"Time! Time is money. I can't afford it." He stooped and lifted her in his right arm, and before she could protest he was half way down the stairway. He laughed at the horrified face of the aunt. He was following impulses now. As they walked side by side slowly—she, not without considerable effort—up toward the spring, he said abruptly, but tenderly:
"You must think you're better—that's half the battle. See that stream? Some day I'm going to show you where it starts. Do you know if you drink of that water up at its source above timber-line it will cure you?"
She saw his intent and said, "I'm afraid I'll be cured before I get to the spring."
"I'm going to make it my aim in life to see you drink at that pool." His directness and simplicity stimulated her like some mediæval elixir. He made her forget her pain. They did not talk much until they were seated on one of the benches near the fountain.
"Sit in the sun," he commanded. "Don't be afraid of the sun. You hear people talk about the sun's rays breeding disease. The sun never does that. It gives life. Beware of the shadow," he added, and she knew he meant her mental indifference. They had a long talk on the bench. He told her of his family, of himself.
"You see," he said, "father had only a small business, though he managed to educate me, and, later, my brother. But when he died it had less value, for I couldn't hold the trade he had and times were harder. I kept brother at college during his last two years, and when he came out I gave the business to him and got out. He was about to marry, and the business wouldn't support us both. I was always inclined to adventure anyway. Gold Creek was in everybody's mouth, so I came here.
"Oh, that was a wonderful time; the walk across the mountains was like a story to me. I liked the newness of everything in the camp. It was glorious to hear the hammers ringing, and see the new pine buildings going up—and the tent and shanties. It was rough here then, but I had little to do with that. I staked out my claim and went to digging. I knew very little about mining, but they were striking it all around me, and so I kept on. Besides"—here he looked at her in a curiously shy way—"I've always had a superstition that just when things were worst with me they were soonest to turn to the best, so I dug away. My tunnel went into the hill on a slight upraise, and I could do the work alone. You see I had so little money I didn't want to waste a cent.
"But it all went at last for powder and the sharpening of picks, and for assaying—till one morning in August I found myself without money and without food."
He paused there, and his face grew dark with remembered despair, and she shuddered.
"It must be terrible to be without food and money."