"It was."
"I should think you'd feel real bad?"
"I do, at times." He smiled, and laid his stick on the stone. "You now see, Miss Mulrady, how necessary to me is this good fortune that you don't think me worthy of. Meantime I must try to make a home for them at Rough-and-Ready."
Miss Mulrady put down her knee and her parasol. "We mustn't stay here much longer, you know."
"Why?"
"Why, the stage-coach comes by at about this time."
"And you think the passengers will observe us sitting here?"
"Of course they will."
"Miss Mulrady, I implore you to stay."
He was leaning over her with such apparent earnestness of voice and gesture that the color came into her cheek. For a moment she scarcely dared to lift her conscious eyes to his. When she did so, she suddenly glanced her own aside with a flash of anger. He was laughing.