rmen--he could not decide yet how he should deal with Carmen. Loyal as
he was by nature, and as he had shown himself to Wisler, modest as to his
own deserts, and slow to fancy himself valued by any woman, he could not
now help seeing, as Wisler had seen the one motive which could have
tempted Carmen Gaylor to send Angela May a box of poison-oak. Many little
things came back, in a flood of disturbing memory; things to which Nick
had attached no importance at the time, or had misunderstood, owing to his
humility, where women were concerned, and his chivalrous, almost
exaggerated respect for his employer's wife and widow--the generous,
disinterested friend that he had thought her. "What a fool--what a
double-dyed fool!" he anathematized himself, as he got the motor ready to
start, while Billy still ate apple-pie and cream on the kitchen veranda.
In spite of Wisler's catechism he had let Angela accept Carmen's
invitation, had even urged her to accept. If anything hideous happened it
would be his fault. But no, surely nothing would happen. It was too bad to
be true. If Carmen had committed the crime of sending the poison-oak, it
must have been in a fit of madness, after hearing things--stupid
things--from Miss Dene. By this time she must have repented. She could not
be a woman and harm a guest--such a guest as Angela May and in her own
house.

And yet it was odd--he had dimly thought it odd, even in his
ignorance--that Carmen should have followed them out to the Big Trees from
Wawona, there to make a "dead set" at Mrs. May. She had said that her
choice of the Yosemite for rest and change of air was a coincidence; that
she had not known he was in the neighbourhood until she heard the news at
Wawona. But suddenly Nick ceased to believe that story. She had gone
because he was there--with Angela May.

As he thought these things he was starting the car, getting into the car,
driving the car away from the house, to the Gaylor ranch. There was no bad
patch of road. That was an invention of Carmen's for the plausibility of
the plan she had sketched out to Angela. The road had been finished months
ago, and Nick flew along it in the Bright Angel at a pace which might have
got him into trouble with the police if there had been any police to spy
upon him. The way ran through disused pasture land which was to be
irrigated, enriched, and grown with alfalfa; and at a turn in the road he
came upon a sight which flashed to his eyes like a sp