“Are you going to betray a guest?  I’ve always heard that Western hospitality—­”

“You’re not my guest.  You’re the company’s.”

“And you won’t take me for yours?”

“Be reasonable, Miss Welland.”

“I suppose it’s a question of the conventionalities,” she mocked.

“I don’t know or care anything about the conventionalities—­”

“Nor I,” she interrupted.  “Out here.”

“—­but my guess would be that they apply only to people who live in the same world.  We don’t, you and I.”

“That’s rather shrewd of you,” she observed.

“It isn’t an easy matter to talk about to a young girl, you know.”

“Oh, yes, it is,” she returned with composure.  “Just take it for granted that I know about all there is to be known and am not afraid of it.  I’m not afraid of anything, I think, except of—­of having to go back just now.”  She rose and went to him, looking down into his eyes.  “A woman knows whom she can trust in—­in certain things.  That’s her gift, a gift no man has or quite understands.  Dazed as I was last night, I knew I could trust you.  I still know it.  So we may dismiss that.”

“That is true,” said Banneker, “so far as it goes.”

“What farther is there?  If it’s a matter of the inconvenience—­”

“No.  You know it isn’t that.”

“Then let me stay in this funny little shack just for a few days,” she pleaded.  “If you don’t, I’ll get on to-night’s train and go on and—­and do something I’ll be sorry for all the rest of my life.  And it’ll be your fault!  I was going to do it when the accident prevented.  Do you believe in Providence?”

“Not as a butt-in,” he answered promptly.  “I don’t believe that Providence would pitch a rock into a train and kill a lot of people, just to prevent a girl from making a foo—­a bad break.”

“Nor I,” she smiled.  “I suppose there’s some kind of a General Manager over this queer world; but I believe He plays the game fair and square and doesn’t break the rules He has made Himself.  If I didn’t, I wouldn’t want to play at all!...  Oh, my telegram!  I must wire my aunt in New York.  I’ll tell her that I’ve stopped off to visit friends, if you don’t object to that description as being too compromising,” she added mischievously.  She accepted a pad which he handed her and sat at the table, pondering.  “Mr. Banneker,” she said after a moment.

“Well?”

“If the telegram goes from here, will it be headed by the name of the station?”

“Yes.”

“So that inquiry might be made here for me?”

“It might, certainly.”

“But I don’t want it to be.  Couldn’t you leave off the station?”

“Not very well.”

“Just for me?” she wheedled.  “For your guest that you’ve been so insistent on keeping,” she added slyly.

“The message wouldn’t be accepted.”

“Oh, dear!  Then I won’t send it.”