One afternoon young Corrigan appeared at the office. “I wish you would repeat,” he said, when the civilities had been exchanged, “what you said to me a little while back.”

“About Mr. Bigelow?”

“Yes. Please tell me just what you think, and why you think so. You understand that I couldn't go on with this without pretty good authority behind me.”

“I have no documentary proof, if that's what you mean. But to my notion, that isn't necessary.” And Halloran simply repeated his former statements.

“Tell me again about this Le Duc—what is his relationship to Mr. Bigelow?”

“I may as well give you the whole story, Mr. Corrigan. The daughter of our Captain Craig went to Chicago some twenty years ago as Bigelow's private secretary. They were married and had two children, and then they were divorced. The courts allowed Mrs. Bigelow a decent income by way of alimony, most of which was never paid, and in some letters Bigelow admitted that it was unpaid. A little while ago, Le Duc, a fellow I had known in college, who had drifted on the stage and was rather up against it, married the daughter, Elizabeth Bigelow. They were all poor—Mrs. Bigelow (or Mrs. Craig, as she is now known) was really in want—and finally Le Duc got the letters from her and went out one evening to Evanston to demand money from Bigelow. Instead of giving it to him, Bigelow bought him off by offering him a position as the nominal head of the corner he was contemplating on the Board. Le Duc accepted, kept the letters, and cast off Mrs. Craig, who is now living here in Wauchung with her father. Just before I saw you he told me himself that Bigelow was the man behind him in his operations. That's the story.”

“Well—well,” observed Corrigan, with a distressed expression.

“And in telling it to you, I'm assuming that you don't want a Board of Trade plunger at the head of your combination.”

“No, no, of course we don't. Now, Mr. Halloran, what is it exactly that you have to suggest?”

“Say to Mr. Bigelow at your meeting that you have been told that he is behind the corner and request an explanation.”

“Yes?”

“If he can explain, well and good. You can refer the whole matter to me. But if he can't—there you are.”

Corrigan pondered. “That seems fair. I'll talk it over with my father. I'm much obliged to you, anyhow.”

“Not at all.”

A reaction had followed the fire and the long strain leading up to it. They all felt it. Crosman, wearied by the comparative idleness that was forced upon him, was irritable and inclined to chafe against the steady disapproval of Mrs. Higginson. Halloran was plunged in gloom most of the time. And to add to the depression Captain Craig decided to give up his post.

“You see, Mr. Halloran,” he said, in speaking of it, “you maybe wouldn't think to look at me that I'm a great-grandfather, but I've known it by my feelings since the fire. I didn't stand it very well—the running and the wet and all; and my eyes have been bothering me, too. Jennie and me, we've been talking it over, and she thinks I ought to just quit now, and look after the garden, and take it kind of easy. There's no room for us old fellows now, anyhow. A man had better make up his mind to it before he gets crowded out. I've saved a little something—enough to live on, and I've got my place, and I guess that's enough for anybody.”

“You're mistaken, Captain. There's not a better man on the Lakes, and I'm glad to tell you so. The Number One is yours as long as you'll keep her.”

There were tears in the Captain's eyes. “That's all right—I'm obliged to you. But I guess it's time to quit now while we're shut down and you have a good chance to look around for somebody else. There's only one thing that's been bothering me. Do you think you're going to have a place for George?”

“I'm sure of it. He's going to make a good man before he gets through with it.”

“I'm glad you think so. I must tell Jennie—it'll please her. And say—here's a little something—George says he's owed you three-fifty for a long while. He's managed to save it up now, and he wanted me to hand it to you.”

Halloran had to think. “Oh, that—that's nothing—I couldn't take it.”

“If you don't mind—I think you'd better. And I—I want to say, Mr. Halloran, before I quit you, that it's been a great thing for Mr. Higginson to have you here. I guess there ain't no doubt you've saved his business for him.”

This brought the gloom back to the Manager's face. He shook his head.

“That's all right now—I've watched the business some. It's your nerve and grit——”

“Captain,” Halloran broke in bitterly, “I———”

“I guess I know what you mean. You've been carrying a load that would have broke most men, and now you're sort of unstrung.”

Halloran shook his head again. “Damn the load.” He looked around the office. Crosman was out; the door was shut. “Captain, I've lost the girl I want to marry, for want of nerve.”

“Are you sure?”

He nodded.

“Is she married already?”

“Oh, no; she's gone away.”

“Where?”

“Down East. She didn't leave word.”

“And she ain't married anybody else? Then she ain't lost. Why don't you go after her?”

“I know. I've thought of that.”

“Thinking 'll never do it. You better go.” Halloran looked up and caught the Captain's eye. It was beaming with good-will, and it opened to him a glimpse of a new world. “I believe I will,” he said, holding his breath.

“You can get the eleven o'clock on the PÈre Marquette and connect with the Central Limited to-night at Detroit. I'll take care of the fire department while you're gone.”

“Will you?” He caught at the Captain's hand.

“Sure. You'd better move right along———Lord, yes, there's only twenty-five minutes, and it'll take you most of that to get home and pack. I'll call up the livery and have a carriage go right up after you.”

“Good. Tell Crosman I've been called East.”

“I'll see to everything. Good-by. And say, don't hurry back. Wire your address, and if we need you we'll let you know. Good-by. Good luck.”

“Thanks. Good-by.” He was gone with a rush, leaving his desk open behind him.

It so chanced that on this morning when Halloran went plunging off to seek his fortune, Mr. G. Hyde Bigelow, in an equally uncertain frame of mind, was fronting his. Matters were going awry down in Chicago. The Board of Trade deal, thanks to the elation and consequent intermeddling of the paid figurehead, was wobbling dangerously. And at ten o'clock, while Le Duc was hearing sharp, straight-out words in the mahogany office, the heads of nearly a score of Michigan lumber firms were gathering in the city office of the Corrigans, not far away. Hard-headed old fellows they were, most of them—men with slouch hats and unkempt beards, men who wore high boots beneath their bagging trousers, and swore as they talked and breathed. And there they waited for Bigelow, to ask him where their money had gone and how he proposed to get it back. At length he came.

“Good-morning, gentlemen,” he observed, as he laid aside his coat and stick and his silk hat.

“Good-morning,” came from Corrigan, and “How are you?” from one or two others. One graybeard murmured to a neighbour that he wished he'd a known in the first place that Bigelow wore a silk hat. “You can't trust a dude,” he muttered.

“Well, gentlemen,” the managing director began, drawing his report from his pocket, “I suppose a statement of what we have accomplished will——”

But young Corrigan couldn't wait. “Excuse me, Mr. Bigelow—and gentlemen. I think we all know just about where we stand in this business. And———”

“One moment, Mr. Corrigan. It is usual———”

“What I have to say is not usual, Mr. Bigelow. It's so important that it takes precedence, to my notion. It concerns our existence as a working body and our relations with you, sir. And this meeting can't go forward until it has been laid before you, and you've had the chance to convince us that what has been reported to me is untrue—that it is, as we should hope, a malicious lie. Before we think of the question of going forward or backward as a combination we must settle the question of our mutual confidence as individuals. A shadow has been cast upon this confidence; and you know, every man of you—” the graybeards, some startled, others condescending, looked at him; Bigelow looked at him, too—“You know that our whole structure must rest on complete confidence in the men we choose to direct our affairs. If this is removed, we can't do business a day.”

“I should suggest, Mr. Corrigan, that what you have to say had better come in the discussion that will follow the reading of the report. It is the object of this report to answer in advance all inquiries, to tell every fact about our work.”

“You'd better wait, Harry,” observed a man in boots. “Let him read it.”

“If this were a fact of our work it could wait, sir; but it ain't.” Corrigan was warming up. “It concerns you, personally, Mr. Bigelow. We have accepted your guidance so far because we believed you to be a certain kind of a man, and to stand for certain principles in business. We want to go on believing this, and we don't want to wait a minute, now that we're all together here. I've been told that you're the real operator of the big corner on the Board, that your money is in it, and that the man named Le Duc has been put up so that your name wouldn't be known. Is that so?”

Every face in the room changed expression. The blood rushed into Bigelow's.

“If you've been taking our time to make wild charges against my character———”

“You aren't answering,” shouted Corrigan. “Tell me that. That's what I ask.”

“You'd better cool down a bit, Harry.”

“No, Mr. Anderson, I won't cool down.”

“See here,” said Bigelow, his voice rising with the others. “This has nothing whatever to do with this meeting.”

Corrigan leaned over the table and looked him keenly in the eyes. “If you mean to withdraw here and now, Mr. Bigelow, to dissolve this agreement, then I'm with you; it has nothing to do with it. But if you mean to go on as our managing director, then you've got to answer that question.”

The other men looked at one another. “I guess that's fair, Mr. Bigelow,” observed the man in boots. “So long as Harry's sprung this on us we wouldn't any of us feel quite easy about it.”

“Well, sir, is it true?” asked Corrigan.

“I claim that this is impertinent.”

“Is it true?”

“I decline to answer. My private investments are simply none of your business.”

Corrigan sank back in his chair and drew a long breath. “There,” he said, “that's all I wanted to know. I think you'll agree with me, gentlemen, that we can't keep up these relations any longer. Suppose we hear the report now.”

It was half-past two when the door was opened and a score of heated, hungry men came out for lunch. Bigelow had recovered and made a strong fight, but the sentiment was overwhelmingly against him. The managership had been offered to Corrigan; he had declined and stood out for dissolution on the ground that during the dozen or fifteen years that remained before the timber should be all cut out there was room for them all without any damaging competition. And so before they broke up the lumber agreement was abrogated. And in a few days, as soon as matters could be settled, the lumber world would know it.

Eastward sped Halloran, on to the Hudson, on up the crooked mountain railroad to the junction village, on up the wagon road behind a team of crawling white horses; reaching at last the house perched on the mountainside, lost in billows of autumn flame. Yes, Miss Davies was still there. The wife of the proprietor had seen her shortly before, walking up the trail behind the house.

He found her standing in a tangle of late blackberries, hatless, her sleeves rolled to the elbow, reaching up to break off a crimson maple branch. She heard him crashing through brake and bramble, and turned. He did not see that she changed colour, she was so browned by the mountain sun—but she was startled. She did not move, but stood, holding the branch and looking at him without a word.

“How do you do?” he said, shaking hands. “Hardly expected to see me, did you?”

“No. This is a surprise. When did you get here?”

“Just now.”

“Well, you're just in time to walk back with me.”

He was disappointed. “Don't go right down. I came because they told me you were here, and now it would be too bad not to see you.”

“I'm going to play tennis, and there's only an hour before dark. Here, you may carry these branches. Aren't they beautiful? You walk ahead so I can look at them.”

There was no other way; the trail was narrow, and with the great bundle of branches in his arms he had all he could do to pick his way down the rocky path. Near the house they were met by a big young man in flannels, carrying tennis rackets. He looked curiously at Halloran, and passing him, walked with Miss Davies.

“Mr. Halloran,” she said, “Mr. Green.”

Mr. Green bowed and said, “How are you?” with an eastern drawl. And that was the last Halloran saw of her until supper time. He might have sat on the veranda and watched the game, but he did not; instead, he walked down to the road, and in the same plunging mood that had brought him East he went swinging up the valley. The bold splashes of crimson and yellow and golden brown on the long slopes, brought sharply out by the somber pines; the fringe of Queen Anne's lace along the road, and the masses of goldenrod and mint; the hum of millions of bees; the tumbling brook a rod away, with its pebbly ripples and dark pools; these he hardly saw. Even the Wittenberg, standing rugged against the sky, its crown of balsams now a trembling, luminous purple under the shafts of the setting sun, could not move him.

After supper, by some managing, he caught her alone in the hall. “Come,” he said, “let's go outside.”

She hesitated, but yielded. “I can't stay out but a minute. It's too cold.”

“Get a wrap or something. If you bundle up we could sit awhile. It's stuffy in there.”

“Oh, no, I can't. We're going to play euchre to-night.”

“We——”

“Oh, everybody. That means you, too, of course. Come in and let me introduce you. The people are jolly, most of them. There are always some queer ones, you know, at a place like this.”

“But, Margaret, I didn't come to play euchre. I don't want to know these people. Can't you see? I came on purpose to see you, and to talk to you. Get your things and take a walk with me. Never mind the euchre.”

“Oh, no, I couldn't do that. The people—it wouldn't look right.”

“What do we care for them?”

“No, I mustn't. We had really better go in.” And in she went, with Halloran, crestfallen, following.

After an insufferable evening he tried again to see her, and again it was accomplished only by maneuvering.

“Margaret,” he said, when he had drawn her into the corner of the emptying room, “tell me what it means. What's the matter?”

She looked at him and slowly shook her head. “Nothing,” she replied; “nothing at all.”

“Did you get my letters?”

She nodded.

“I didn't know—you didn't answer. Why didn't you write, Margaret?”

No answer.

“Won't you tell me? I've come a long way to ask you.”

“I—why, I just couldn't.”

“Didn't you have anything to say to me?”

“No, I don't believe I did.”

“And have you nothing to say to me now?”

A long, long silence. Then this from Miss Davies:

“Oh, please don't now. It's very late—and I'm tired.”

“But when am I to see you?” he broke out impatiently.

“Oh, there will be plenty of time. But not to-night—please. You aren't going away before morning.”

“I am here only for a day or so. I—I am down East on—on business.” He had quailed again. “I just stopped off here.”

“Oh, you just happened to come?”

“No, I meant to come—I had to, I couldn't stay away. It's a long time since I've seen you, Margaret.

“I know. You called in Evanston, didn't you? Mrs. Bigelow wrote me that you had taken George. How is he doing?”

“Well. But when can I talk with you—alone somewhere? I can't say anything when you seem so hurried.”

“Why—to-morrow, perhaps.”

“To-morrow morning?”

“No, not the morning. I'm going to climb the Terrace.”

“Why not drop that and come with me?”

“I can't. I promised Mr. Green. He's getting up a party. You—you might come along.” He shook his head. There was another pause. “Margaret,” he said then, “who is Mr. Green?”

“He's a Boston man.”

“Is he—is he——?”

Some one was looking for Miss Davies. “She's in the card-room, I think,” said a voice.

“Here I am. I'll be there directly.”

“Wait, Margaret. Do you plan to get back for lunch?”

“Yes—I don't think we're going to take any with us.”

“Then I'll order a carriage for two o'clock, and we'll drive.”

“Well——”

“Of course”—and every word he uttered sounded like “Mr. Green—Mr. Green”—“of course, if you'd rather not———”

“Oh, no—thank you very much. I'd enjoy going. At two, did you say?”

She was gone; and Halloran went outside and paced the veranda, alone with a cigar. His regular footfall sounded for a long time—during two cigars, in fact; and the thoughts he finally carried to bed with him were not the sort to put him into a condition for the diplomacy the morrow was to demand. In the morning, long before daylight he was up and dressed. He breakfasted late to avoid the climbing party, and from his window he watched them start up the road. He saw Green take Margaret's jacket and tie the sleeves through his belt. An annoying fellow he was with his easy manners, his faultless clothes, his calm reserve. He grated on Halloran; he reminded him of his own blunt western way; he forced him to recall again those rough antecedents of his. And that Halloran was keen enough to recognize the difference, indefinable as it seemed, aggravated matters. For an hour or so he sat in the library and tried to read, but failed. He thought a little fresh air might fix him up, and he went out for a six-mile tramp up the Panther Kill, through the ravine where the rock walls shine with moisture, and the trout lie deep in the pools below the falls, and the trees mat closely to shut out the day; but this was worse than the book. He came back over a spur of the Panther Mountain and here he had his first occupation of the day, scrambling up the ledges, fighting through the brambles, placing his feet carefully on the treacherous moss-covered rocks; here drawing himself by a finger grip up a sheer precipice, there elbowing up a chimney.

He reached the top of the ridge and plunged down through the forest. He saw a clearing ahead, and, pushing on, found the whole valley spread out below, the stream splashing and glittering in the sun, the white road winding out here and there from the shelter of the trees, and all the tumbling mountain land blazing with colour. To the south towered the Wittenberg, to the north lay the peaceful slopes of North Dome and Mount Sheridan. He was knee-deep in fragrant mint, and surrounded by droning bees. A look, and he was crashing on, covered with thistledown from the tangle of brush. It was a pleasure to jump the great hemlock logs that the tanners had left to rot thirty years before. Once a birch of six inches diameter snapped off short under his hand and gave him a tumble and a roll down the slope. He got up, shook out his joints and went on with a laugh, chasing a porcupine that lumbered off and tried to hide its head under a stone. And when at last he ran out into the upper meadows behind the house he was no longer thinking of Green.

But at noon the climbing party did not appear in the dining-room. At two o'clock, when the carriage appeared, there was no sign of them. At three the horse was still waiting and Halloran had gone back to his cigars. At half-past three he called the boy and ordered him shortly to take the horse back to the barn. At four the party, disheveled, flushed with exercise, laughing merrily together over the little jokes and incidents of the climb, came wearily up the walk. Halloran stood on the veranda and watched them as they climbed the steps. Margaret met him half-defiantly, half-apologetically.

“I'm sorry,” she murmured, as she passed him, the last of the party; “Mr. Green did take some sandwiches in his pockets. We—we went on about half way up the Wittenberg. I must change my things now; but if you still want to go I can be ready in a few minutes.”

“No—I've sent the horse back. You couldn't go now—you need a rest.”

“Well”—with a little toss of her head, “that's just as you like. We can go to-morrow, perhaps.”

“I think I shall have to go away this afternoon.” Here he was, forcing her to speak out and urge him; and she had no notion of being forced to speak.

“Oh, must you go so soon?”

“I think so.”

“That's too bad. You've not much more than got here. You really should have gone with us; we had a glorious climb. I'm all torn to pieces.” She put out a shoe that was cut and tom in two or three places. “I never worked so in my life before.”

Halloran was thawing rapidly; he could not stand there looking at her and still keep all his resentment. And when she said, with an embarrassed little laugh, “Well, I simply must go in,” he delayed her:

“Margaret, wait just a minute. Haven't you anything to say to me. It all rests with you. If you would tell me—to stay——”

He could not get further. She looked at him, then away. “Why—why—if you——— Of course you know best how much time you have.”

He turned away impatiently, and she hurried into the house, pausing only to add, “I shall be down in a few minutes.”

But when the few minutes, lengthened to half an hour, had passed, and she had come down and looked with a curious expression into the parlours and out about the veranda, Halloran was half a mile away, driving rapidly toward the railway station in the junction village. And not until the evening did she know certainly that he had gone.

One PÈre Marquette train reached Wauchung early in the morning, to connect with the car-ferry across the lake; and this was the train that brought Halloran back home. Walking up the street, bag in hand, he met the Captain, who was getting home from the yards for breakfast. Craig stopped when he saw him, and waited. They shook hands with only a greeting, but the Captain's shrewd old eyes were searching Halloran's face.

“Well, Mr. Halloran, we weren't looking for you quite so soon.”

“I've taken the best part out of a week. I couldn't stay longer than that. I'll see you after breakfast and go over things. No news?”

“No; everything's lovely. But say, Mr. Halloran, how about it?”

Halloran shook his head and would have hurried on.

“Pshaw, now; it wasn't no, was it?”

“Not exactly.”

“Well, say—then maybe it's all right.”

“It's nothing, Captain—worse than nothing.”

“You don't mean—you ain't telling me you've come back without either no or yes?”

Halloran made no answer. He simply wanted to get away.

“Mr. Halloran, I didn't think it of you; honest, I didn't. Say, now,” he reached down and caught hold of the bag, not heeding Halloran's protest, “let's step back this way. There hasn't a soul seen you—not a soul.” His eyes swept the street. “Just step along a little quicker. The early train 'll be pulling out before long, and you can pick up some breakfast at Reed City. I'd take you home with me—Jennie'd never peep—but I'm afraid some of the boys might be around when you come out, and anyhow you'd have to wait till the later train, and when you come to things like this time's worth saving. I guess prob'ly there's some other fellow hanging around down there these days and you've gone and given him a cool two days' start of you—you've just handed it to him. Now you get right back by the fastest train you can make. There's a good many things you know a heap more about than I do, but I guess maybe women ain't one of 'em.”

They reached the station, Halloran walking moodily without a word. At the edge of the platform he turned. “Captain, do you really think I ought to do it?”

“My boy, you've got to do it. You ain't going to lie down here, are you? And that's what it means if you don't. There's your train waiting there. You get right aboard before anybody shows up to ask questions. Good-by; good luck to you.”

Halloran got aboard, moody still; pulled up his collar, pulled down his hat, slid down low in the seat, and fixed his eyes on a worn spot in the back of the seat ahead. And when the train pulled into Reed City he was still gazing at the worn spot.

The invigorating autumn air still held in Woodland Valley. Halloran, finding that the sleepy white horses and their driver were likely to be delayed in the village, threw his bag under a seat and set out on foot, following the road up through the notch by the bronze patches of cornstalks. He caught up a handful of young winter-green and munched it as he tramped. There was a lift in the air, and he threw open his coat and walked with a swing.

At the house he asked for Miss Davies and was told that she was in her room, so he wrote a line in the library and gave it to a maid to take to her.

She came in a moment.

“Get your things, Margaret,” he said; “let's go outside.”

“But—when did you come?”

“Just now. I walked up. I've been out to Wauchung since I saw you the other day, but there was no use trying to stay there. You see—what I said about being down here on business was all a fib—I was afraid to own up.”

“Afraid,” she stood looking at him, with such a peculiar expression that he feared another delay.

“Never mind now; I'll tell you all about it when we get out. I want to walk up to the blackberry patch where I saw you the first day.” She went without a word for her things, still with that odd, sober expression; and in a few moments they were walking up the path toward the lower slopes of the mountain.

“You—you said you had been to Wauchung?” she remarked by way of breaking the silence.

“Yes. I stayed there about twenty minutes. You see—I can laugh at it now, but I couldn't then—I've been sort of a fool. When I wrote those letters and you didn't answer, and then when I went to your house and found that you'd come down here without a word to me, I was all broken up, and my nerve just left me. And then finally I did manage to get down here, and you didn't seem very glad to see me, and I don't doubt I was jealous of the Green fellow. I had forgotten then that after that night in Evanston—that when you had once let me know what you let me know then—you never would change. You see, I know you better than you think, Margaret. I've seen since that it was my fault—that I've been expecting you to say things it was my business to say for myself—and that there couldn't anything but little misunderstandings come between us after—after that. And—and———”

He paused to look at her. She would have liked a broad hat, a sunbonnet, anything that would have shielded her face from him, but her little tarn was merciless, and she could only study the path. Another moment and he had to fall behind her.

“Well, I guess that's all there is about it, Margaret. I was a fool, but I'm not a fool any longer. Here we are, where I saw you. Let's sit down on this log.” She slipped to the ground and deliberately faced away from him, looking off at the tumbling slopes of Cross Mountain. But he came around to the other side. “Now, Margaret, I've told you once, and you know all I could say without my telling you again. I love you: that's all. I can't go on any longer this way. I can't live without you—I've tried it—it's no use—so why can't we understand each other right now, and stop this playing at cross-purposes, and just be happy! You—you're all that I want in this world, Margaret—everything—everything.” He was leaning forward, playing nervously with a thorny twig and eagerly searching her face. “Tell me, Margaret—tell me if you will come right now into my life and make it worth something. I've been working day and night for other people—now I want to work for you. I want to see if I can't make a home for you—if I can't make you happy. When I've been working the hardest I've wondered, a good many times, what was the use of it all—what good it would do me if I should succeed, and make a lot of money and direct a lot of men. There's a passion for money, and there's a passion for power—I know a good many men that have one or the other or both of them—but one thing I've learned this year, Margaret, is that neither could ever fill my life and make it what I want to make it. Nothing, nobody but you can do that. Money and power mean worse than nothing to me unless they are means toward making you happy. That's what I want to do, Margaret, if you'll only give me the chance. Will you?”

There was a long, long time before she could do more than look off at the cloud-shadows floating up the opposite mountainside. They sat motionless; Halloran's hand had dropped from the twig; and the wonderful silence of the mountains wrapped them about. She wondered why he did not go on; he waited, breathless. She half turned; he caught her hand and gripped it with a nervous grasp. Her eyes sought the shadows again, wavered, were drawn, slowly, in spite of herself, to his face. And then he had her in his arms.

Oh, the glory of the painted mountains, the joy of the world about them! A hawk circled overhead, flew whistling off and lost himself in the forest. The squirrels and chipmunks, peering out from tree and rock, recalled their own young days and whisked away. The bees alone kept them company, but bee-workers have no time for love-making. And all those two knew was that the world was young and the world was many-tinted; that the sky was blue-and-white above; that all, everything, was theirs forever, in this world and in the world to come.

“Dear girl,” he murmured, with his lips at her ear, “there is no mistake this time? This is for always?”

Before the words were spoken her arms were around his neck, her lips were close to his, her heart was beating against his own. “Always,” she was repeating with him—“always—always!”