“Hallam,” he said, and stopped a moment, while his voice was harsh as he continued, “going to restake my claim.  Well, there is time still in hand and he can’t do it yet.  Now——­”

The girl stopped him with a gesture.  “You must ask me nothing,” she said.  “You can understand what I told you?”

A slow glow crept into Alton’s eyes.  “Oh, yes, it’s all quite plain,” he said.  “When you find a mineral claim you have got to record it in fifteen days, or it goes back to the Crown, and I couldn’t do that, you see, because I was lying for weeks at Somasco.  Well, while the claim is unrecorded anybody can jump it, but I couldn’t get back up there through the snow, and didn’t figure Hallam’s man knew just where to find it.  Now you’ve told me we’ll get in ahead of him yet, and the man he sends up there will have his journey for nothing.  Do you know that what you have done means just everything to Somasco?”

Alton stopped suddenly, and there was consternation in the girl’s face as she glanced at him.

“I think there’s somebody coming,” he said slowly.

Now there was still just time for Alton to have shut the outer door, but he remembered for the first time that the girl’s visit at that hour might be considered unusual, and it appeared probable that she would not approve of the action, while having as yet only dealt with men, his usual quick decision deserted him.  He glanced once from his companion to the partition and the door of the inner room, and shook his head.  Then he sprang forward towards the outer door, forgetting that he was lame.  That, however, did not alter the fact, and as he stumbled a little the tray on the table he struck went down with a crash, scattering its contents about the room, while before he reached the door it swung open and a man stood smiling in the opening.

“Hello!  I seem to have scared you,” he said.  “Got anything you don’t want folks to know about in here?”

The stranger moved forward another step, and then stopped abruptly with a little gasp as his glance took in the overturned tray, scattered crockery, and the rigid figure of the girl standing with a flushed face beside the stove.  Then he glanced at Alton, and noticing the old jacket and deerhide slippers, appeared to have some difficulty in checking a smile, for this was a young man who knew nothing of the simple strenuous life of the bush, but a good deal about the under-side of that of the cities.

“I’ll come back in business hours to-morrow,” he said.  “Sorry to disturb you, but I hadn’t a minute all day, and there was a question I figured we could best talk over quietly.”

“Then you had better start in with it,” said Alton quietly.  “This lady, who came here on business, is just going.”

“Of course,” said the stranger.  “I think I have had the pleasure of meeting her.”

He turned with a little smile which broadened into a grin Alton found intolerable, for there was a patter of feet on the stairway, and when he looked round except for himself and Alton the room was empty.