Ringing a bell, she asked for a telegraph form and hurriedly filling it up, said to the waiting lad, “Take this down to the office.”

The lad wore a smart uniform and was called a page, but he had the pertness that generally marks the bellboy in Western hotels.

“Certainly, miss.  But I reckon I’ll be wanted when the stranger who’s coming up the road gets here.  Guess it will be all right if I take your message when he’s fixed.”

Lucy, who scarcely heard, sent the page away.  Walters would arrive in a minute or two, and now she had warned Foster she thought she had better not avoid him.  If she hid her distrust, she might find out something, and she would sooner he saw her before he met Lawrence.  There was nobody else in the veranda just then.  Walters came in with a smile that somehow intensified her antagonism, but she waited calmly, although she did not give him her hand.

“It looks as if you were rather surprised to see me,” he remarked.

“I am,” said Lucy.  “Perhaps that’s not unnatural!”

He laughed and since she did not suggest his sitting down, remained standing in a rather graceful pose.  She meant to hide her real feelings if she could, but as she had been angry when he left it was better that he should think her angry now.  A marked change in her attitude would be illogical and might excite suspicion.

“I suppose that means you blame me for Lawrence’s illness and haven’t forgiven me yet?” he suggested.

“I do blame you.  You let the guide get drunk and left Lawrence on the couloir.  Then you were a long time coming back, when you knew the danger he was in.”

“Well,” said Walters in an apologetic tone, “I suppose all this is true, but I must point out that when we slipped down the gully it was impossible to get up again.  Then there were some big crevasses in the glacier and I had a half-drunk man to help across; I really didn’t know he would drink too much when I gave him the flask.  However, although perhaps I was rather careless, I hope you won’t forbid my seeing Lawrence.”

“I couldn’t forbid your seeing him, as you must know.”

“You couldn’t, in a sense,” Walters agreed.  “Still, of course, your wishes go a long way with him, and I imagine he is what one might call amenable.”

“I don’t understand that.”

Walters smiled.  “I always found Lawrence good-humored and it would surprise me if he did anything you didn’t like.  I don’t know that I can go farther without venturing on an open compliment.  But I’m anxious to know how he is.”

“He is getting better, but must be kept quiet for some time.  But why did you come here?”

“It ought to be obvious,” Walters replied in a tone of mild protest.  “You blame me for my friend’s illness, and though I don’t know what I left undone, I am, in a sense, responsible; anyway, I was with him.  Well, I found I had to go east, and determined to put off my business for a day or two so I could stop over and see how he is getting on.”