"I don't know," said Gordon, with a wry twist of the lips and a shrug.

"Say, did you ever feel a perfect, idiotic fool? No, of course you never have, because you couldn't be one. I feel that way. Guess it's a sort of reaction. I just know I've busted everything. The whole of our scheme is on the rocks, through me, and, for the life of me, somehow I--I don't care. I've hit up that cur so he won't want his med'cine again for years, and it was good, because it was for you. So I don't just care two cents about anything. Say, I'm learning I'm alive, same as you talked about the first day I met you, and it's you are teaching me. But the champagne of life isn't just Life. Guess Life is just a cheap claret. You're the champagne of my life. That being so, I guess I'm a drunkard for champagne."

Hazel was held serious by some feeling that also kept her silent.

Somehow she could no longer face those shining, smiling, ingenuous blue eyes. She wanted to, because she felt they were the most beautiful in the whole world, and she longed to go on gazing into them forever and ever. But something forced her to deny herself, and she kept hers straight ahead.

Gordon went on.

"Say, I haven't said anything wrong, have I?" he cried, fearful of her displeasure. "You see, I can't put things as they run through my head.

That's one of the queer things about a feller. You know, I've got a whole heap of beautiful language running around in my head, and when I try to turn it loose it comes out all mussed up and wrong. Guess you've never been like that. That's where girls are so clever. D'you know, if you were to ask me just to pass the salt at supper it would sound to me like the taste of ice-cream?"

Hazel looked round at the earnest face with a swift sidelong glance.

Then her laughter would no longer be denied.

"Would it?" she cried.

"Say, don't laugh at a feller. I'm in great trouble," Gordon went on quickly.

"Trouble?"

"Sure. Wouldn't you be if you'd bust up a man's scheme the same as I have, and if the only person in the world whose opinion you cared for can't help but think you all sorts of a fool?"

Hazel's smile had become very, very tender.

"Who thinks you a--fool?"

"Anybody with sense."

"Then I'm afraid I've got no sense."

Gordon found himself looking into the girl's serious eyes.

"You--don't think me--a--fool?" he cried incredulously.

Hazel had no longer any inclination to laugh. A great emotion suddenly surged through her heart, and her pretty oval face was set flushing.

"When a woman owes a man what I owe you, if he were the greatest fool in the world to others, to that woman he becomes all that is great and fine, and--and--oh, just everything she can think good of him. But you--you are not a fool, or anything approaching it. I don't care what you have done in our affairs--for me, whatever it is, it is right.

I'll tell you something more. I am certain that if my daddy wins through it will be your doing."

Gordon had nothing to say. He was dumbfounded. Hazel, in her generosity, was the woman he had always dreamed of since that first day he had seen her, which seemed so far back and long ago. He had nothing to say, because there was just one thought in his mind, and that thought was, then and there to take her in his arms and release her for no man, not even her----

Hazel was pointing along the trail.

"Why, there is my daddy coming along--on foot. I've never--known him to walk a prairie trail ever before, I wonder what's ailing him."

And then Gordon had to laugh.

They were back in the office. By every conceivable process Silas Mallinsbee had sought to discover what had happened. But Hazel would tell him nothing, and Gordon followed her lead.

The old man was disturbed. He was on the verge of anger with both of them. Then Hazel lifted the safety valve as she remounted her mare, preparatory to a hasty retreat homewards.

"I'll get back to home, Daddy," she said, in a tone lacking all her usual enthusiasm. "Mr. Van Henslaer has a lot to tell you about things, and when I am not here he'll be able to tell you all that happened--out there."

Gordon again took his cue.

"Yes, I've a heap to tell you," he said, without any display of enjoyment.

The men passed into the office as Hazel took her departure. Her farewell wave of the hand and its accompanying smile for once were not for her father. Even in the midst of his mixed feelings that obvious farewell to Gordon made the old rancher feel a breath of the winter he had once spoken of, nipping the rims of his ears.

And his mind settled upon the thought of banking the furnaces with--coal.

He took his seat in the big chair he always used and lit a cigar.

Gordon went at once to his desk and sat down. He leaned forward with hands clasped, and looked squarely into the strong face before him.

"It's bad talk," he said briefly.

"So I guessed."

Then, after a few moments of silence, Gordon recounted the story of the events of the afternoon right up to Mallinsbee's arrival at the office.

The rancher listened without comment, but with obvious impatience.

This was not what he wanted to hear first. But Gordon had his own way of doing things.

"You see, I took a big chance on the spur of the moment," he finished up. "I just didn't dare to think. The idea took right hold of me.

And even now, when I tell it you in cold blood, I seem to feel it was one of those inspirations that don't need to be passed by. In the ordinary way I believe it would succeed. Slosson would have been driven into our plans. But--but now there's worse to come."

"So I guessed."

Mallinsbee's answer was sharp and dry.

"And it's the most important of your talk," he added a moment later.

"What happened--out there?"

Gordon's eyes took on a far-away expression as he gazed out of the window.

"I nearly killed David Slosson," he said simply. Then he added, "I knew I'd have to do it before I'd finished."

His gaze came back to Mallinsbee's face. A fierce anger had made his blue eyes stern and cold. Then he told the rancher of his finding Hazel struggling furiously in the man's arms, and of her piteous cry for help, and all that followed.

While he was still talking the girl's father had leaped from his seat and began pacing the little room like a caged wild beast. His cigar was forgotten, and every now and then he paused abruptly as Gordon made some definite point. His eyes were darkly furious, his nostrils quivered, his great hands clenched at his sides, and in the end, when the story was told, he stood towering before the desk with a pair of murderous eyes shining down upon the younger man.

"God in heaven!" he cried furiously; "and he's still alive?"

Then he turned away abruptly. A revolver-belt was hanging on the wall, and he moved towards it. But Gordon was on his feet in a moment.

"That gun's mine, and--you can't have it!"

Gordon was standing in front of the weapon, facing the furious eyes of the father.