"Oh, thank you very much," answered Mrs. Hardesty sweetly, "I prefer to pay, if you don't mind."
"Your privilege," conceded Rimrock, "this is a fine, large, free country. We try to give 'em all what they want."
"Yes, it is!" she exclaimed. "Isn't the coloring wonderful! And have you spent all your life on these plains? Can't we sit down here somewhere? I'm just dying to talk with you. And I have business to talk over, too."
"Oh, not here!" exclaimed Rimrock as she glanced about the lobby. "This may not be the Waldorf, but we've got some class all the same. Come up to the balcony—built especially for the ladies—say, how's friend Buckbee and the rest?"
And then with the greatest gallantry in the world he escorted her to Mary's own balcony. There was another, across the well, but he did not even think of it. He had forgotten that Mary was in the world. As they sat in the dim alcove he found himself telling long stories and listening to the gossip of New York. Every word that he said was received with soft laughter, or rapt silence or a ready jest; and when she in her turn took the conversation in hand he found her sharing with him a new and unseen world. It was a woman's world, full of odd surprises. Everything she did seemed quite sweet and reasonable and at the same time daring and bizarre. She looked at things differently, with a sort of worldly-wise tolerance and an ever-changing, provocative smile. Nothing seemed to shock her even when, to try her, he moved closer; and yet she could understand.
It was a revelation to Rimrock, the laughing way she restrained him; and yet it baffled him, too. They sat there quite late, each delving into the mystery of the other's personality and mind, and as the lower lights were switched off and the alcove grew dimmer, the talk became increasingly intimate. A vein of poetry, of unsuspected romance, developed in Rimrock's mind and, far from discouraging it or seeming to belittle it, Mrs. Hardesty responded in kind. It was a rare experience in people so different, this exchange of innermost thoughts, and as their voices grew lower and all the world seemed far away, they took no notice of a ghost.
It was a woman's form, drifting past in the dark corridor where the carpet was so thick and soft. It paused and passed on and there was a glint of metal, as of a band of steel over the head. Except for that it might have been any woman, or any uneasy ghost. For night is the time the dead past comes back and the soul mourns over what is lost—but at dawn the spirits vanish and the work of the world goes on.
Mary Fortune appeared late at the Company office, for she had very little to do; and even when there she sat tense and silent. Why not? There was nothing to do. Jepson ran the mine and everything about it, and Rimrock attended to the rest. All she had to do was to keep track of the records and act as secretary to the Board of Directors. They never met now, except perfunctorily, to give Rimrock more money to spend. He came in as she sat there, dashing past her for some papers, and was dashing out when she spoke his name.
"Oh, Mr. Jones," she said and, dimly noting its formality, he paused and questioned her greeting.
"Oh, it's Mister again, is it?" he observed stopping reluctantly. "Well, what's the matter now?"