“Surely,” he replied unguardedly.

“Then we may as well begin at once,” she said coolly; and turning quickly to the others:  “O all you people; listen a minute, will you?  Hush, Carolyn!  What do you say to a moonlight ride through one of the grandest canyons in the West in Mr. Lidgerwood’s car?  It will be something to talk about as long as you live.  Don’t all speak at once, please.”

But they did.  There was an instant and enthusiastic chorus of approval, winding up rather dolefully, however, with Miss Doty’s, “But your mother will never consent to it, Eleanor!”

“Mr. Lidgerwood will never consent, you mean,” put in Miriam Holcombe quietly.

Lidgerwood said what he might without being too crudely inhospitable.  His car was entirely at the service of the president’s party, of course, but it was not very commodious compared with the Nadia.  Moreover, he was going on a business trip, and at the end of it he would have to leave them for an hour or two, or maybe longer.  Moreover, again, if they got tired they would have to sleep as they could, though possibly his state-room in the service-car might be made to accommodate the three young women.  All this he said, hoping and believing that Mrs. Brewster would not only refuse to go herself but would promptly veto an unchaperoned excursion.

But this was one time when his distantly related kinswoman disappointed him.  Mrs. Brewster, cajoled by her daughter, yielded a reluctant consent, going to the car door to tell Lidgerwood that she would hold him responsible for the safe return of the trippers.

“See, now, how fatally easy it is for one to promise more—­oh, so very much more!—­than one has any idea of performing,” murmured the president’s daughter, dropping out to walk beside the victim when the party trooped down the long platform of the Crow’s Nest to the service-car.  And when he did not reply:  “Please don’t be grumpy.”

“It was the maddest notion!” he protested.  “Whatever made you suggest it?”

“More churlishness?” she said reproachfully.  And then, with ironical sentiment:  “There was a time when you would have moved heaven and earth for a chance to take me somewhere with you, Howard.”

“To be with you; yes, that is true.  But——­”

Her rippling laugh was too sweet to be shrill; none the less it held in it a little flick of the whip of malice.

“Listen,” she said.  “I did it out of pure hatefulness.  You showed so plainly this afternoon that you wished to be quit of me—­of the entire party—­that I couldn’t resist the temptation to pay you back with good, liberal interest.  Possibly you will think twice before you snub me again, Howard, dear.”

Quickly he stopped and faced her.  The others were a few steps in advance; were already boarding the service-car.

“One word, Eleanor—­and for Heaven’s sake let us make it final.  There are some things that I can endure and some others that I cannot—­will not.  I love you; what you said to me the last time we were together made no difference; nothing you can ever say will make any difference.  You must take that fact into consideration while you are here and we are obliged to meet.”