“Quite naturally, you thought it was the Sequoia stage,” he said to her.  He turned a smoldering glance upon George Sea Otter.  “George,” he declared ominously, but with a sly wink that drew the sting from his words, “if you’re anxious to hold down your job the next time a lady speaks to you and asks you a simple question, you answer yes or no and refrain from sarcastic remarks.  Don’t let your enthusiasm for this car run away with you.”  He faced the girl again.  “Was it your intention to go out to Sequoia on the next trip of the stage?”

She nodded.

“That means you will have to wait here three days until the stage returns from Sequoia,” Bryce replied.

“I realized, of course, that we would arrive here too late to connect with the stage if it maintained the customary schedule for its departure,” she explained, “but it didn’t occur to me that the stage-driver wouldn’t wait until our train arrived.  I had an idea his schedule was rather elastic.”

“Stage-drivers have no imagination, to speak of,” Bryce assured her.  To himself he remarked:  “She’s used to having people wait on her.”

A shade of annoyance passed over the classic features of the Highest Living Authority.  “Oh, dear,” she complained, “how fearfully awkward!  Now I shall have to take the next train to San Francisco and book passage on the steamer to Sequoia—­and Marcelle is such a poor sailor.  Oh, dear!”

Bryce had an inspiration and hastened to reveal it.

“We are about to start for Sequoia now, although the lateness of our start will compel us to put up tonight at the rest-house on the south fork of Trinity River and continue the journey in the morning.  However, this rest-house is eminently respectable and the food and accommodations are extraordinarily good for mountains; so, if an invitation to occupy the tonneau of my car will not be construed as an impertinence, coming as it does from a total stranger, you are at liberty to regard this car as to all intents and purposes the public conveyance which so scandalously declined to wait for you this morning.”

She looked at him searchingly for a brief instant:  then with a peculiarly winning smile and a graceful inclination of her head she thanked him and accepted his hospitality—­thus: 

“Why, certainly not!  You are very kind, and I shall be eternally grateful.”

“Thank you for that vote of confidence.  It makes me feel that I have your permission to introduce myself.  My name is Bryce Cardigan, and I live in Sequoia when I’m at home.”

“Of Cardigan’s Redwoods?” she questioned.  He nodded.  “I’ve heard of you, I think,” she continued.  “I am Shirley Sumner.”

“You do not live in Sequoia.”

“No, but I’m going to hereafter.  I was there about ten years ago.”

He grinned and thrust out a great hand which she surveyed gravely for a minute before inserting hers in it.  “I wonder,” he said, “if it is to be my duty to give you a ride every time you come to Sequoia?  The last time you were there you wheedled me into giving you a ride on my pony, an animal known as Midget.  Do you, by any chance, recall that incident?”