen
range is goin' right away to the bottom of Sweetwater Pond."

He allowed himself to stain the outer planks of the dwelling, but not
to use any decorative paints which an ordinary trapper or an Indian
could not procure. A garden, with flowers as well as vegetables, and
creepers for the veranda, he considered necessaries, just as frames for
pictures, shelves for his books, racks for his guns, and cupboards for
his crockery were necessary.

There were three rooms in the cabin--a large living-room, which was
also kitchen, a workroom, and a bedroom; and they were all three very
simply furnished. Not far behind the cabin were the sheds and
outhouses, the stables, cow-house, and barns; and down at the lakeside
was a boathouse, in which to keep his canoes and fishing materials.

This was the secluded home which Lord St. Olave was making for himself,
in preference to a grand house in London and a great mansion on his
vast estate in Norfolk, with innumerable servants to wait upon him, and
crowds of fashionable friends to enjoy his hospitality. He was
realizing his wish to abandon the social whirl of London and to return
to his native wilds. But he was not yet wholly satisfied with his
choice.

He entered the living-room one afternoon looking weary and untidy, and
flung himself into an easy-chair, giving a curt nod of greeting to
Gideon Birkenshaw, who had strolled down from the homestead to have tea
with him.

"Tired, Kiddie?" Gideon inquired. "Bin workin' too hard?"

"No," returned Kiddie, "I ain't tired. I'm never tired."

"Ankle still hurtin' you some, mebbe?" pursued Gideon.

"Ankle's gettin' along all right," Kiddie assured him. "Guess it'll
soon be's well's ever. Shall we have tea?