"It's a good deal more wholesome here in several ways," said he. "If you're wise, you'll let up on card-playing and hanging round the settlement, Ferris, and stick to farming. Even if you lose almost as many dollars over it, it will pay you considerably better. Now that's all I'm going to tell you, but I know what I'm speaking of, because I've had my fling--and it's costing me more than I care to figure out still. You, however, can pull up, because by this time you have no doubt found out a good deal, if you're not all a fool. Curiosity's at the bottom of half our youthful follies, isn't it, Courthorne? We want to know what the things forbidden actually taste like."

"Well," said Witham dryly, "I don't quite know. You see, I had very little money in the old country, and still less leisure here to spend either on that kind of experimenting. Where to get enough to eat was the one problem that worried me."

Dane turned a trifle sharply. "We are, I fancy, tolerably good friends. Isn't it a little unnecessary for you to adopt that tone with me?"

Witham laughed, but made no answer, and their companion said nothing at all. Either the night wind had a drowsy effect on him or he was moodily resentful, for it was not until Witham pulled up before the homestead whose lands he farmed indifferently under Barrington's supervision that he opened his mouth.

"You have got off very cheaply to-night, and if you're wise you'll let that kind of thing alone in future," said Witham quietly.

The lad stepped down from the wagon and then stood still. "I resent advice from you as much as I do your uncalled-for insolence an hour or two ago," he said. "To lie low until honest men got used to him would be considerably more becoming to a man like you."

"Well," said Witham, stung into forgetfulness, "I'm not going to offend in that fashion again, and you can go to the devil in the way that most pleases you. In fact, I only pulled you out of the pit to-night because a lady, who apparently takes a quite unwarranted interest in you, asked me to."

Ferris stared up at him, and his face showed almost livid through the luminous night.

"She asked you to!" he said. "By the Lord, I'll make you sorry for this."

Witham said nothing, but shook the reins, and when the wagon lurched forward Dane looked at him.

"I didn't know that before," he said.

"Well," said Witham dryly, "if I hadn't lost my temper with the lad you wouldn't have done now."

Dane smiled. "You miss the point of it. Our engaging friend made himself the laughing-stock of the colony by favouring Maud Barrington with his attentions when he came out. In fact, I fancy the lady, in desperation, had to turn her uncle loose on him before he could be made to understand that they were not appreciated. I'd keep your eye on him, Courthorne, for the little beast has shown himself abominably vindictive occasionally, though I have a notion he's scarcely to be held accountable. It's a case of too pure a strain and consanguinity.

Two branches of the family--marriage between land and money, you see."

"It will be my heel if he gets in my way," said Witham grimly.

It was late when they reached his homestead where Dane was to stay the night, and when they went in a youthful figure in uniform rose up in the big log-walled hall. For a moment Witham's heart almost stood still, and then, holding himself in hand by a strenuous effort, he moved forward and stood where the light of a lamp did not shine quite fully upon him. He knew that uniform, and he had also seen the lad who wore it once or twice before, at an outpost six hundred miles away across the prairie. He knew the risk he took was great, but it was evident to him that if his ident.i.ty escaped detection at first sight, use would do the rest, and while he had worn a short pointed beard on the Western prairie, he was cleanly-shaven now.

The lad stood quite still a moment staring at him, and Witham returning his gaze steadily felt his pulses throb.

"Well, trooper, what has brought you here?" he said.

"Homestead visitation, sir," said the lad, who had a pleasant English voice. "Mr. Courthorne, I presume--accept my regrets if I stared too hard at you--but for a moment you reminded me of a man I knew. They've changed us round lately, and I'm from the Alberta Squadron just sent in to this district. It was late when I rode in, and your people were kind enough to put me up."

Witham laughed. "I have been taken for another man before. Would you like anything to drink, or a smoke before you turn in, trooper?"

"No, sir," said the lad. "If you'll sign my docket to show I've been here, I'll get some sleep. I've sixty miles to ride to-morrow."

Witham did as he was asked, and the trooper withdrew, while when they sat down to a last cigar it seemed to Dane that his companion's face was graver than usual.

"Did you notice the lad's astonishment when you came in?" he asked.

"He looked very much as if he had seen a ghost."

Witham smiled. "I believe he fancied he had. There was a man in the district he came from whom some folks considered resembled me. In reality, I was by no means like him, and he's dead now."

"Likenesses are curious things, and it's stranger still how folks alter," said Dane. "Now, they've a photograph at Barrington's of you as a boy, and while there is a resemblance in the face, n.o.body with any discernment would have fancied that lad would grow into a man like you. Still, that's of no great moment, and I want to know just how you spotted the gambler. I had a tolerably expensive tuition in most games of chance in my callow days, and haven't forgotten completely what I was taught then, but though I watched the game I saw nothing that led me to suspect crooked play."

Witham laughed. "I watched his face, and what I saw there decided me to try a bluff, but it was not until he turned the table over I knew I was right."

"Well," said Dane dryly, "you don't need your nerves toning up. With only a suspicion to go upon, it was a tolerably risky game. Still, of course, you had advantages."

"I have played a more risky one, but I don't know that I have cause to be very grateful for anything I acquired in the past," said Witham with a curious smile.

Dane stood up and flung his cigar away. "It's time I was asleep," he said. "Still, since our talk has turned in this direction, I want to tell you that, as you have doubtless seen, there is something about you that puzzles me occasionally. I don't ask your confidence until you are ready to give it me--but if ever you want anybody to stand behind you in a difficulty, you'll find me rather more than willing."

He went out, and Witham sat still very grave in face for at least another hour.

CHAPTER XIII

A FAIR ADVOCATE

Thanks to the fashion in which the hotel-keeper managed the affair, the gambler left the settlement without personal injury, but very little richer than when he entered it. The rest of those who were present at his meeting with Witham were also not desirous that their friends should know they had been victimized, and because Dane was discreet, news of what had happened might never have reached Silverdale, had not one of the younger men ridden in to the railroad a few days later. Odd sc.r.a.ps of conversation overheard led him to suspect that something unusual had taken place, but as n.o.body seemed willing to supply details, he returned to Silverdale with his curiosity unsatisfied. As it happened, he was shortly afterwards present at a gathering of his neighbours at Macdonald's farm and came across Ferris there.

"I heard fragments of a curious story at the settlement," he said.

"There was trouble of some kind in which a professional gambler figured last Sat.u.r.day night, and though n.o.body seemed to want to talk about it, I surmised that somebody from Silverdale was concerned in it."

He had perhaps spoken a trifle more loudly than he had intended, and there were a good many of the Silverdale farmers with a few of their wives and daughters whose attention was not wholly confined to the efforts of Mrs. Macdonald at the piano in the long room just then. In any case a voice broke through the silence that followed the final chords.

"Ferris could tell us if he liked. He was there that night."

Ferris, who had cause for doing so, looked uncomfortable, and endeavoured to sign to the first speaker that it was not desirable to pursue the topic.

"I have been in tolerably often of late. Had things to attend to," he said.

The other man was, however, possessed by a mischievous spirit, or did not understand him. "You may just as well tell us now as later, because you never kept a secret in your life," he said.

In the meantime, several of the others had gathered about them, and Mrs. Macdonald, who had joined the group, smiled as she said, "There is evidently something interesting going on. Mayn't I know, Gordon?"

"Of course," said the man, who had visited the settlement. "You shall know as much as I do, though that is little, and if it excites your curiosity you can ask Ferris for the rest. He is only anxious to enhance the value of his story by being mysterious. Well, there was a more or less dramatic happening, of the kind our friends in the old country unwarrantably fancy is typical of the West, in the saloon at the settlement not long ago. Cards, pistols, a professional gambler, and the unmasking of foul play, don't you know. Somebody from Silverdale played the leading role."

"How interesting!" said a young English girl. "Now, I used to fancy something of that kind happened here every day before I came out to the prairie. Please tell us, Mr. Ferris! One would like to find there was just a trace of reality in our picturesque fancies of debonair desperadoes and big-hatted cavaliers."

There was a curious expression in Ferris' face, but as he glanced round at the rest, who were regarding him expectantly, he did not observe that Maud Barrington and her aunt had just come in and stood close behind him.

"Can't you see there's no getting out of it, Ferris?" said somebody.

"Well," said the lad in desperation, "I can only admit that Gordon is right. There was foul play and a pistol drawn, but I'm sorry that I can't add anything further. In fact, it wouldn't be quite fair of me."

"But the man from Silverdale?" asked Mrs. Macdonald.

"I'm afraid," said Ferris, with the air of one shielding a friend, "I can't tell you anything about him."

"I know Mr. Courthorne drove in that night," said the young English girl, who was not endued with very much discretion.