In the face of a keen wind the professor started down the mountain to leave the letters at Marston with the agent, who was very obliging and would see that they were put on the “down” train that evening.

Marion did not see any sense in his going away that day, and she told Kate so very bluntly.  With the professor gone she could not meet Jack and have those broiled bear steaks, because some one had to stay with Kate.  When Kate suggested that she have Jack come to the cabin with his bear steaks, she discovered that she could not do that either.  She was afraid to tell Jack that Kate knew.  Of course, it was all right—­Kate had promised faithfully never to tell; but Jack was awfully queer, lately, and the least little thing offended him.  He would refuse to see that it was the best to take Kate into the secret, because it gave Marion more freedom to do things for his comfort.  He would consider that she had been tattling secrets just because she could not hold her tongue, and she resented in advance his attitude.  Guiltily conscious of having betrayed him, she still believed that she had done him a real service in the betrayal.

It was a complicated and uncomfortable state of mind to be in, and Kate’s state of mind was not much more complacent.  She also had broken a promise and betrayed a trust, and she also believed she had done it for the good of the betrayed.  To their discomforting sense of guilt was added Marion’s disappointment at not meeting Jack, and Kate’s sprained ankle, which was as swollen and painful as a sprained ankle usually is.  They began by arguing, they continued by reminding each other of past slights and injuries, they ended by speaking plain truths that were unpalatable chiefly because they were true.  When the professor tramped home at sundown he walked into an atmosphere of icy silence.  Kate and Marion were not on speaking terms, if you please.

The next day was cold and windy, but Marion hurried the housework in a way that made Kate sniff disgustedly, and started out to signal Jack and bring him down to their last meeting place.  Flash after flash she sent that way, until the sun went altogether behind the clouds and she could signal no more.  Not a glimmer of an answering twinkle could she win from the peak.  The most she did was to stimulate old Mike to the point of mumbling wild harangues to the uneasy pines, the gist of which was that folks better look out how they went spyin’ around after him, an’ makin’ signs back and forth with glasses.  They better look out, because he had good eyes, if Murphy didn’t have, and they couldn’t run over him and tromp on him.

He was still gesticulating like a bear fighting yellow-jackets when Marion walked past him, going up the trail.  She looked at him and smiled as she went by, partly because he looked funny, waving his arms over his head like that, and partly by way of greeting.  She never talked to Mike, because she could not understand anything he said.  She did not consider him at all bright, so she did not pay much attention to him at any time; certainly not now, when her mind was divided between her emotions concerning Jack and her fresh quarrel with Kate.