"Mind? Why should I mind?"
"You know I thought once"—Clyde hesitated—"you see you were such great friends——"
"You thought I might be fond of him? Why, so I am. Not in that way, though. I might have been if he had tried to make love to me, but he never did. You see, Miss Burnaby——"
"I wish you'd call me Clyde."
"If you'll call me Sheila. You see, Clyde, Casey and I are too much two of a kind. We'd never get on. You'll idealize him; I'd call him down. He'll talk out of his heart to you; he'd talk irrigation, and crops, and horses to me. You'll accept his judgment in most things as final; I'd want him to take my opinion instead of his own. Oh, we'd make an awful mess of it! And so, my dear, don't you think that I'd want his love, even if I could get it. But at that he's the whitest man I know, and the best friend I ever had. You're lucky. I don't wonder that he fell in love with you, either. I wish to goodness I were as pretty."
"I'm glad," said Clyde, "that you haven't said anything about money. Thank you."
"It's not because I didn't think of it," Sheila admitted frankly. "But I know it makes no difference to Casey. Fact is, I wonder, knowing him as I do, that he hadn't some absurd scruples on that point."
"He had. He says we can't be married if he loses this ranch and the other lands."
"Nonsense," said Sheila practically. "He won't stay with that if you coax him; he couldn't."
Clyde laughed happily. "That's the nicest compliment I ever had. You're absolutely the first person I've told."