He ruminated upon this a minute, flushing slightly.

“Well, I wish you luck,” he said sincerely enough.  “Though I can hardly realize this sudden move.  You and Jack Fyfe may get on all right.  He’s a good sort—­in his way.”

“His way suits me,” she said, spurred to the defensive by what she deemed a note of disparagement in his utterance.  “If you have any objections or criticisms, you can save your breath—­or address them direct to Mr. Fyfe.”

“No, thank you,” he grinned.  “I don’t care to get into any argument with him, especially as he’s going to be my brother-in-law.  Fyfe’s all right.  I didn’t imagine he was the sort of man you’d fancy, that’s all.”

Stella refrained from any comment on this.  She had no intention of admitting to Charlie that marriage with Jack Fyfe commended itself to her chiefly as an avenue of escape from a well-nigh intolerable condition which he himself had inflicted upon her.  Her pride rose in arms against any such belittling admission.  She admitted it frankly to herself,—­and to Fyfe,—­because Fyfe understood and was content with that understanding.  She desired to forget that phase of the transaction.  She told herself that she meant honestly to make the best of it.

Benton turned again to his papers.  He did not broach the subject again until in the distance the squat hull of the Panther began to show on her return from the Springs.  Then he came to where Stella was putting the last of her things into her trunk.  He had some banknotes in one hand, and a check.

“Here’s that ninety I borrowed, Stell,” he said.  “And a check for your back pay.  Things have been sort of lean around here, maybe, but I still think it’s a pity you couldn’t have stuck it out till it came smoother.  I hate to see you going away with a chronic grouch against me.  I suppose I wouldn’t even be a welcome guest at the wedding?”

“No,” she said unforgivingly.  “Some things are a little too—­too recent.”

“Oh,” he replied casually enough, pausing in the doorway a second on his way out, “you’ll get over that.  You’ll find that ordinary, everyday living isn’t any kid-glove affair.”

She sat on the closed lid of her trunk, looking at the check and money.  Three hundred and sixty dollars, all told.  A month ago that would have spelled freedom, a chance to try her luck in less desolate fields.  Well, she tried to consider the thing philosophically; it was no use to bewail what might have been.  In her hands now lay the sinews of a war she had forgone all need of waging.  It did not occur to her to repudiate her bargain with Jack Fyfe.  She had given her promise, and she considered she was bound, irrevocably.  Indeed, for the moment, she was glad of that.  She was worn out, all weary with unaccustomed stress of body and mind.  To her, just then, rest seemed the sweetest boon in the world.  Any port in a storm, expressed her mood.  What came after was to be met as it came.  She was too tired to anticipate.