“So strong and cool and clearheaded,” she went on, “and such nerve. Why, he’s everything a man should be. Don’t you agree with me?”
“Most decidedly.”
“Ah, I like to hear a man speak well of another.”
“Why? Isn’t it usual?” said Dick.
“No. At least not within my experience. Almost invariably if I boom one man to another that other will either agree half-heartedly, or find something disparaging to say.”
“Well, even if I felt that way inclined, I should be an absolutely unspeakable cur were I to say anything of the sort about Greenoak, considering that this is the third time he has saved my life,” answered Dick.
“Is it? Oh, do tell me about the others,” cried Hazel, eagerly.
“I can’t tell you about the other because it comes into the mystery of this place, as to which, as you know, we are sworn to secrecy. But I told you the first. It was the night I shot the big buffalo.”
Looking down into the bright, sparkling eager face, Dick Selmes was conscious of that unwelcome misgiving taking even more definite hold of his mind. The eagerness with which she hung upon his words was not because they were his words. Greenoak of all people! Why, he must be old enough to be her father, concluded Dick, in his inexperience rather consoling himself with the thought.
“Yes, you told me that,” rejoined Hazel. “But you are only one of many. Harley Greenoak has the reputation of having saved countless lives and got no end of people out of difficulties of one kind or another, yet he never talks about it, they say. I can’t tell you how proud I am to have made his acquaintance.”