“Ah!  Unema! hong oy!” said Algy blasphemously.  “You makee me velly sick!  Just wash my hands for finish my dinner.  Too much monkey-doodle!” and off he went to his work, followed at once by Mrs. Dick.

“Algy’s too modest,” Van assured the crowd.  “And none of you chaps are fit to apologize to Mrs. Dick, so you’d better go wash up for dinner.  But don’t let me hear so much as a peep about Algy from one of this bunch, or Eden will turn into Hades.”  As the men arose to their feet sheepishly, and began to slink away he added to the spokesman, “You there with the face for pie, go up to my camp and call the boys to feed.”

The men disappeared.  Van, left alone, was turning away when his glance was attracted to the window, up above, where Beth was looking down.  His face turned red to the topmost rim of his ears.

The girl was pale, but resolute.

“May I see you a moment, please?” she said, “before the men come in?”

“Certainly.”  Van went to the front and waited at the foot of the stairs.

When Beth came down he was standing in the doorway, looking off at the shadowy hills.  He heard her steps upon the stairs and turned, removing his hat.

For a moment Beth faced him silently, her color coming and going in rapid alternations.  She had never seemed more beautiful than now, in her mood of worry and courage.

“Thank you for waiting,” she said to him faintly, her heart beating wildly in her bosom, “I felt as if I had the right—­felt it only right—­won’t you please tell me what I have done?”

It was not an easy matter for Van to hold his own, to check an impulse utterly incontinent, utterly weak, that urged him fairly to the edge of surrender.  But his nature was one of intensity, and inasmuch as he had loved intensely, he distrusted now with equal force.

“What you have done?” he repeated.  “I’m sure I can’t tell you of anything that you do not know yourself.  What do you wish me to say?”

“I don’t know!  I don’t know,” she told him honestly.  “I thought if I asked you—­asked you like this—­you’d tell me what is the matter.”

“There’s nothing the matter.”

“But there is!” she said.  “Why not be frank?  I know that you’re in trouble.  Perhaps you blame——­”

“I told you once that taking trouble and having trouble supply all the fun I have,” he interrupted.  “The man without trouble became extinct before he was born.”

“Oh, please don’t jest,” she begged him earnestly.  “You and I were friends—­I’m sure we were friends—­but now——­”

“Now, if we are not, do you think the fault is mine?”

He, too, was white, for the struggle was great in his soul.

“It isn’t mine!” she said.  “I want to say that!  I had to say that.  I stopped you—­just to say that.”  She blushed to say so much, but she met his stern gaze fearlessly with courage in her eyes.