He laughed. "He ought to be. I am, too." Jeff rose and took up his hat and Rita Cheyne's traveling bag. "There's one thing sure: I'm not going to talk about this any more—not now. You're tired. I've got to get you fixed up somehow. You know I started building a place up in the cañon, but it's not finished yet. Mrs. Brennan is away. There's nothing for it but a hotel, I guess."
"Oh, I don't care. I'm not going to be discouraged. I warn you I always have my own way—in the end—in all things."
He chose to disregard the significance of the remark and showed her out. On their way up the street the spirit moved him to apologize again.
"There's a bathroom at the Kinney House. I'd better take you there. It's pretty well kept. Camilla stayed there once. I wish she was here."
"You do?" quizzically.
"Why—yes."
"Then why don't you have her here?" she asked suddenly.
A shade passed over Jeff's face. "We went East for the winter," he said slowly. "I had to come back here. My wife likes it in New York. It—it wasn't advisable for her to come."
"Thanks, I knew that before," she said slowly. Further conversation was interrupted by their arrival at the Kinney House, a frame structure at the upper end of Main Street, where it stood in lonely dignity, quite dwarfing its nearest neighbors, which clambered part of the way up the slope and then paused—as though in sudden diffidence before the majesty of its three-storied preëminence. It wore at this time a coat of yellow paint of a somewhat bilious hue, but its cornices, moldings, and the rather coquettish ornaments about the "Ladies Entrance" were painted white. The letters C-A-F-E (without the accent), painted ostentatiously upon a window, gave a touch of modernity, and the words "Ladies' Parlor" advised the wearied traveler that here was to be found a haven for the females of refined and retiring dispositions. The sound of a piano was heard from that chaste apartment as Mrs. Cheyne registered her long angular signature beneath that of "Pat O'Connell, Santa Fe"; and the strains of "The Maiden's Prayer" came forth, followed presently by the "Carnival of Venice." Mrs. Cheyne smiled her tolerance.
"Do you want a room by the day, week or month, ma'am?" asked the clerk.