had convictions of his own. He had seen the great Pacific, oh, yes, often, when he had journeyed for the fur company to Nootka; and he had watched ships approach from the far horizon, but to see the masts first proved nothing; a vessel was most all sail. And it was true that once he had met a sailor who said he had taken a ship at Quebec and sailed straight on and on, and without turning back had found himself again at home. But plainly the man had lied, for how could one make la bon voyage up the Fraser, through the big lakes and down the St. Lawrence in a great vessel? Bah, every one knew it could only be done in a canoe. "De eart' roun'?" he concluded. "No, no, Mees, you doan' mek me beli've dat. But it ees gre't joke; oui, a gre't joke, ha, ha. Well, good-by, Mees. Tek care yourse'f."

He shouldered the gun and strode away through the door. At the same time there was the snapping of a twig and a glimpse of retreating bare heels at the corner of the house, and while the Canadian moved down the river trail a pair of keen eyes, set in a ferret-shaped face, peered at him from behind the angle. They were the eyes of Lem Myers. When he had satisfied himself that Laramie was truly on his way he came cautiously to the threshold. The teacher was seated at her desk using her pencil with rapid, decisive strokes. He crossed the floor to the platform before she was conscious of his presence.

"Well, Lem," and she smiled down at him, "are you waiting for me?"

"Wal, yes; thort I'd wait an' see it out." He slipped up behind her chair to look over her shoulder, bending his head as she moved her hand, the better to follow her work. "Oh, gee," he exclaimed suddenly, slapping his knees, "gee. You're a-settin' here a-makin' er picture of him, an' I 'lowed all ther time you was scared."

"Scared?" She suspended her pencil to look at him.

"Yes, Mose was gone an' ther wan't nobody else ter hit."

"Hit? Do you mean he might have struck me?" She rose to her feet, facing the boy. "Do you— Do men in this settlement ever strike the women?"

He gave her a sidelong glance and thrust his hands deep into his trousers pockets. "You bet," he answered.

There was a brief silence, then she said, and the vibration had not gone from her voice, "No, Lem, I was not afraid, but I might have been if I had known. Where I have lived men never strike women; they have other ways. I was just thinking of Mose. I wanted to ask Mr. Laramie not to be hard with him."

"Oh, don't you bother 'bout Mose. He kin take care hisself. He's got more muscle now'n any other boy in ther hull deestrict, an' it won't be long 'fore he kin turn in an' thrash ther ole man."

There was another silence; the merriment again dimpled her mouth and she looked off through the open door. Lem stooped and picked up a loose sheet that had fluttered from the sketchbook to the floor. "Gee," he said, "gee, but you kin draw."

"Yes?" Her glance returned and rested on the sheet interestedly. "What is it, Lem?"

"Why, it's er picture of ther timber-cruiser an' that ther black horse o' his. Here's ther same nice little star atween ther eyes, an' I've seen him fling up his head an' point one ear jes that erway."

"So you know Colonel," she said, flushing, yet pleased at the recognition. "Mr. Forrest bought him when he was a colt. He broke him, and I am the only woman who ever mounted him."

"I 'low then you kin ride some. Ther ain't never be'n no sech stepper in this hull deestrict. Mill Thornton calc'lated he hed er prize when he raised ther sorrel filly, but gee, I've seen ther black leave her clear out o' sight in less'n er minute."

The teacher laughed softly. "I know, I know, the beauty. And his master, Lem. Did you ever see such a man in the saddle? So straight, so easy, so ready at just the right instant with a quiet word, or else that soft whistle."

"He kin ride," admitted Lem. "I've never seen him fizzle, an' he's be'n out here off an' on considerable; timber-cruisin' first an' then prospectin'. He 'lowed last year he'd struck er gold mine or somethin'."

"I know," she repeated, "I know. It was only a few miles from here he found those splendid indications."

"Yes," said the boy with his impish smile, "an' lost 'em."

"The mineral is there," she said with an upward tilt of her chin. "The ore he brought down assayed remarkably rich. But he had broken his compass that day and a heavy mist settled over every peak and spur. There was absolutely nothing to mark a course from. Still, it's there, Lem, locked in the heart of the hills. He will find it again, sometime."

She went over and took her hat from its peg on the wall, and Lem followed, waiting on the steps while she locked the door.

"There will be no more timber-cruising when he takes his position at the new mills," she said as they started up the trail; "no more chances to prospect. But he is coming out to the settlement before he goes to Seattle, for a last trip into the hills, and, if your mother can go with us, he intends to take me, to see the Cascades at close range, and the canyon and the leaning tower, and spend a night or two in his favorite camp at the headwaters."

A few rods from the schoolhouse the trail to the Myers clearing, which was her boarding-place, began an abrupt ascent across the face of a burned over ridge. They made the first part in silence, then she paused to look back on the desolate waste. "Oh," she said, "it's like the end of the world. It's always so wretchedly hot on this dead side-hill; the gravel shifts so underfoot. It's very different on the Tumwater road."

"Whar's that?" asked Lem.

"Why, it's the way from Olympia to the Tumwater mills where Mr. Forrest has lived since he was a small boy. And it's through the woods and down a great ridge, with glimpses of blue sea between the firs, and always, even in warmest weather, a cool, salt breeze. The lower falls of the Des Chutes plunge into the Sound there, at Tumwater, and their thunder fills the gorge. We used to go down often, walking or riding, and sometimes when the wind and tide were right, we sailed. I suppose, Lem, you never have seen a yacht?"

"Wal, no, I dunno's I hev."

"Then you have missed a great deal. But the first time I go down to the Sound I'll take you; and Mr. Kingsley, my brother-in-law, will have us aboard the Phantom. Then, out past the old monastery on Priest Point, we'll catch a swinging breeze, and all the running waves will toss their whitecaps,—you'll like that, even if the scud whips your face,—and someone, my sister perhaps, will start 'The White Squall.' It's the best sea song, made for the accompaniment of water on a cleaving keel."

For a moment she forgot the boy. She stood looking off across the charred stumps and skeletons of trees, as though she saw far away that blue sea she loved, and expected to hear that rush and gurgle along a moving keel. And he, this urchin who had lived his life among the weasels and squirrels in the heart of the great forest, who knew nothing of whitecaps, to whom scud was a new and vague torment, waited with his ferret eyes upon her, sharp chin lifted, lips apart. Her glance fell. Their eyes met and she laughed. "Would you like to make