he heard the careless music of the woman’s laugh.  He saw the dull animal stare of workers on their way to uncongenial toil; the hands still unsteady from yesterday’s excesses lifting to dry lips the wine that would make them still more unsteady on the morrow.  Could these contrasts be forever continued? he wondered.  Would they be permitted to exist indefinitely side by side?  Again, problem more difficult, could it be possible that the condition in which they existed was life?  He could not believe it.  His nature rebelled at the thought.  No; life was not an artificial formula like this.  It was broad and free and natural, as the prairies, his prairies, were natural and free.  This other condition was a delirium, a momentary oblivion, of which the four young men in the alcove were a symbol.  Transient pleasure, the life might mean; but the reverse, the inevitable reaction as from all intoxication, that—­

Finishing his breakfast, Ben lit a cigar and sauntered out to the street.  He had intended spending the morning seeing the town; but for the present he felt he had had enough—­all he could mentally digest.  Without at first any definite destination, in mere excess of healthy animal activity, he began to walk; but his principal object in coming to the city, the object he made no effort to conceal, acted upon him like a lodestone, and almost ere he was aware he was well out in the residence portion of the city and headed directly for the Baker home.  He was unaware that morning was not the fashionable time to call upon a lady.  To him the fact of inclination and of presence in the vicinity was sufficient justification; and mounting the well-remembered steps he rang the doorbell stoutly.  A prim maid in cap and diminutive apron, a recent addition to the household, answered his ring.

“I’d like to see Miss Baker, if you please,” said Ben.

The girl inspected the visitor critically.  Beneath her surface decorum he had a suspicion that she was inclined to smile.

“I hardly think Miss Baker is up yet,” she announced at last.  “Will you leave your card?”

Ben looked at the sun, now well elevated in the sky, with an eye trained in the estimate of time.  He drew mental conclusions silently.

“No,” he said.  “I will call later.”

He did call later,—­two hours later,—­to receive from Scotty himself the intelligence that Florence was out but would soon return.  Evidently the Englishman had been instructed; for, though he added an invitation to wait, it was only half-hearted, and being declined the matter was not pressed.

Ben returned to the hotel, ate his lunch, and considered the situation.  A lesser man would have given up the fight and hidden his bruise; but Benjamin Blair was in no sense of the word a little man.  He had come to town with definite intent of seeing a certain girl alone, and see her alone he would.  At four o’clock in the afternoon he again pressed the button on the Baker door-post, and again waited.