One afternoon three or four days after Carroll had sailed, Evelyn sat alone in Mrs. Nairn's drawing-room, a prey to confused regrets and keen anxiety. She had recovered from the first shock caused her by Carroll's news, but though she could face the situation more calmly, she could find no comfort anywhere—Vane was lying, helpless and famishing, in the frost-bound wilderness. She knew that she loved the man; indeed, she had really known it for some time, and it was that which had made Jessy's revelation so bitter. Now, fastidious in thought and feeling as she was, she wondered whether she had been too hard upon him; it was becoming more and more difficult to believe that he could have justified her disgust and anger; but this was not what troubled her most. She had sent him away with cold disfavor. Now he was threatened by dangers. It was horrible to think of what might befall him before assistance arrived, and yet she could not drive the haunting dread out of her mind.

She was in this mood when a maid announced that two visitors wished to see her; and when they were shown in, she found it difficult to hide her astonishment as she recognized in Kitty the very attractive girl she had once seen in Vane's company. It was this which prompted her to assume a chilling manner, though she asked her guests to be seated. Neither of them appeared altogether at her ease, and there was, indeed, a rather ominous sparkle in Kitty's blue eyes.

"Mr. Carroll was in town not long ago," Kitty began bluntly. "Have you had any news of him since he sailed?"

Evelyn did not know what to make of the question, and she answered coldly.

"No; we do not expect any word for some time."

"I'm sorry. We're anxious about Mr. Vane."

On the surface, the announcement appeared significant, but the girl's boldness in coming to her for news was inexplainable to Evelyn. Puzzled as she was, her attitude became more discouraging.

"You know him then?"

Something in her tone made Celia's cheeks burn and she drew herself up.

"Yes," she said; "we know him, both of us. I guess it's astonishing to you. But I met him first when he was poor, and getting rich hasn't spoiled Mr. Vane."

Evelyn was once more puzzled. The girl's manner savored less of assurance than of wholesome pride which had been injured. Kitty then broke in:

"We had no cards to send in; but I'm Kathleen Blake, and this is Celia
Hartley—it was her father sent Mr. Vane off to look for the spruce."

"Ah!" exclaimed Evelyn, a little more gently, addressing Celia. "I understand that your father died."

Kitty flashed a commanding glance at Celia.

"Yes," the girl replied; "that is correct. He left me ill and worn out, without a dollar, and I don't know what I should have done if Mr. Vane hadn't insisted on giving Drayton a little money for me; on account, he said, because I was a partner in the venture. Then Miss Horsfield got some work among her friends for me to do at home. Mr. Vane must have asked her to; it would be like him."

Evelyn sat silent a few moments. Celia had given her a good deal of information in answer to a very simple remark; but she was most impressed by the statement that Jessy, who had prejudiced her against Vane, had helped the girl at his request. It was difficult to believe that she would have done so had there been any foundation for her insinuations. If Celia spoke the truth, and Evelyn somehow felt this was the case, the whole thing was extraordinary.

"Now," continued Celia, "it's no way astonishing that I'm grateful to Mr. Vane and anxious to hear whether Mr. Carroll has reached him." This was spoken with a hint of defiance, but the girl's voice changed.

"I am anxious. It's horrible to think of a man like him freezing in the bush."

Her concern was so genuine and yet somehow so innocent that Evelyn's heart softened.

"Yes," she asserted, "it's dreadful." Then she asked a question. "Who's the Mr. Drayton you mentioned?"

Kitty blushed becomingly; this was her lead.

"He's a kind of partner in the lumber scheme; I'm going to marry him. He's as firm a friend of Mr. Vane's as any one. There's a reason for that—I was in a very tight place once, left without money in a desolate settlement where there was nothing I could do, when Mr. Vane helped me. But perhaps that wouldn't interest you."

For a moment her doubts still clung to their hold in Evelyn's mind, and then she suddenly drove the last of them out, with a stinging sense of humiliation. She could not distrust this girl; it was Jessy's suggestion that was incredible.

"It would interest me very much," she declared.

Kitty told her story effectively, but with caution, laying most stress upon Vane's compassion for the child and her invalid mother. She was rather impressed by Miss Chisholm, but she supposed that she was endowed with some of the failing common to human nature.

Evelyn listened with confused emotions and a softened face. She was convinced of the truth of the simple tale, and the thought of Vane's keeping his moneyed friends and directors waiting in Vancouver in order that a tired child might rest and gather shells upon a sunny beach stirred her deeply. It was so characteristic; exactly what she would have expected him to do.

"Thank you," she said quietly, when Kitty had finished; and then, flinging off the last of her reserve, she asked a number of questions about Drayton and about Celia's affairs.

Before her visitors left, all three were on friendly terms; but Evelyn was glad when they took their departure. She wanted to be alone to think. In spite of the relief of which she was conscious, her thoughts were far from pleasant. Foremost among them figured a crushing sense of shame. She had wickedly misjudged a man who had given her many proofs of the fineness of his character; the evil she had imputed to him was born of her own perverted imagination. She was no better than the narrow-minded, conventional Pharisees she detested, who were swift to condemn out of the uncleanness of their self-righteous hearts. Then, as she began to reason, it flashed upon her that she was, perhaps, wronging herself. Her mind had been cunningly poisoned by an utterly unscrupulous and wholly detestable woman, and she flamed out into a fit of imperious anger against Jessy. She had a hazy idea that this was not altogether reasonable, for she was to some extent fastening the blame she deserved upon another person's shoulders; but it did not detract from the comfort the indulgence in her indignation brought her.

When she had grown a little calmer, Mrs. Nairn came in; and Mrs. Nairn was a discerning lady. It was not difficult to lead Evelyn on to speak of her visitors, for the girl's pride was broken and she felt in urgent need of sympathy; but when she had described the interview she felt impelled to avoid any discussion of the more important issues, even with the kindly Scotch lady.

"I was surprised at the girls' manner," she concluded. "It must have been embarrassing to them; but they were really so delicate over it, and they had so much courage."

Mrs. Nairn smiled.

"Although one of them has traveled with third-rate strolling companies and the other has waited in a hotel? Weel, maybe your surprise was natural. Ye canna all at once get rid of the ideas and prejudices ye were brought up with."

"I suppose that was it," replied Evelyn thoughtfully.

Her companion's eyes twinkled.

"Then, if ye're to live among us happily, ye'll have to try. In the way ye use the words, some of the leading men in this country were no brought up at all."

"Do you imagine that I'm going to live here?"

Mrs. Nairn gathered up one or two articles she had brought into the room with her and moved toward the door, but before she reached it she looked back with a laugh.

"It occurred to me that the thing was no altogether impossible."

An hour afterward, Evelyn and Mrs. Nairn went down into the town, and in one of the streets they came upon Jessy leaving a store. The latter was not lacking in assurance and she moved toward them with a smile; but Evelyn gazed at her with a total disregard of her presence and walked quietly on. There was neither anger nor disdain in her attitude; to have shown either would have been a concession she could not make. The instincts of generations of gently-reared Englishwomen were aroused, as well as the revulsion of an untainted nature from something unclean.

Jessy's cheeks turned crimson and a malevolent light flashed into her eyes as she crossed the street. Mrs. Nairn noticed her expression and smiled at her companion.

"I'm thinking it's as weel ye met Jessy after she had got the boat for
Carroll," she commented.

The remark was no doubt justified, but the fact that Jessy had been able to offer valuable assistance failed to soften Evelyn toward her. It was merely another offense.

In the meanwhile, the powerful tug steamed northward, towing the sloop, which would be required, and after landing the rescue party at the inlet steamed away again. Before she had disappeared Carroll began his march, and his companions long remembered it. Two of them were accustomed to packing surveyors' stores through the seldom-trodden bush and the others had worked in logging camps and chopped new roads, but though they did not spare themselves, they lacked their leader's animus. Carroll, with all his love of ease, could rise to meet an emergency, and he wore out his companions before the journey was half done. He scarcely let them sleep; he fed them on canned stuff to save delay in lighting fires; and he grew more feverishly impatient with every mile they made. He showed it chiefly by the tight set of his lips and the tension of his face, though now and then when fallen branches or thickets barred the way he fell upon the obstacles with the ax in silent fury. For the rest, he took the lead and kept it, and the others, following with shoulders aching from the pack-straps and labored breath, suppressed their protests.

Like many another made in that country, it was a heroic journey; one in which every power of mind and body was taxed to the limit. Delay might prove fatal. The loads were heavy; fatigue seized the shrinking flesh, but the unrelenting will, trained in such adventures, mercilessly spurred it on. Toughened muscle is useful and in the trackless North can seldom be dispensed with; but man's strength does not consist of that alone: there are occasions when the stalwart fall behind and die.

In front of them, as they progressed, lay the unchanging forest, tangled, choked with fallen wreckage, laced here and there with stabbing thorns, appalling and almost impenetrable to the stranger. They must cleave their passage, except where they could take to the creek for an easier way and wade through stingingly cold water or flounder over slippery fangs of rock and ice-encrusted stones. There was sharp frost among the ranges and the brush through which they tore their way was generally burdened with clogging snow. They went on, however, and on the last day Carroll drew some distance ahead of those who followed him. It was dark when he discovered that he had lost them, but that did not matter, for now and then faint moonlight came filtering down and he was leaving a plain trail behind. His shoulders were bleeding beneath the biting straps; he was on the verge of exhaustion; but he struggled forward, panting heavily and rending his garments to rags as he smashed through the brakes in the darkness.

The night—it seemed a very long one—was nearly over when he recognized the roar of a rapid that rang in louder and louder pulsations across the snow-sprinkled bush. He was not far from the end now, and he became conscious of an unnerving fear. The ground was ascending sharply, and when he reached the top of the slope the question from which he shrank would be answered for him—if there should be no blink of light among the serried trunks, he would have come too late.

He reached the summit and his heart leaped; then he clutched at a drooping branch to support himself, shaken by a reaction that sprang from relief. A flicker of uncertain radiance fell upon the trees ahead, and down the bitter wind there came the reek of pungent smoke. The bush was slightly more open, and Carroll broke into a run. Presently he came crashing and stumbling into the light of the fire and then stopped, too stirred and out of breath to speak. Vane lay where the red glow fell upon his face, smiling up at him.

"Well," he said, "you've come. I've been expecting you, but on the whole
I got along not so badly."

Carroll flung off his pack and sat down beside the fire; then he fumbled for his pipe and began to fill it hurriedly with trembling fingers. He lighted it and flung away the match before he spoke.

"Sorry I couldn't get through sooner," he mumbled. "The stores on board the sloop were spoiled; I had to go on to Vancouver. But there are things to eat in my pack."

"Hand it across. I haven't been faring sumptuously the last few days. No, sit still! I'm supple enough from the waist up."

He proved it by the way he leaned to and fro as he opened the pack and distributed part of its contents among the cooking utensils. Carroll assisted him now and then but he did not care to speak. The sight of the man's gaunt face and the eagerness in his eyes prompted him to an outbreak of feeling rather foreign to his nature, and he did not think his companion would appreciate it. When the meal was ready, Vane looked up at him.

"I've no doubt this journey cost you something—partner," he said.

Then they ate cheerfully, and Carroll, watching his friend's efforts with appreciation, told his story in broken sentences. Afterward, they lighted their pipes, but by and by Carroll's fell from his relaxing grasp.

"I can't get over this sleepiness," he explained. "I believe I disgraced myself in Vancouver by going off in the most unsuitable places,"

"I dare say it was quite natural. Anyway, hadn't you better hitch yourself a little farther from the fire?"

Carroll did so and lay still afterward, but Vane kept watch during the rest of the night, until in the dawn the packers appeared.