“Which?” asked Mr. Crocker.

“Never mind that, Cornelius,” put in Phinney, sharply.  “Why don’t you let other folks’ affairs alone?  That was a secret that Olive told your sister and you’ve got no right to go blabbin’.”

“Aw, hush up, Sim!  I ain’t tellin’ no secrets to anybody but Ed here, and he ain’t lived in East Harniss long or he’d know it already.  The mountain and Mahomet?  Why, them was the last words Sol and Olive had.  ’Twas Sol’s stubbornness that was most to blame.  That was his one bad fault.  He would have his own way and he wouldn’t change.  Olive had set her heart on goin’ to Washin’ton for their weddin’ tower.  Sol wanted to go to Niagara.  They argued a long time, and finally Olive says, ’No, Solomon, I’m not goin’ to give in this time.  I have all the others, but it’s not fair and it’s not right, and no married life can be happy where one does all the sacrificin’.  If you care for me you’ll do as I want now.’

“And he laughs and says, ’All right, I’ll sacrifice after this, but you and me must see Niagara.’  And she was sot and he was sotter, and at last they quarreled.  He marches out of the door and says:  ’Very good.  When you’re ready to be sensible and change your mind, you can come to me.  And says Olive, pretty white but firm:  ’No, Solomon, I’m right and you’re not.  I’m afraid this time the mountain must come to Mahomet.’  That ended it.  He went away and never come back, and after a long spell she give in to her dad and married Bill Edwards.  Foolish?  ’Well, now, wa’n’t it!”

“Humph!” grunted Crocker.  “She must have been a born gump to let a smart man like him get away just for that.”

“There’s a good many born gumps not so far from here as her house,” interjected Phinney.  “You remember that next time you look in the glass, Ed Crocker.  And—­and—­well, there’s no better friend of Sol Berry’s on earth than I am, but, so fur as their quarrel was concerned, if you ask me I’d have to say Olive was pretty nigh right.”

“Maybe—­maybe,” declared the allwise Cornelius, “but just the same if I was Sol Berry, and knew my old girl was likely to go to the poorhouse, I’ll bet my conscience—­”

“S-ssh!” hissed Crocker, frantically.  Cornelius stopped in the middle of his sentence, whirled in his chair, and looked up.  Behind him in the doorway of the station stood Captain Sol himself.  The blue cap he always wore was set back on his head, a cigar tipped upward from the corner of his mouth, and there was a grim look in his eye and about the smooth shaven lips above the short, grayish-brown beard.

“Issy” sprang from his settee and jammed the paper novel into his pocket.  Ed Crocker’s sunburned face turned redder yet.  Sim Phinney grinned at Mr. Rowe, who was very much embarrassed.

“Er—­er—­evenin’, Cap’n Sol,” he stammered.  “Nice, seasonable weather, ain’t it?  Been a nice day.”

“Um,” grunted the depot master, knocking the ashes from his cigar.