“Where the brimstone does Mrs. Margery keep the scrubbing soap?” he said.

Nobody answered him, and he moved back into the dust, while Seaforth was coming up the stairway carrying a mop and pail when a big empty oilcan smote him upon the chest.  He dropped the pail and leaned a moment, gasping and dripping, against the balustrade.

“You might notice where you’re throwing things,” he said.

The dust rolled more thickly, and Alton’s voice came out of it.  “I hadn’t time to be particular, and a sensible man would have got out of the way of it.  Don’t stand there, anyway, but help me fix this place fit for a lady before Miss Deringham gets up.  Then you’re going through to the railroad with the new pack-horse to wire for Mrs. Margery after breakfast.”

“I don’t think I am,” said Seaforth.  “Not on Julius Caesar, anyway.  He will need a little more taming before I’m fit to ride him.”

“Then,” said Alton, laughing, “I guess you can shove him, because you’ll want a horse to bring up the things you’re going to wire Vancouver for, and Tom’s off with the teams up the valley.  Fetch some more water, and start in with the scrubbing.  I don’t want Miss Deringham to guess we’ve been doing anything unusual.”

“If she doesn’t hear you,” said Seaforth, “she must be very deaf.”

“Now,” said Alton regretfully, “I never thought of that.  Sit right down, Charley, and take your boots off.”

“I am going to the well first,” said Seaforth, who retired grinning, and Miss Deringham laughed softly as she heard the cautious movements of a big barefooted man floundering about clumsily with a brush or mop.

When she came down to breakfast, however, she was a little astonished.  The room was swept, and garnished with cedar sprays, while though it smelled of some crude soap the aromatic sweetness of balsam was present too, and there were signs of taste in its decoration and the disposition of the splendid fruit upon the table.  Alton had not plucked it all, and the golden apples and velvety peaches lay with their soft tinting enhanced amidst the leaves.  When he came in, bright of eye and apparently glowing from a plunge in the river, she glanced at him with quiet amusement.

“You have been improving the place wonderfully,” she said.

“You are pleased with it?” said the rancher, and the girl noticed the contentment in his eyes when she smiled approvingly.

“I think,” she said, “it is very pretty.”

CHAPTER VII

ALTON BLUNDERS

Deringham spent several weeks at Somasco without arriving at any understanding with its owner.  This, however, did not cause him any great concern, because he had at his doctor’s recommendation decided on a somewhat lengthy absence from England, and found himself regaining health and vigour with every day he passed in the pleasant valley.  He was also desirous of gaining time, because he had left negotiations for the formation of a company to take over an enterprise he was interested in in train, and, while these could proceed as well without him, a favourable termination would, by relieving him from immediate financial anxiety, enable him if it seemed advisable to adopt a firmer tone in any discussion respecting Carnaby.  Alton had in the meanwhile quietly avoided the subject.