“I have never seen her until to-night, Pete.  She got off the train, and Carson asked me to escort her up-town—­it was dark, you know.  How did she like the palatial apartment?”

“Well, she didn’t say nothin’; just sorter looked around.  I reckon she’s a good sport, all right.  What do ye suppose she’s come yere for?”

“Not the slightest idea; I take it that’s her business.”

“Sure; but a feller can’t help wonderin’, can he?  Donovan,” he mused, peering at the name; “that’s Irish, I take it—­hey?”

“Suspiciously so; you are some detective, Pete.  I’ll give you another clue—­her eyes are Irish grey.”

He sauntered across to the stove, and stood looking idly at the card-players, blue wreaths of tobacco smoke circling up from the bowl of his pipe.  Some one opened the street door, letting in a babel of noise, and walked heavily across the office floor.  Westcott turned about to observe the newcomer.  He was a burly, red-faced man, who had evidently been drinking heavily, yet was not greatly under the influence of liquor, dressed in a checked suit of good cut and fashion, but hardly in the best of taste.  His hat, a Stetson, was pushed back on his head, and an unlighted cigar was clinched tightly between his teeth.  He bore all the earmarks of a commercial traveller of a certain sort—­a domineering personality, making up by sheer nerve what he might lack in brains.  But for his words the miner would have given the fellow no further thought.

“Say, Timmons,” he burst forth noisily, and striding over to the desk, “the marshal tells me a dame blew in from New York to-night—­is she registered here?”

The landlord shoved the book forward, with one finger on the last signature.

“Yep,” he said shortly, “but she ain’t the one you was lookin’ for—­I asked her that, furst thing.”

“Stella Donovan—­huh!  That’s no name ever I heard; what’s she look like?”

“Like a lady, I reckon; I ain’t seen one fer quite a spell now.”

“Dark or light?”

“Waal, sorter medium, I should say; brown hair with a bit o’ red in it, an’ a pair o’ grey eyes full of fun—­some girl, to my notion.”

The questioner struck his fist on the wood sharply.

“Well, what the devil do you suppose such a woman has come to this hole clear from New York for, Timmons?  What’s her game, anyhow?”

“Blessed if I know,” and the proprietor seated himself on a high stool.  “I didn’t ask no questions like that; maybe the gent by the stove there might give yer all the information yer want.  He brought her up from the dapoo, an’ kin talk English.  Say, Jim, this yere is a short horn frum New York, named Beaton, an’ he seems ter be powerfully interested in skirts—­Beaton, Mr. Jim Westcott.”

The two men looked at each other, the miner stepping slightly forward, and knocking the ashes out of his pipe.  Beaton laughed, assuming a semblance of good nature.