Stella put the receiver back on the hook and looked at her watch.  It lacked a quarter of two.  In the room adjoining, Charlie and Linda were jubilantly wading through the latest “rag” song in a passable soprano and baritone, with Mrs. Abbey listening in outward resignation.  Stella sat soberly for a minute, then joined them.

“Jack’s in town,” she informed them placidly, when the ragtime spasm ended.  “He telephoned that he was going to snatch a few minutes between important business confabs to run out and see me.”

“I could have told you that half an hour ago, my dear,” Mrs. Abbey responded with playful archness.  “Mr. Fyfe will dine with us this evening.”

“Oh,” Stella feigned surprise.  “Why, he spoke of going to Victoria on the afternoon boat.  He gave me the impression of mad haste—­making a dash out here between breaths, as you might say.”

“Oh, I hope he won’t be called away on such short notice as that,” Mrs. Abbey murmured politely.

She left the room presently.  Out of one corner of her eye Stella saw Linda looking at her queerly.  Charlie had turned to the window, staring at the blue blur of the Lions across the Inlet.

“It’s a wonder Jack would leave the lake,” he said suddenly, “with things the way they are.  I’ve been hoping for rain ever since I’ve been down.  I’ll be glad when we’re on the spot again, Linda.”

“Wishing for rain?” Stella echoed.  “Why?”

“Fire,” he said shortly.  “I don’t suppose you realize it, but there’s been practically no rain for two months.  It’s getting hot.  A few weeks of dry, warm weather, and this whole country is ready to blow away.  The woods are like a pile of shavings.  That would be a fine wedding present—­to be cleaned out by fire.  Every dollar I’ve got’s in timber.”

“Don’t be a pessimist,” Linda said sharply.

“What makes you so uneasy now?” Stella asked thoughtfully.  “There’s always the fire danger in the dry months.  That’s been a bugaboo ever since I came to the lake.”

“Yes, but never like it is this summer,” Benton frowned.  “Oh, well, no use borrowing trouble, I suppose.”

Stella rose.

“When Jack comes, I’ll be in the library,” she said.  “I’m going to read a while.”

But the book she took up lay idle in her lap.  She looked forward to that meeting with a curious mixture of reluctance and regret.  She could not face it unmoved.  No woman who has ever lain passive in a man’s arms can ever again look into that man’s eyes with genuine indifference.  She may hate him or love him with a degree of intensity according to her nature, be merely friendly, or nurse a slow resentment.  But there is always that intangible something which differentiates him from other men.  Stella felt now a shyness of him, a little dread of him, less sureness of herself, as he swung out of the machine and took the house steps with that effortless lightness on his feet that she remembered so well.