Crime was frequent in the streets and houses.  Disturbing reports of marauding expeditions on the part of the convicts, still at large, came with insistent frequency.  Altogether the week had been a trial to her nerves.  It had also been a vexation.  No man had a right, she told herself, to do and say the things that Van had said and done, only to go off, without so much as a little good-by and give no further sign.  She told herself she had a right to at least some sort of opportunity to tender her honest congratulations.  She had heard of his claim—­the “Laughing Water”—­and perhaps she wished to know how it chanced to have this particular name.  If certain disturbing reflections anent that woman who had run to him wildly, out in the street, came mistily clouding the estimate she tried to place upon his character, she confessed he certainly had the right to make an explanation.  In a purely feminine manner she argued that she had the right to some such explanation—­if only because of certain liberties he had taken with her hands—­on which memories still warmly burned.

Wholly undecided as to what she would do if she could, and impatient with Bostwick for his sheer neglect in searching out her brother, she was thoroughly glad to see him to-day when he came so unannounced to the house.

“Well if you don’t look like a mountaineer!” she said, as she met him in the dining-room, which was likewise the parlor of the place.  “Where in the world have you been, all this time?  You haven’t come back without Glen?”

He had gone away ostensibly to find her brother.

“Well, the fact is he wasn’t where I went, after all,” he said.  “I hastened home, after all that trip, undertaken for nothing, and found a letter from him here.  I’ve come at once to have an important talk.”

“A letter?” she cried.  “Let me see it—­let me read it, please.  He’s—­where?  He’s well?  He’s successful?”

“Sit down,” answered Bostwick, taking a chair and placing his hat on the table.  “There’s a good deal to say.  But first, how have you been here, all alone?”

“Oh—­very well—­I suppose,” she answered, restraining the natural resentment she felt at his patent neglect.  “It isn’t exactly the place I’d choose to remain in, alone all the time.”

“Poor little girl, I’ve been thinking of that,” he told her, reaching across the table to take her hands.  “It’s worried me, Beth, worried me greatly—­your unprotected position, and all that.”

“Oh, you needn’t worry.”  She withdrew her hands.  Someway it seemed a sacrilege for him to touch them—­it was not to be borne—­she hardly knew why, or since when.  “I want to know about Glen,” she added.  “Never mind me.”

“But I do mind,” he assured her.  His hand was trembling.  “Beth, I—­I can’t talk much—­I mean romantic talk, and all that, but—­well—­I’ve about concluded we ought to be married at once—­for your sake—­your protection—­and my peace of mind.  I have thought about it ever since I left you here alone.”